Ray Barrett

Ray Barrett
Born	2 May 1927(1927-05-02) Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
Died	8 September 2009(2009-09-08) (aged 82) Southport, Queensland, Australia

Raymond Charles "Ray" Barrett (2 May 1927 – 8 September 2009) was an Australian actor. He was a popular leading men on British television in the 1960s, where he was best known for his appearances in The Troubleshooters (1965 to 1971). He was a leading man in many Australian TV series over the years.

General biography

Barrett was born in Brisbane, Queensland and was educated at Brisbane State High School. He was fascinated by radio from an early age and won an on-air talent competition in 1939. At the age of 12 he won an eisteddfod that was broadcast on 4BH radio, with a musical monologue about a dog named 'Paddy'. This was to set him on a different path from his dream of boat-building.

Ray was initiated into Freemasonry in 1949 as an initiate and member of Empire Lodge #197 of the United Grand Lodge of Queensland.

He lived on Stradbroke Island in the 1970s. Barrett died, aged 82, at the Gold Coast Hospital in Southport after suffering a brain haemorrhage.

He married three times, and left three children.

Acting career

Ray Barrett first appeared on radio in Brisbane, and later in Sydney. In 1954 he moved from Brisbane to Sydney. In 1957 he moved to England where he his background as a singer won him a part in a revue co-starring with Beryl Reid, Patrick Wymark and Sheila Hancock.

Due to his "tough looks" Ray Barrett was given character and tough guy roles from an unusually young age. In Britain he played one of the lead roles in the British TV series Emergency - Ward 10 and later played one of the main characters, hard-nosed oilman Peter Thornton, in the long-running BBC series about the oil industry, The Troubleshooters. He was also the voice of a number of characters in Gerry Anderson marionette series: he voiced Commander Shore and Titan in Stingray and later was John Tracy, the Hood and many of the extra characters in Thunderbirds. He appeared as a murderer in the Doctor Who serial "The Rescue" in 1965.

It was only in the following decades that he emerged to big-screen stardom in his native country, Australia, earning roles as a central character in many TV series. Barrett was the prime minister (who was assassinated) in Burn the Butterflies and a tough miner in Golden Soak. He played the part of the controversial Australian historical figure Governor Bligh in the 1980 ABC Television production The Timeless Land. He also had secondary roles in many others, including Something in the Air.

He appeared in such films as Don's Party and in a film about the release of the Leyland P76 car in 1973 with Noel Ferrier, Walter Sullivan, Katy Wild and Nick Tate (The Carmakers).

In 2005 Ray Barrett won the Australian Film Institute Longford Life Achievement Award. His last appearance was in the film Australia in 2008.

Filmography

Film

• The Desperate Women (1958)
• The Sundowners (1960)
• Touch of Death (1961)
• Time to Remember (1962)
• Jigsaw (1962)
• Mix Me a Person (1962)
• To Have and to Hold (1963)
• 80,000 Suspects (1963)
• Valley of the Kings (1964)
• The Reptile (1966)
• Thunderbirds Are GO (1966)
• Just Like a Woman (1967)
• Peer Gynt (1972)
• Little Laura and Big John (1973)
• Inn of the Frightened People (1974)
• The Hostages (1975)
• The Amorous Milkman (1975)
• Arena (1976)
• Don's Party (1976)
• Let the Balloon Go (1976)
• No Room to Run (1978)
• The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (1978)
• The Earthling (1980)
• Departmental (1980)
• A Shifting Dreaming (1982)
• A Dangerous Summer (1982)
• Goodbye Paradise (1983)
• Conferenceville (1984)
• Wo die grünen Ameisen träumen (1984)
• Relatives (1985)
• The Empty Beach (1985)
• Rebel (1985)
• Contagion (1987)
• Frenchman's Farm (1987)
• As Time Goes By (1988)
• Prisoners of the Sun (1990)
• Waiting (1991)
• No Worries (1994)
• Asian Connection: Old Flames (1995)
• Hotel Sorrento (1995)
• Dad and Dave: On Our Selection (1995)
• Brilliant Lies (1996)
• Hotel de Love (1996)
• Heaven's Burning (1997)
• In the Winter Dark (1998)
• Deluge (1999)
• Dalkeith (2002)
• After the Deluge (2003)
• Visitors (2003)
• Australia (2008)

Television

• The Adventures of Long John Silver (1957)
• Educating Archie (1959)
• Armchair Mystery Theatre (1960)
• Armchair Theatre (1960)
• Emergency-Ward 10 (1960–1961)
• Out of This World (1962)
• Man of the World (1962)
• The Avengers (1963)
• Z Cars (1963)
• ITV Television Playhouse (1963)
• The Edgar Wallace Mystery Theatre (1962–1963)
• First Night (1963)
• ITV Play of the Week (1963–1964)
• Ghost Squad (1963–1964)
• The Saint (1964)
• The Brothers Karamazov (1964)
• Doctor Who (1965)
• Thursday Theatre (1965)
• Stingray (1964–1965)
• Drama 61-67 (1962–1965)
• BBC Play of the Month (1965)
• Blackmail (1965)
• Gideon C.I.D. (1965)
• No Hiding Place (1963–1965)
• The Spies (1966)
• The Man in Room 17 (1966)
• Thunderbirds (1965–1966)
• Till Death Us Do Part (1967)
• The Corbett Follies (1969)
• Mogul (1965–1972)
• Public Eye (1972)
• Barlow at Large (1974)
• The Adventures of Black Beauty (1974)
• Dixon of Dock Green (1964–1974)
• Colditz (1974)
• The Double Dealers (1974)
• Churchill's People (1975)
• The Outsiders (1976)
• Run from the Morning (1978)
• Golden Soak (1979)
• The Timeless Land (1980)
• Levkas Man (1981)
• Sporting Chance (1981)
• Five Mile Creek (1984)
• Waterfront (1984)
• The Last Bastion (1984)
• The Challenge (1986)
• The Flying Doctors (1986)
• Tusitala (1986)
• G.P. (1989)
• The Paper Man (1990)
• Correlli (1995)
• Bordertown (1995)
• Fire (1996)
• Adrenalin Junkies (1997)
• Something in the Air (2000)
• Stingers (2000)
• White Collar Blue (2003)
• All Saints (2004)

External links

• Ray Barrett at the Internet Movie Database
• Ray Barrett at the National Film and Sound Archive
• Obituary in The Independent
• Ray Barrett – Daily Telegraph obituary