Bill Maynard

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Walter Frederick George Williams (born 8 October 1928 in Heath End, Farnham, Surrey) more commonly known as Bill Maynard, is a British comedian and actor.

Bill Maynard
Born	8 October 1928 (1928-10-08) (age 79) Heath End, Farnham, Surrey) England
Years active	1957–Present

He attended Kibworth Beauchamp Grammar School and started as a variety performer, taking his professional surname from an advertising board (billboard) for Maynard's Wine Gums, a popular British confectionery. He placed fourth in the UK heat of the 1957 Eurovision Song Contest. With Terry Scott he appeared at Butlins Holiday Camp in Skegness and was teamed with him in the TV series Great Scott, It's Maynard!.

He was at first best known on TV for his role as Selwyn Froggitt in the sitcom Oh No, It's Selwyn Froggitt! and for playing Fred Moffatt in The Gaffer. In 1973, Maynard teamed up with BBC television actor and comedian Ronnie Barker in the (original) 'Football Blues' which aired as Spanners Eleven and was part of a series called Seven of One. In 1975 he had a film role as Yorkshire farmer Hinchcliffe in It Shouldn't Happen to a Vet. In 1992, he played Claude Jeremiah Greengrass in the popular and long running television series Heartbeat until 2001, and its spinoff series The Royal until about 2004. He is also known for small roles in some of the Carry On Films.

In the 1980s, Maynard stood against Tony Benn in a by-election at Chesterfield as an Independent Labour candidate. It was his only foray into politics and was purely to try to prevent Benn winning the seat and thus reentering Parliament as an MP. Benn won the seat; Maynard took fourth place.

Maynard wrote his autobiography 'The Yo-Yo Man' and having originally retired from acting in 2001 following a series of strokes he made a return and comeback to radio presenting in March 2003 for BBC Radio Leicester where he had last worked in 1968. His show airs every Sunday afternoon from 2-4 pm. Unfortunately Bill was unceremouniously sacked from this show on 5th Feb 2008. Although no reason was given by BBC Radio Leicester the general feeling of Leicestershire folk was Bill's unwillingness to conform to the PC Brigade and his honest outspokeness.

He is a vegetarian. His son is Maynard Williams.

[edit] Television Roles

Year	Title	Role
1973	Seven of One	Councillor Todd
1975	The Sweeney	Quirk
1975	The Life Of Riley	Frank Riley
1976 to 1977	Oh No, It's Selwyn Froggitt!	Selwyn Froggitt
1977	Paradise Island	Rev Alexander Goodwin
1978	Selwyn	Selwyn Froggitt
1981 to 1983	The Gaffer	Fred Moffatt
1984	Minder	Barney Todd
1985 to 1992	In Sickness and in Health	Bert Luscombe
1990	Oddball Hall	Copperthewaite
1991	Screen One - Filipina Dreamgirls	George Trout
1992 to 2000	Heartbeat	Claude Greengrass
2002	Dalziel and Pascoe	Councillor Cyril Steel
2003	The Royal	Claude Greengrass