Robert Coleby
Encyclopedia
Robert Coleby is a British actor who has spent most of his career in Australia
. Active since the 1970s, he has over 70 film and television credits to his name. Coleby has acted on stage in numerous productions for Queensland Theatre Company
based in Brisbane
, Australia.
Robert's real name is Robert Taylor. Since there was already a famous actor of that name, Equity
rules required that he choose another. In his late teens, Robert lived in Edington, Somerset
, and went to Dr Morgan's School in Bridgwater
. At that time he was influenced by the beat generation
, novelist Jack Kerouac
and singer/songwriter Bob Dylan
and performed with acoustic guitar at folk music clubs in Bridgwater and Taunton
. He enjoyed hitch-hiking in Europe during the school holidays, and worked in the peat
fields near Shapwick to earn enough money for his ferry ticket to France and to buy bread, cheese and wine for the few weeks on the road.
in the long-running US series Hallmark Hall of Fame
, followed by a role as a hitchhiker in the 1971 US motion picture The Last Run
which starred George C Scott. During the next several years, he appeared in a number of TV productions in the UK, including five episodes of the successful 1973 children's series Pollyanna. Moving to Sydney
, Australia, he made his debut on Aussie TV appearing in an episode of the TV period drama Rush
in 1976. Over the next two decades, Coleby became a regular face on Australian TV; he was a cast regular on several TV series including the role of pilot Barry Drummond on Chopper Squad
(1977–79), of RAN officer Lt Fisher in Patrol Boat
(1979–83), of Reverend Lonsdale in the mini-series Anzacs (1985) and of businessman Tom Barsby in the short-lived soap opera
Paradise Beach
(1993–94)
All Saints
between 2001 and 2004, and appeared as William Maplewhite in two episodes of The Lost World in 2001 and 2002. In 2005 he portrayed Rock Hudson
in the fictionalized American
television movie
/docudrama
Dynasty: The Making of a Guilty Pleasure
, based on the creation and behind the scenes production of the 1980s prime time soap opera
Dynasty
. Coleby played Alexander Preston in the 2006 American telenovela
Monarch Cove
, and Howard Webb in a 2006 episode of the Australian drama McLeod's Daughters
. He later played Paul Devers in the 2007 American miniseries
The Starter Wife. Amongst his recent theatre work has been playing the title role in the Queensland Theatre Company's 2007 production of the Henrik Ibsen
play John Gabriel Borkman
. In 2011, Coleby appeared in an episode of Terra Nova
, titled "Proof", as Professor Ken Horton.
and Conrad Coleby
.
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
. Active since the 1970s, he has over 70 film and television credits to his name. Coleby has acted on stage in numerous productions for Queensland Theatre Company
Queensland Theatre Company
The Queensland Theatre Company was established in 1970 as the Royal Queensland Theatre Company. The Company is the state's flagship professional theatre company, headed up by multi-award winning playwright and director Wesley Enoch...
based in Brisbane
Brisbane
Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of over 2 million, and the South East Queensland urban conurbation, centred around Brisbane, encompasses a population of...
, Australia.
Robert's real name is Robert Taylor. Since there was already a famous actor of that name, Equity
Equity
Equity is the name given to the set of legal principles, in jurisdictions following the English common law tradition, that supplement strict rules of law where their application would operate harshly...
rules required that he choose another. In his late teens, Robert lived in Edington, Somerset
Edington, Somerset
Edington is a rural village, situated on the north side of the Polden Hills in the Sedgemoor district of Somerset, England.Either side of it lie the villages of Chilton Polden and Catcott, and north of it is the small village of Burtle...
, and went to Dr Morgan's School in Bridgwater
Bridgwater
Bridgwater is a market town and civil parish in Somerset, England. It is the administrative centre of the Sedgemoor district, and a major industrial centre. Bridgwater is located on the major communication routes through South West England...
. At that time he was influenced by the beat generation
Beat generation
The Beat Generation refers to a group of American post-WWII writers who came to prominence in the 1950s, as well as the cultural phenomena that they both documented and inspired...
, novelist Jack Kerouac
Jack Kerouac
Jean-Louis "Jack" Lebris de Kerouac was an American novelist and poet. He is considered a literary iconoclast and, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Kerouac is recognized for his spontaneous method of writing, covering topics such as Catholic...
and singer/songwriter Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
and performed with acoustic guitar at folk music clubs in Bridgwater and Taunton
Taunton
Taunton is the county town of Somerset, England. The town, including its suburbs, had an estimated population of 61,400 in 2001. It is the largest town in the shire county of Somerset....
. He enjoyed hitch-hiking in Europe during the school holidays, and worked in the peat
Peat
Peat is an accumulation of partially decayed vegetation matter or histosol. Peat forms in wetland bogs, moors, muskegs, pocosins, mires, and peat swamp forests. Peat is harvested as an important source of fuel in certain parts of the world...
fields near Shapwick to earn enough money for his ferry ticket to France and to buy bread, cheese and wine for the few weeks on the road.
Early career
Coleby's earliest screen role was in 1970, playing the role of Fortinbras in a TV version of HamletHamlet
The Tragical History of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, or more simply Hamlet, is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1599 and 1601...
in the long-running US series Hallmark Hall of Fame
Hallmark Hall of Fame
Hallmark Hall of Fame is an anthology program on American television, sponsored by Hallmark Cards, a Kansas City based greeting card company. The second longest-running television program in the history of television, it has a historically long run, beginning in 1951 and continuing into 2011...
, followed by a role as a hitchhiker in the 1971 US motion picture The Last Run
The Last Run
The Last Run is a 1971 action film directed by Richard Fleischer, starring George C. Scott, Tony Musante, Trish Van Devere, and Colleen Dewhurst.-Plot:...
which starred George C Scott. During the next several years, he appeared in a number of TV productions in the UK, including five episodes of the successful 1973 children's series Pollyanna. Moving to Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
, Australia, he made his debut on Aussie TV appearing in an episode of the TV period drama Rush
Rush (TV series)
Rush was an Australian television series produced by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation between 1974 and 1976. The first 13 episodes were produced in 1974 and filmed in black and white. In 1976, 13 more episodes were produced, in colour, in conjunction with French production company Antenne 2...
in 1976. Over the next two decades, Coleby became a regular face on Australian TV; he was a cast regular on several TV series including the role of pilot Barry Drummond on Chopper Squad
Chopper Squad
Chopper Squad is an Australian television series produced by the Reg Grundy Organisation for the 0-10 Network .The series was based around the work of a helicopter rescue team operating on Dee Why beach in Sydney...
(1977–79), of RAN officer Lt Fisher in Patrol Boat
Patrol Boat (TV series)
Patrol Boat is an Australian television drama series that screened on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Patrol Boat was created by James Davern and two series were produced, in 1979 and 1983, with a total of 26 episodes....
(1979–83), of Reverend Lonsdale in the mini-series Anzacs (1985) and of businessman Tom Barsby in the short-lived 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,...
Paradise Beach
Paradise Beach
Paradise Beach is an Australian television series made by Village Roadshow Pictures. It is associated with New World Television for the Nine Network that aired between 1993 and 1994...
(1993–94)
Recent career
Coleby played Richard Craig in several episodes of the Australian medical dramaMedical drama
A medical drama is a television program, in which events center upon a hospital, an ambulance staff, or any medical environment.In the United States, most medical episodes are one hour long and, more often than not, are set in a hospital. Most current medical Dramatic programming go beyond the...
All Saints
All Saints (TV series)
All Saints is an Australian medical drama which first screened on the Seven Network. The series debuted on 24 February 1998 and concluded its run on 27 October 2009...
between 2001 and 2004, and appeared as William Maplewhite in two episodes of The Lost World in 2001 and 2002. In 2005 he portrayed Rock Hudson
Rock Hudson
Roy Harold Scherer, Jr., later Roy Harold Fitzgerald , known professionally as Rock Hudson, was an American film and television actor, recognized as a romantic leading man during the 1950s and 1960s, most notably in several romantic comedies with Doris Day.Hudson was voted "Star of the Year",...
in the fictionalized American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
television movie
Television movie
A television film is a feature film that is a television program produced for and originally distributed by a television network, in contrast to...
/docudrama
Docudrama
In film, television programming and staged theatre, docudrama is a documentary-style genre that features dramatized re-enactments of actual historical events. As a neologism, the term is often confused with docufiction....
Dynasty: The Making of a Guilty Pleasure
Dynasty: The Making of a Guilty Pleasure
Dynasty: The Making of a Guilty Pleasure is a 2005 American television movie based on the creation and behind the scenes production of the 1980s prime time soap opera Dynasty...
, based on the creation and behind the scenes production of the 1980s prime time 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,...
Dynasty
Dynasty (TV series)
Dynasty is an American prime time television soap opera that aired on ABC from January 12, 1981 to May 11, 1989. It was created by Richard & Esther Shapiro and produced by Aaron Spelling, and revolved around the Carringtons, a wealthy oil family living in Denver, Colorado...
. Coleby played Alexander Preston in the 2006 American telenovela
Telenovela
A telenovela is a limited-run serial dramatic programming popular in Latin American, Portuguese, and Spanish television programming. The word combines tele, short for televisión or televisão , and novela, a Spanish or Portuguese word for "novel"...
Monarch Cove
Monarch Cove
Monarch Cove is a prime time telenovela that premiered on Lifetime Television on November 4, 2006. It ran for 14 episodes, ending on December 16, 2006.-Premise:...
, and Howard Webb in a 2006 episode of the Australian drama McLeod's Daughters
McLeod's Daughters
McLeod's Daughters is a Logie award-winning Australian drama series that aired on the Nine Network from 2001 to 2009. It tells the story of two sisters, Claire and Tess McLeod, who are reunited after they inherit the family farm...
. He later played Paul Devers in the 2007 American miniseries
Miniseries
A miniseries , in a serial storytelling medium, is a television show production which tells a story in a limited number of episodes. The exact number is open to interpretation; however, they are usually limited to fewer than a whole season. The term "miniseries" is generally a North American term...
The Starter Wife. Amongst his recent theatre work has been playing the title role in the Queensland Theatre Company's 2007 production of the Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Ibsen
Henrik Ibsen was a major 19th-century Norwegian playwright, theatre director, and poet. He is often referred to as "the father of prose drama" and is one of the founders of Modernism in the theatre...
play John Gabriel Borkman
John Gabriel Borkman
John Gabriel Borkman is the penultimate composition of the Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, written in 1896.-Plot:The Borkman family fortunes have been brought low by the imprisonment of John Gabriel who used his position as a bank manager to illegally speculate with his investors' money...
. In 2011, Coleby appeared in an episode of Terra Nova
Terra Nova (TV series)
Terra Nova is an American science fiction drama television series that airs on Fox on Monday nights. It premiered September 26, 2011 with a one-and-a-half-hour episode...
, titled "Proof", as Professor Ken Horton.
Personal life
Coleby is married to Lena Coleby; their children are Australian actors Anja ColebyAnja Coleby
Anja Coleby is an Australian model and television actress.- Career :Coleby has appeared in a number of US science fiction and action series, and in Australian film and TV. She was a main cast member of the TV series Flipper, playing the character Holly Myers for three seasons...
and Conrad Coleby
Conrad Coleby
Conrad Julius Coleby is an Australian actor.-Biography:Coleby is the son of actor Robert Coleby and brother of actress Anja Coleby. He attended Somerset College on the Gold Coast, graduating in 1996. In the same year, he played the role of Colonel Juan Perón in the school's production of Evita...
.