Career
Beckinsale acquired his first starring role in 1970 as Geoffrey in the sitcom The Lovers, opposite fellow newcomer Paula Wilcox. The show was a success without being a runaway triumph, and did enough to put both lead performers in the public eye. It also, like many sitcoms of the time, spawned a film version.
There followed a purple patch when he was appearing in two of British TV's most successful sitcoms at the same time. On ITV, he was playing naive medical student Alan Moore in Rising Damp (voted ITV's best-ever sitcom in the Britain's Best Sitcom survey of 2004) while also starring in BBC's Porridge as Lennie Godber alongside Ronnie Barker. In 1975 he appeared in the comedy film Three for All and in 1976 appeared against type as a car thief in the ITV Playhouse episode "Last Summer". Shortly after his 30th birthday, Beckinsale was surprised by Eamonn Andrews with the famed 'big red book' for an appearance on This Is Your Life.
Beckinsale quit Rising Damp in 1977, the same year that Porridge was brought to a natural end after his character of Godber was released from his prison sentence in the final episode. He subsequently starred alongside Barker in Going Straight, a spin-off of Porridge in which the two criminal characters are seen on the outside rebuilding their lives.
At the beginning of 1979, Beckinsale made a film version of Porridge. It was to be his last and only completed work of the year.
In October 1980, Frederick Muller Ltd published a volume of Beckinsale's poetry entitled "With Love" (ISBN 0584103875).
Read more about this topic: Richard Beckinsale
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