Gareth Gwenlan

A British television comedy legend, who will forever be remembered for directing and producing series such as The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin (1976), Butterflies (1978) and Only Fools and Horses (1981), Gareth Gwenlan was born in Brecon on April 26 1937. His father died when he was two and he was brought up by his grandparents and widowed mother, a teacher, in Cefn Coed near Merthyr Tydfil. Educated at Vaynor and Penderyn High School, Cefn Coed, he saw active service as an RAF National Serviceman in Cyprus, then a British colony, during the Eoka insurgency. In 1958 he returned home to train as an actor at the Rose Bruford College of Speech and Drama in Sidcup. In 1960, he joined the repertory company at the Theatre Royal, York, where he met and shared digs with the actor John Alderton. Moving to the Derby Playhouse, he fulfilled his ambition to direct when taking over after the incumbent director fell ill; once recovered, he made Gwenlan assistant director. Gwenlan then worked as