James Beck

James Beck
Beck as Private Walker in the Dad's Army episode "The Honourable Man" in 1973, just over a week before his collapse
Born	Stanley James Carroll Beck (1929-02-21)21 February 1929 Islington, London, England
Died	6 August 1973(1973-08-06) (aged 44) Roehampton, London, England
Resting place	Putney Vale Cemetery, London, England
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1961–1973
Spouse	Kathleen Bullus ​ (m. 1959)​

Stanley James Carroll Beck (21 February 1929 – 6 August 1973) was an English actor who played the role of Private Walker, a cockney spiv, in the BBC sitcom Dad's Army from the show's beginning in 1968 until his sudden death in 1973.

Early life

Beck was born on 21 February 1929 in Islington, North London, and attended Popham Road Primary School. His childhood was hard, with his father frequently unemployed and his mother making artificial flowers to provide a small income.

After attending Saint Martin's School of Art and doing his national service as a physical training instructor in the British Army, Beck became an actor. Prior to his broadcast roles he spent several seasons with the Unicorn Players based in Paignton, Devon.

His early broadcast roles included Charlie Bell in an episode of Dr Finlay's Casebook (Series 1 episode 4, "Conduct Unbecoming", 1962), and Shylock in The Merchant of Venice in 1963, for which he gained positive reviews. He concentrated on television and was cast as a policeman in a 1965 episode of Coronation Street in a storyline concerning the collapse of a house and in a 1967 episode in a storyline concerning a train crash. He also appeared, uncredited, as a policeman in Gideon's Way (1965), and was often seen in TV drama, with one-off roles in series such as The Troubleshooters (1965, 1967, 1970) and the BBC's Sherlock Holmes with Peter Cushing in the lead ("The Blue Carbuncle", 1968).

In 1968, he was offered the role of Private Walker in Dad's Army, originally written by Jimmy Perry for himself. Perry approved of the casting of Beck: "He had the right mix of cheekiness and charm. He gave the role a bit of oomph." While successful in the role, Beck yearned for the challenge of other roles.

Always in demand, he continued to work on TV programmes including A Family at War (1970) and Romany Jones (1972–73), in which he played the lead character of Bert Jones. He also recorded a pilot for an uncommissioned series called Bunclarke With an E (1973), which was to be based on scripts originally written for Hancock's Half Hour and in which Arthur Lowe was also to appear.

Death

By 1973, Beck had recorded five series of Dad's Army and was working on the sixth, besides working on the radio series of the show. Location filming for series seven was completed when Beck suddenly fell ill while opening a school fête in aid of Guide Dogs for the Blind. He returned home and within an hour was taken to Queen Mary's Hospital suffering from pancreatitis. He died three weeks later, due to a combination of heart failure, renal failure and pancreatitis, aged 44, and was cremated at Putney Vale Cemetery, where a tree was planted in his memory, with a marker bearing his name.

The last time Beck's Dad's Army co-stars saw him alive was on Friday 13 July 1973 at the Playhouse Theatre in London where he recorded two radio episodes of Dad's Army (which ran alongside the TV series). The following afternoon Beck suddenly became ill.

His death was a great shock to his fellow cast members, as well as to Jimmy Perry and David Croft. Perry has said that heavy drinking was common in show business at the time, and that he paid little attention to Beck's habit until "I saw Jimmy’s legs and they were purple. It was the last episode he appeared in before he died."

In the sixth series, during the episode "Things that Go Bump in the Night", Walker is present only in the location scenes in the second half of the episode, as these were filmed weeks earlier than the studio scenes. In one of the videotaped sequences filmed after Beck's death, the platoon is aboard Corporal Jones's van when Captain Mainwaring tells Sergeant Wilson to "take Private Walker's name". Wilson writes the name "Walker" in the condensation on the window.

In the following episode, "The Recruit" (the series 6 finale), Mainwaring reads a note written by Walker apologising for his absence, as he has gone "up the Smoke" (to London) to conduct one of his deals. This was the last time the character was mentioned. In the radio adaptations of Dad's Army, Graham Stark stood in until Larry Martyn portrayed Walker in subsequent shows. John Bardon played Walker in the stage production in 1976.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1968	Star!	Drunken Soldier	Uncredited
1970	Groupie Girl	Brian	Released as I Am a Groupie in the United States
	Carry On Loving	Mr Roxby	Scenes deleted from final film
1971	Dad's Army	Private Walker
	A Couple of Beauties	Sidney	Short
1973	Love Thy Neighbour	Cyril	Last regular film appearance

Television

Year	Title	Role	Episode
1961	Dixon of Dock Green	Various	6 episodes
	Deadline Midnight	Ambulance man	1 episode
1962	Dr. Finlay's Casebook	Charlie Bell	Conduct Unbecoming
	Z Cars	Constable	The Five Whistles
1964	Taxi!	Len Gladwin	5 episodes
1964-67	Coronation Street	Police Sergeant Bowden	6 episodes
1965	Gideon's Way	Police Inspector	A Perfect Crime
1966	All Gas and Gaiters	Policeman	The Bishop Rides Again (pilot)
1967	The Troubleshooters	Dave Candy	Some Days You Just Can't Win
1968	The Blue Carbuncle	James Ryder
	Not in Front of the Children	Estate Agent	Home Chat
1968–73	Dad's Army	Private Walker	59 episodes (last appearance)
1969	Two in Clover	Dr. Molineux
1970	Doctor in the House	Mr Wale	What Seems to Be the Trouble
1972	The Fenn Street Gang	Auctioneer	Horse of the Year
	Scoop	Corker	3 episodes
	My Wife Next Door	Mr Fielding	Undesirable Residence
1972–73	Romany Jones	Bert Jones	14 episodes

Radio

Year	Title	Role	Episode	Notes
1968	The Events at Black Tor	Sergeant	5 episodes
1970, 1971	Brothers in Law	Fred Tanner, Newman	2 episodes	Beck played Fred Tanner in the first series (1970), and Newman in the second series (1971).
1971	Hush, Hush, Here Comes the Bolshie Man	TBA	1 episode	A pilot episode recorded for Comedy Parade 1971.
1971, 1972	The Motorway Men	Steve	8 episodes + pilot	This program's pilot episode featured alongside Hush, Hush, Here Comes the Bolshie Man on Comedy Parade 1971.
1973	Dad's Army	Private Walker	20 episodes

Further reading

• Pertwee, Bill (2009). Dad's Army: The Making of a Television Legend. Anova Books. pp. 56–59. ISBN 978-1-84486-105-7.

External links

• James Beck at IMDb
• James Beck at Find a Grave
• James Beck BFI