Suave actor Leslie Phillips has died aged 98
(Picture: Fiona Hanson/PA)Actor Leslie Phillips, who was known for appearing in the Carry On and Doctor films, has died aged 98 after a long illness.
Phillips’s agent, Jonathan Lloyd, confirmed the star died peacefully in his sleep on Monday (November 7).
The comic actor starred in more than 200 films, TV, and radio series over his eight-decade career.
He was known as an onscreen upper-class charmer, with famous catchphrases such as “Ding dong” - a reference to the name of his character, Jack Bell, in 1959’s Carry on Nurse - “I say”, and “Well, hello”.
Phillips was also familiar to younger fans as the voice of the Sorting Hat in Harry Potter films.
A total of 31 Carry On films were made between 1958 and 1992, often featuring the same principle cast.
The likes of Sid James, Kenneth Williams, and Hattie Jacques became household names thanks to the cheeky series that started with Carry on Sergeant in 1958 and finished 34 years later with Carry On Columbus.
Philips’s death - which comes two years after Barbara Windsor’s - leaves Jim Dale, 86, as the last surviving regular from the Carry On films.
Jim Dale
The final surviving regular actor who had a lead role in the films is Jim Dale.
Now aged 87, Dale - who is also a singer, comedian, narrator, and author - made his first appearance in 1963’s Carry on Cabby.
Dale appeared in nine of the films between 1963 and 1967, before returning in 1969 for Carry On Again Doctor, and the final film, Carry on Columbus, in 1992.
Initially playing supporting characters, he soon progressed to taking on younger male lead roles.
Dale moved to America in the Eighties, and reinvented himself as a stage actor, starring in productions such as the Broadway musical Barnum, Me and My Girl, and as Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol.
He found new fame in recent years thanks to Harry Potter. Dale has narrated the audiobook versions of all seven of JK Rowling’s fantasy novels in America, winning multiple awards along the way.
In 2003, he was made an MBE.
