Cockney role comes naturally

Press, 29 June 1987, Page 19

Cockney role comes naturally

Over recent weeks followers of “Eastenders” have suffered with Arthur Fowler as he fought through a bout of severe depression.

The character of Arthur Fowler is played by Bill Treacher, who brings a great deal of authority to the role by virtue of having spent his childhood in the middle of the East End. Born in London, he spent his childhood in Hackney, Bethnal Green and Mile End.

“We were a large family of six boys and two girls,” he recalls, “and times were very lean for people round our way in the thirties. Me and my brother used to go down to the market on Mile End ‘waste* and scrounge boxes, broken nuts and anything else going. When I was six or so, I desperately wanted to belong to a Mickey Mouse Club at the Saturday morning cinema, but' it cost three pence — well beyond our means.”

After National Service in the R.A.F., Treacher went to sea as a steward

with the P. and 0. Line for four years, to earn sufficient money to put himself through drama school. One Saturday, between trips, he auditioned for the Webber Douglas Academy. They told him they would let him know within a fortnight whether he had gained a place.

“I said I had to know straight away as I was sailing off on again the Monday! They were so taken aback, they told me to wait, and some hours later I heard I’d been accepted.” Treacher’s many television credits include “Angels,” “The Agatha Christie Hour” and “Grange Hill,” and just recently a new 8.8. C. TV children’s series, “Who Sir? Mr Sir?” He also appeared in many Dick Emery Shows.

Treacher lives in Suffolk with his wife Kate and their two children, Jamie, who is 12 and eight-year-old Sophie. “The whole family,” he says, “loves to potter about, swimming, sailing and bird-watching.”