DOCTOR AT LARGE

In what would have been Barry Evans' 80th year, Daniel Ward tells the story of an actor who was one of the most famous faces on television in the 1970s

- Daniel Ward

At the beginning of the 1970s, actor Barry Evans was at the height of his profession. He was a regular feature at the top of the television ratings, seen by millions each week in the hit sitcom Doctor in the House and its sequel Doctor at Large, and had recently been voted among the Top 10 television personalities of the year by readers of the TV Times.

It was understandable, therefore, that the public wanted to know more about him, that newspapers and magazines would be queuing up to do features on him. Understandable to all but Barry Evans himself. He just wanted to do his work, then go home and be left alone like any other ordinary person. But Barry's story was anything but ordinary.

Barry didn't like giving interviews. He wanted his work to speak for itself but knew the realities of being a star meant he had to open his life to a succession of journalists who would be sent to his door. Was he really like the fresh-faced and perpetually innocent Dr Michael Upton who was charming the nation each week on their television screens, they wanted to know? Or was he more like Jamie McGregor, the young man eager to join the permissive society he had portrayed in his breakthrough film Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush (1968) just a few years earlier? Or perhaps he was a dark, brooding actor like so many others of his generation?

Whatever their expectations, journalists found Barry Evans reticent almost to the point of being obstructive. He would happily confess to them that he found the interest in him difficult to comprehend and how he yearned for anonymity. "I'm recognised wherever I go now," he would admit, "and it's not easy."

Being one of the most famous faces on television did not sit easy with Barry Evans. He had overcome great adversity to achieve such success though, little did he know it then, it would not last.