Norman Wisdom

NORMAN WISDOM OBE d2010. English actor, comedian and singer-songwriter best known for a series of comedy films produced between 1953 and 1966 featuring his hapless onscreen character Norman Pitkin. These films initially made more money than the James Bond series and secured him a celebrity status in lands as far apart as South America, Iran and many Eastern-Bloc countries, particularly in Albania. Wisdom was the only Western actor to enjoy this privilege. Charlie Chaplin famously referred to Wisdom as his "favourite clown". He later forged a career on Broadway and as a television actor, winning critical acclaim for his dramatic role of a dying cancer patient in the television play Going Gently in 1981. In 1995 he received an OBE and was knighted in 2000 and spent his later years in The Isle Of Man. He retired from acting at the age of 90 after his health declined and died aged 95 in 2010..