David Jasona shy, quiet man taken by surprise

Press, 3 February 1986, Page 11

David Jason — a shy, quiet man taken by surprise

Meeting people does not come easily to actor David Jason, who has just been voted the B.B.C’s TV personality of the year, says DUO

writer

JAMES GREEN.

David Jason has had the most successful year of any actor in Britain. It has been Christmas all the way for him, and while he welcomed 1986 he was sorry to see the old year slip away.

Can you blame him?

He was voted 8.8. C. TV personally of the year and had the unbelievable luck to star in the Beeb’s two top comedy series watched by millions every week.

To get “Open All Hours,” playing the shop lad Granville, was a joy, but also to play wheelerdealer Del Trotter in “Only Fools and Horses” suggests he must be in liaison with Santa. (An old series of “Open All Hours” is now being repeated on Two.) The 8.8. C. gave him a prime Christmas Day slot for a 90-minute special as Del, and he is now making his West End debut at the Strand Theatre in the farce “Look, No Hans”.

Clearly his national popularity is enormous. But Jason is a contradiction — on screen or stage a cheeky-faced soul-of-the-party, in private he is

shy and reluctant to talk about himself.

Meeting people is not something that comes easy to him. The actor, who on TV appears to have “more front than Brighton,” explains modestly: “I like the quiet life. I never thought this would happen for me or that I would be considered that good. “I’m wary it is all a mistake and someone will ask me shortly if I enjoyed the joke?” He cites the example of his mother’s indifference to his new-found status and recognition. “I love her dearly but she’s totally unimpressed about whatever happens in my life.

“I’m a qualified electrician and when I call to see her all she wants to discuss is her latest electricity bill. She asks me why it has gone up £7.67p? “To her I’m the ‘sparkle.’ Nor does she walk

around telling anyone that she’s my mother. It’s the neighbours who tell her how I’m doing.” The trophy which goes with that personality of the year title rests on his mantelpiece and means a lot to him.

“Never won a thing in my life and what pleases me is that I came into the business from nowhere,” he says. “I had no help and no drama school training. Whatever I have achieved has been done the hard way. “I tried for many months to get my first acting job and eventually I was given a start by a London suburban company. They cast me as a black butler!”

In the year ahead he has a new series of “Only Fools and Horses” due; he will also work on I.T.V.’s “Dangermouse” and “Wind in the Willows” series, and the 8.8. C. is finding a new show for him during the summer.

He couldn’t be busier — yet he refuses to play the rising star game. He stays

a jobbing actor wondering anxiously where the next job is coming from. David Jason is 43 and likes to use humour as a defence mechanism. His real name is White, but he changed it to avoid clashing with another actor with the same name. Jason was taken from “Jason And The Argonauts.” “My dad was a funny man and would walk around Billingsgate with fish boxes on his head,” he says. “He could have been the manager of a shop except he refused to take risks or responsibility. “The result was my mother had to stay at work as a char. My brother Arthur, for a long time in ‘Crossroads,’ trained as a butcher, and I became an electrician. “The day we told Dad we wanted to become actors he was shattered. Why give up worthwhile

; trades and waste your t lives?” However, the old skills 1 still prove handy. He 1 bought a farm-worker’s 3 cottage in Sussex and, 5 having worked on building sites, he was able to r pull it down, rebuild, and extend it. Home in London is a tiny one-bedroom flat r close to the Post Office . Tower. “It’s a Peabody l Buildings type place and • the flat is more like a prison cell,” he says. “When I’ve the time I’ll i convert it, and also I will change the cottage for a proper house in Reigate.” He gives an impression of being self-sufficient. “I suppose I am a loner,” he admits. “I can be cheerful on my own or cooking for myself. “I think I must be boring,” he says seriously. “I’m not theatrical, don’t go to show business parties, I haven’t been married ten times, don’t ! have 47 kids, and I’m not

involved in raging loving affairs.

“But I do fly my glider whenever I get the chance, and I enjoy rebuilding motor-cycles. So I’m very different to my TV characters.

David Jason no longer needs to know the address of the local pawnbroker, and the man who 1985 treated so kindly as a good idea of what he would like from 1986 and 1987.

“The comedy actors I most admire are Peter Sellers and Jacques Tati who both worked with body language in preference to words.

“With their passing they have left a gap and I am keen to try to emulate them on TV. Once again I have given myself a time limit.

“I am going to try and if I fail then you can lay me to rest somewhere really quiet ... like outside the box office of the Alhambra, Bradford.” — DUO.