Hugh Lewis Lloyd, MBE was an English actor who made his name in television and film comedy from the 1960s to the 1980s. He was best known for appearances in Hugh and I and other sitcoms of the 1960s.
Life
Hugh Lloyd was born in Chester and attended the King's School. After leaving school he spent two years as a newspaper reporter on the Chester Chronicle. His first professional acting appearance was with ENSA and he worked in repertory theatres until 1957, when he made the first of 25 appearances in the television series Hancock's Half Hour. Many years after its first transmission, he is still remembered as the character in the episode entitled The Blood Donor in which he forgets to return Tony Hancock's wine gums. He appeared with Terry Scott in the series Hugh and I and The Gnomes of Dulwich; with Peggy Mount in Lollipop Loves Mr. Mole; in Jury and You Rang M'Lord?. He created the series Lord Tramp, written by Michael Pertwee, in which he also starred. The Comedy Playhouse episode, Hughie, in which he starred as a recently released prisoner following the ending of Hugh and I, was unsuccessful. Television plays in which he appeared include She's Been Away ; The Dunroamin Rising; A Matter Of Will ; and a number of Alan Bennett plays, such as A Visit From Miss Protheroe, Say Something Happened, and Me, I'm Afraid Of Virginia Woolf. He played Goronwy Jones in the Doctor Who story Delta and the Bannermen and appeared in numerous television light entertainment shows, including Victoria Wood, Jimmy Cricket and Babble Quiz. On the West End stage, Lloyd spent three seasons at the Windmill Theatre; a year at the Strand Theatre in When We Are Married; two years in No Sex Please, We're British at the Strand; and at the Lyric Theatre in Tonight at 8.30. He was part of the Royal National Theatre company under Ian McKellen, in The Critic, The Cherry Orchard and The Duchess of Malfi. He also performed in over twenty pantomimes. Lloyd met his fourth wife, journalistShan Lloyd, at Allen's restaurant in London's West End, in 1978. Lloyd, who was in his fifties at the time, had been married and divorced three times before meeting Shan. In his autobiography, he described his future wife as "a scatty, blondehaired Fleet Streettabloid journalist". Hugh and Shan married in 1983. The couple moved to Worthing in 2003 and remained married until his death on 14 July 2008. Shan Lloyd died in December 2008, just five months after Hugh Lloyd. Lloyd was awarded an MBE in the 2005 New Year Honours List for his services to drama and charity. He died on 14 July 2008 at his home in Dolphin Court, Grand Avenue, West Worthing.
