News has reached me, via his widow Julia, that Michael Hawkins – who played General Williams in the 1972 Doctor Who adventure Frontier In Space – died late last year. Julia is happy for the information to appear online so I thought I’d do a quick post for the actor best known among visitors to this parish for his dignified turn as the human soldier responsible for starting a deadly war between Earth and Draconia. Mr Hawkins was also interviewed about his role on the Making Of… documentary on the Dalek War DVD box set.
A handsome actor with a refined air about him, he was more versatile than the parts he usually got suggested – note his turn as Beavis, the beleaguered subject of cruel mental conditioning in the Doomwatch episode Hair Trigger (1972). He had previously appeared in the very first episode of that series, The Plastic Eaters (1970), and his other genre roles included an aristocrat in the early scenes of Hammer’s Hound Of the Baskervilles (1959), The Avengers (3 roles from 1961), Out Of This World (1962), as a regular in R3 (1965), Thirteen Against Fate (1966), The Baron (1967), Man In A Suitcase (1968), and another military type in Survivors (1977).
He enjoyed a busy time of it on television all through the 60s and 70s in everything from Z-Cars to George And Mildred, via I,Claudius and Crown Court, with decent stints in Brett (1971), season one of The Brothers (1972), The Scobie Man (1972), King Cinder (1977) and The Devil’s Crown (1978) propping up a hefty roster of one-off guest stints.
He is often mistakenly referred to as the father of Christian Slater – there is indeed a similar hawkish profile shared by both men, and the Hollywood star’s father was indeed an actor called Michael Hawkins, but this is not he. Like many details on certain famous websites, this is incorrect, so I have not used any other information here (such as dates) given by them either – not until I am satisfied they are correct. At present I am happier to leave that information blank than propagate a mistake, though I believe Mr Hawkins was in his mid 80s at the time of his death on the 26th October last year.
This short article may be updated in due course.
Thanks to Paul Ballard of Fantom Films.
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