Michael Gambon
Not Just Dumbledore
The news broke today that actor Michael Gambon has died. Gambon is probably best know as Dumbledore in the Harry Potter movies. But I first came upon him in The Singing Dectective, a BBC six-episode series from 1986 that I later saw on PBS. Gambon played Philip Marlow, a detective fiction writer hospitilized with a form of inflammatory arthritis. From his bed, he both plots and fantasizes about his noir detective’s next adventure. Scenes in black & white of the detective — also named Marlow — fade into and out of reality. It was sometimes a bit confusing but fascinating. Gambon was brilliant in the role. It seems that one can watch the series on the archive of the shows writer, Dennis Potter (who also suffered from the same form of arthritis ): https://archive.org/details/the-singing-detective/1.Skin.mp4
Gambon was also brilliant in the ITV Maigret series of 12 episodes from 1992-93. This is one of the three versions of Maigret that I have watched. It comes closest to what I think of as the classic French version starring Bruno Cremer than does the also fine version with Rowan Atkinson. (In my view there are no bad versions of Maigret. Both the Gambon and Atkinson versions can be seen on Britbox.)
The Singing Detective was utterly extraordinary tv -- as was most of of Dennis Potter's work, including his wrenching Pennies from Heaven with the late Bob Hoskins in the lead. (The later Steve Martin version, though good, was a pale imitation). Gambon was one of the greats.
super of you to remember Gabon on this day. He was an excellent character actor, and frankly unfortunate that it is as Dumbledore that he is more likely to be remembered, I agree re Maigret, so let's raise a glass!