Francis Bell (actor)

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Francis Bell (1944 - May 1994) was a UK-born Australian-based character actor who achieved international stardom playing the part of Max Ramsay in the early years of the popular soap opera, Neighbours. Soon after the serial switched to Channel Ten in early 1986 Bell abruptly went on sick leave. To accommodate the loss the new character of Max's brother Tom was hastily introduced. In the story Tom arrived to take the reigns of Max's plumbing business while Max was away; behind the scenes the scriptwriters went through the scripts replacing "Max" with "Tom", with Tom speaking the dialogue written for Max. Bell's Neighbours contract expired during his period of sick leave and he never returned to the series, meaning that Max never had a farewell scene.

He died after falling from a building in Auckland, New Zealand.