Kenneth Cope
Encyclopedia
For the musician, see Kenneth Cope (musician)
Kenneth Cope (musician)
Kenneth Cope is a composer and performer of religious music geared towards Latter Day Saints. His first album, Heaven — Don't Miss It For The World, was released in February 1988...

.

Kenneth Cope (born 14 June 1931) is an English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 actor
Actor
An actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...

. He is most famous for his roles as Marty Hopkirk
Marty Hopkirk
Marty Hopkirk is a fictional ghost played by English actor Kenneth Cope in the television private detective series Randall and Hopkirk from 1969 to early 1970...

 in Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased)
Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased)
Randall and Hopkirk , first transmitted during 1969-70, is a British private detective television series starring Mike Pratt and Kenneth Cope as the private detectives Jeff Randall and Marty Hopkirk, respectively. The series was originally created by Dennis Spooner and produced by Monty Berman...

, Jed Stone
Jed Stone
John Edward "Jed" Stone, played by Kenneth Cope, is a fictional character from the soap opera Coronation Street. He was a lodger of Minnie Caldwell's in the 1960s, and her nickname for him was "Sunny Jim"...

 in Coronation Street
Coronation Street
Coronation Street is a British soap opera set in Weatherfield, a fictional town in Greater Manchester based on Salford. Created by Tony Warren, Coronation Street was first broadcast on 9 December 1960...

and Ray Hilton in Brookside
Brookside
Brookside is a defunct British soap opera set in Liverpool, England. The series began on the launch night of Channel 4 on 2 November 1982, and ran for 21 years until 4 November 2003...

.

Career

He is most famous for his leading role in Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased)
Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased)
Randall and Hopkirk , first transmitted during 1969-70, is a British private detective television series starring Mike Pratt and Kenneth Cope as the private detectives Jeff Randall and Marty Hopkirk, respectively. The series was originally created by Dennis Spooner and produced by Monty Berman...

(1969–1970) as the late private eye Marty Hopkirk
Marty Hopkirk
Marty Hopkirk is a fictional ghost played by English actor Kenneth Cope in the television private detective series Randall and Hopkirk from 1969 to early 1970...

 opposite Mike Pratt's very much alive Jeff Randall
Jeff Randall
Jeff Randall is a fictional character played by Mike Pratt in the original private detective series, Randall and Hopkirk from 1969 to 1971 and by Bob Mortimer in the BBC remake...

. He had previously starred in Coronation Street
Coronation Street
Coronation Street is a British soap opera set in Weatherfield, a fictional town in Greater Manchester based on Salford. Created by Tony Warren, Coronation Street was first broadcast on 9 December 1960...

as the shady Jed Stone (between 1961 and 1966, and in 2008), and had a regular role in the influential satirical series That Was The Week That Was
That Was The Week That Was
That Was The Week That Was, also known as TW3, is a satirical television comedy programme that was shown on BBC Television in 1962 and 1963. It was devised, produced and directed by Ned Sherrin and presented by David Frost...

(1962–1963). He also appeared in two episodes of Minder
Minder (TV series)
Minder is a British comedy-drama about the London criminal underworld. Initially produced by Verity Lambert, it was made by Euston Films, a subsidiary of Thames Television and shown on ITV...

(Bury my Half at Waltham Green) as newly released prisoner Arthur Stubbs, and as 'Scooter' in Waiting For Goddard
Waiting for Goddard
Waiting for Goddard is the title of the only album released by Steve Goddard. Backed by some of the top musicians in the Christian music business of the era, Goddard's strong melodies and provocative lyrics were a big hit. Nevertheless, his comments about the attitude displayed by members of the...

.

He played Subutai
Subutai
Subutai was the primary military strategist and general of Genghis Khan and Ögedei Khan...

 in the 1965 film of the life of Genghis Khan
Genghis Khan
Genghis Khan , born Temujin and occasionally known by his temple name Taizu , was the founder and Great Khan of the Mongol Empire, which became the largest contiguous empire in history after his death....

, and in the same year appeared in Dateline Diamonds
Dateline Diamonds
Dateline Diamonds is a 1966 British music-film. The film was shot in black and white. The "pop and cop" genre of film was a popular concept in the UK during the early 1960s to highlight young music talent and was geared to appeal directly to the young teenage market...

playing Lester Benson. He also took leading roles in two Carry On films
Carry On films
The Carry On films are a series of low-budget British comedy films, directed by Gerald Thomas and produced by Peter Rogers. They are an energetic mix of parody, farce, slapstick and double entendres....

. In Carry On At Your Convenience
Carry On at Your Convenience
Carry On at Your Convenience, released in 1971, is the 22nd film of the Carry On series and was the first box office failure of the series. The failure has been attributed to the film's attempt at exploring the political themes of the trade union movement, crucially portraying the union activists...

(1971) he played Vic Spanner, the obnoxious shop steward central to the film's trade union and industrial problems storyline and rival in the film's romantic sub-plot. In Carry On Matron
Carry On Matron
Carry On Matron is the twenty-third Carry On film. It was released in 1972. It features series regulars Sid James, Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey, Joan Sims, Hattie Jacques, Bernard Bresslaw, Barbara Windsor and Kenneth Connor. This was the last Carry on... film for Terry Scott after appearing...

(1972) he took the more sympathetic role of Cyril Carter, the son of a thief who is forced to impersonate a female nurse as part of his father's attempt to rob a maternity hospital. Once there Cyril finds love with a real nurse.

He later appeared in the Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...

story Warriors' Gate
Warriors' Gate
Warriors' Gate is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was written by the English author Stephen Gallagher and first broadcast in four weekly parts from 3 January to 24 January 1981...

(in 1981), and guest starred in four episodes of Casualty
Casualty (TV series)
Casualty, stylised as Casual+y, is a British weekly television show broadcast on BBC One, and the longest-running emergency medical drama television series in the world. Created by Jeremy Brock and Paul Unwin, it was first broadcast on 6 September 1986, and transmitted in the UK on BBC One. The...

, as well as roles in The Bill
The Bill
The Bill is a police procedural television series that ran from October 1984 to August 2010. It focused on the lives and work of one shift of police officers, rather than on any particular aspect of police work...

, Waking the Dead
Waking the Dead (TV series)
Waking the Dead is a British television police procedural crime drama series produced by the BBC featuring a fictional Cold Case Unit comprising CID police officers, a psychological profiler and a forensic scientist. A pilot episode aired in September 2000 and there have been a total of nine series...

, A Touch of Frost
A Touch of Frost (TV series)
A Touch of Frost is a television detective series produced by Yorkshire Television for ITV from 1992 until 2010, initially based on the Frost novels by R. D. Wingfield....

, Minder
Minder (TV series)
Minder is a British comedy-drama about the London criminal underworld. Initially produced by Verity Lambert, it was made by Euston Films, a subsidiary of Thames Television and shown on ITV...

and Kavanagh QC
Kavanagh QC
Kavanagh QC is a British television series made by Carlton Television for ITV between 1995 and 2001. It has been shown on ITV3 as recently as August 2011; series 1–6 are available on Region 2 DVDs....

.

In 1984 Cope starred in an ill-conceived surreal sitcom about a failing themed cowboy village on the outskirts of Merseyside called Bootle Saddles. He played the lead character Percy James, who was passionate about the park despite the poor financial returns. The series appeared to be less of a parody but more a sort of homage to 1950s and 60s westerns, with episodes structured loosely around epics like High Noon
High Noon
High Noon is a 1952 American Western film directed by Fred Zinnemann and starring Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly. The film tells in real time the story of a town marshal forced to face a gang of killers by himself...

and The Magnificent Seven
The Magnificent Seven
The Magnificent Seven is an American Western film directed by John Sturges, and released in 1960. It is a fictional tale of a group of seven American gunmen who are hired to protect a small agricultural village in Mexico from a group of marauding Mexican bandits...

. The characters rarely strayed out of their diegetic cowboy personas despite the contemporary setting. The series was axed after one season.

In 1997 Cope played dodgy ex-copper Charlie Fairclough alongside David Jason
David Jason
Sir David John White, OBE , better known by his stage name David Jason, is an English BAFTA award-winning actor. He is best known as the main character Derek "Del Boy" Trotter on the BBC sit-com Only Fools and Horses from 1981, the voice of Mr Toad in The Wind In The Willows and as detective Jack...

 in an episode of A Touch Of Frost
A Touch of Frost (TV series)
A Touch of Frost is a television detective series produced by Yorkshire Television for ITV from 1992 until 2010, initially based on the Frost novels by R. D. Wingfield....

entitled "True Confessions
True Confessions
True Confessions is a confession magazine targeted at young women readers. It wasoriginally published by Fawcett Publications, beginning in 1922....

."

From 1999 to 2002 he starred as Ray Hilton in the Channel Four soap opera
Soap opera
A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...

 Brookside
Brookside
Brookside is a defunct British soap opera set in Liverpool, England. The series began on the launch night of Channel 4 on 2 November 1982, and ran for 21 years until 4 November 2003...

.

He was offered a cameo role in the 2000-2001 revival of Randall and Hopkirk
Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased)
Randall & Hopkirk is a British television series, produced by Working Title Films for BBC One. It is a remake of the 1960s television series Randall and Hopkirk and stars Vic Reeves as Hopkirk and Bob Mortimer as Randall, Emilia Fox as Jeannie, and Tom Baker as Wyvern.- Background :Two series...

 starring Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer, but turned it down. He did, however, feature on the "Behind the Scenes" section of the Series 1 DVD, wishing well the cast of the remake. He also provided the foreword to a Randall and Hopkirk retrospective book (by Geoff Tibballs), published in 1994.

Cope's Coronation Street
Coronation Street
Coronation Street is a British soap opera set in Weatherfield, a fictional town in Greater Manchester based on Salford. Created by Tony Warren, Coronation Street was first broadcast on 9 December 1960...

character Jed Stone
Jed Stone
John Edward "Jed" Stone, played by Kenneth Cope, is a fictional character from the soap opera Coronation Street. He was a lodger of Minnie Caldwell's in the 1960s, and her nickname for him was "Sunny Jim"...

 returned to the ITV
ITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...

 soap after 42 years' absence, appearing as part of a storyline involving property developer Tony Gordon
Tony Gordon
Anthony "Tony" Gordon was a fictional character in the itv soap opera Coronation Street, portrayed by actor Gray O'Brien. The character first appeared on screen on 16 September 2007 and making his final appearance on 9 June 2010 after deciding to sacrifice himself in the Underworld fire. He is a...

.

Personal life

He married actress Renny Lister
Renny Lister
-Personal life:Renny Lister is married to film and television actor Kenneth Cope and their daughter is actress Martha Cope.-Selected filmography:* The Curse of the Werewolf * A Touch of the Other * Personal Services...

 in 1961 and they have three children. They met when Renny worked on Coronation Street.

His daughter Martha Cope
Martha Cope
Martha Cope is a British television actress. She has appeared in many popular British programmes, including Doctors, Men Behaving Badly, Peak Practice and Family Affairs between 2002 and 2003 when she played Anna Gregory....

 is also an actress; his sons Nick Cope and Mark Cope were members of the rock group The Candyskins
The Candyskins
The Candyskins are a rock band formed in 1989 in Oxfordshire, England. Though early members of the 'Oxford Scene', they enjoyed limited commercial success compared to their contemporaries Radiohead and Supergrass. They were considered by the British music press as one of the seminal early bands of...

.

He now suffers from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease , also known as chronic obstructive lung disease , chronic obstructive airway disease , chronic airflow limitation and chronic obstructive respiratory disease , is the co-occurrence of chronic bronchitis and emphysema, a pair of commonly co-existing diseases...

.

Kenneth supports Everton
Everton F.C.
Everton Football Club are an English professional association football club from the city of Liverpool. The club competes in the Premier League, the highest level of English football...


Partial filmography

  • Impluse (1954)
  • X the Unknown
    X the Unknown
    X the Unknown is a British science-fiction / horror film made by the Hammer Films company and released in 1956.-Production:The film was originally intended by Hammer to be a sequel to the previous year's successful The Quatermass Xperiment, but writer Nigel Kneale refused permission for the...

    (1956)
  • Doublecross
    Doublecross
    Doublecross is a fictional character from the various Transformers universes. He is an Autobot supply procurer who turns into a two headed dragon.-Transformers: Generation 1:...

    (1956)
  • Yangtse Incident
    Yangtse Incident (1957 film)
    Yangtse Incident: The Story of HMS Amethyst is a 1957 British war film that tells the story of the British frigate HMS Amethyst caught up in the Chinese Civil War....

    (1957)
  • These Dangerous Years
    These Dangerous Years
    These Dangerous Years is a 1957 British comedy musical film directed by Herbert Wilcox and starring George Baker, Frankie Vaughan, Carole Lesley, Thora Hird, Kenneth Cope, David Lodge and John Le Mesurier....

    (1957)
  • Dunkirk
    Dunkirk (film)
    Dunkirk is a 1958 British war film directed by Leslie Norman and starring John Mills, Richard Attenborough and Bernard Lee. It was based on two novels: Elleston Trevor's The Big Pick-Up and Lt. Col. Ewan Hunter and Maj. J. S...

    (1958)
  • No Time to Die (1958)
  • Naked Fury (1959)
  • The Lady is a Square
    The Lady Is a Square
    The Lady Is a Square is a 1959 British comedy musical film directed by Herbert Wilcox and featuring Anna Neagle, Frankie Vaughan and Janette Scott. An aspiring singer goes to work as a butler in the house of a classical music patron...

    (1959)
  • The Unstoppable Man
    The Unstoppable Man
    The Unstoppable Man is a 1960 British crime drama film directed by Terry Bishop and starring Cameron Mitchell, Harry H. Corbett, Marius Goring and Lois Maxwell.-Plot:...

    (1960)
  • The Criminal
    The Criminal
    The Criminal is a 1960 British drama film produced by Nat Cohen and directed by Joseph Losey, starring Stanley Baker, Sam Wanamaker and Jill Bennett. Baker plays an ex-con who takes part in the robbery of a racetrack and is caught and sent back to prison...

    (1960)
  • Jungle Street (1961)
  • The Damned
    The Damned (1963 film)
    The Damned is a 1963 British science fiction film starring Macdonald Carey, Shirley Anne Field and Oliver Reed. It was a Hammer Film production directed by Joseph Losey and based on H.L...

    (1963)
  • Tomorrow at Ten
    Tomorrow at Ten
    Tomorrow at Ten is a 1964 British thriller film directed by Lance Comfort and starring John Gregson, Robert Shaw, Kenneth Cope and William Hartnell in his final film appearance.-Plot:...

    (1964)
  • Father Came Too!
    Father Came Too!
    Father Came Too! is a 1963 British comedy film directed by Peter Graham Scott. It is a sequel to The Fast Lady.-Plot:Dexter and Juliet Munro are a married couple who move to a run-down cottage in hopes of escaping from Juliet's overbearing father. However, the couple are soon confronted by their...

    (1964)
  • Genghis Khan
    Genghis Khan (1965 film)
    Genghis Khan is a 1965 film depicting the life and conquests of the Mongol emperor Genghis Khan. It was released in the United Kingdom and the United States in 1965 by Columbia Pictures, and was directed by Henry Levin, and starred Omar Sharif, who that same year starred in another epic, Doctor...

    (1965)
  • Dateline Diamonds
    Dateline Diamonds
    Dateline Diamonds is a 1966 British music-film. The film was shot in black and white. The "pop and cop" genre of film was a popular concept in the UK during the early 1960s to highlight young music talent and was geared to appeal directly to the young teenage market...

    (1965)
  • Night of the Big Heat
    Night of the Big Heat
    Night of the Big Heat is a science fiction novel written in 1959 by John Lymington. It tells the story of an unnamed British island that is experiencing a bizarre and stifling heatwave.-Plot summary:...

    (1967)
  • Hammerhead
    Hammerhead (film)
    Hammerhead is a 1968 British thriller film directed by David Miller and starring Vince Edwards, Judy Geeson and Diana Dors. A criminal mastermind attempts to steal NATO secrets, while an American agent is hot on his trail. It is based on the novel by James Mayo, and produced by Irwin Allen and...

    (1968)
  • A Twist of Sand
    A Twist of Sand
    A Twist of Sand is a 1968 British adventure film directed by Don Chaffey and starring Richard Johnson, Jeremy Kemp, Honor Blackman and Peter Vaughan.-Cast:* Richard Johnson as Geoffrey Peace* Honor Blackman as Julie Chambois* Jeremy Kemp as Harry Riker...

    (1968)
  • The Desperados
    The Desperados
    The Desperados is a 1969 western film directed by Henry Levin. The film stars Vince Edwards and Jack Palance.-Plot:A ruthless preacher, Parson Josiah Galt, leads a band of Southern marauders during the Civil War that includes his sons, David, Adam and Jacob...

    (1969)
  • A Touch of the Other
    A Touch of the Other
    A Touch of the Other is a 1970 British drama film directed by Arnold L. Miller and starring Kenneth Cope, Shirley Anne Field and Hélène Françoise. A London private detective finds himself the target of gangster.-Cast:* Kenneth Cope ... Delger...

    (1970)
  • She'll Follow You Anywhere
    She'll Follow You Anywhere
    She'll Follow You Anywhere is a 1971 British comedy film directed by David C. Rea and starring Kenneth Cope, Keith Barron and Richard Vernon. Two chemists working in a lab of a big corporation accidentally stumble across a love potion while working to create a new aftershave. The potion makes a man...

    (1971)
  • Carry On at Your Convenience
    Carry On at Your Convenience
    Carry On at Your Convenience, released in 1971, is the 22nd film of the Carry On series and was the first box office failure of the series. The failure has been attributed to the film's attempt at exploring the political themes of the trade union movement, crucially portraying the union activists...

    (1971)
  • Rentadick
    Rentadick
    Rentadick is a 1972 British comedy film directed by Jim Clark and starring James Booth, Richard Briers, Julie Ege, Ronald Fraser and Donald Sinden. It is a spoof spy/detective picture, involving the the attempts to protect a new experimental nerve gas....

    (1972)
  • Carry on Matron
    Carry On Matron
    Carry On Matron is the twenty-third Carry On film. It was released in 1972. It features series regulars Sid James, Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey, Joan Sims, Hattie Jacques, Bernard Bresslaw, Barbara Windsor and Kenneth Connor. This was the last Carry on... film for Terry Scott after appearing...

    (1972)
  • Terror on the Britannic (1974)
  • George and Mildred
    George and Mildred (film)
    George and Mildred is a 1980 British comedy film directed by Peter Frazer Jones. It was an adaptation of the television series of the same name. Yootha Joyce and Brian Murphy reprised their television roles as the two title characters. It was written by Dick Sharples...

    (1980)
  • Captives (1994)
  • Last of the Summer Wine
    Last of the Summer Wine
    Last of the Summer Wine is a British sitcom written by Roy Clarke that was broadcast on BBC One. Last of the Summer Wine premiered as an episode of Comedy Playhouse on 4 January 1973 and the first series of episodes followed on 12 November 1973. From 1983 to 2010, Alan J. W. Bell produced and...

    (1997, 2008)

External links

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