Biography
Dave Dutton, a former television comedy writer, is an actor known for his quirky Northern character roles.
He has played an impressive seven different main characters in the popular British TV soap Coronation Street, including Weatherfield Gazette photographer Harry Benson and Bert Latham, the eccentric friend of Jack Duckworth, with whom he once led a memorable fox hunt episode on the famous street alongside his dog Boomer.
Recently, Dave portrayed Eric the Postman in Emmerdale.
His most recent Coronation Street role was Gerald Unwin, a drink and smoke enthusiast and uncle to Shelley, the manager of the Rovers Return.
As the unscrupulous Harry Benson, the roguish photographer for the Weatherfield Gazette, he once chained one of the Battersby girls to a tree to take glamour shots "for the lads in the darkroom." Alongside reporter Duncan Stott, he disrupted Roy and Hayley’s church wedding.
Dave first gained public attention in the hit series Watching, set in Merseyside and the Wirral, where he portrayed Oswald, the offbeat café owner, delivering deadpan humor in this top-rated Granada TV sitcom. Sky TV has rebroadcast the series on Granada Plus multiple times, and a fan site exists for Watching.
He also appeared in the "Night To Remember" Gala Bingo and Maltesers commercials, where babies play football with Maltesers while he sneaks the ones that enter his goal.
Dave has portrayed Postman Fred Leeder in Heartbeat and appeared in the award-winning drama series Cops. His credits also include the hit series Reckless with Robson Green and a prison guard role in the hospital drama Always and Everyone alongside Niamh Cusack and Martin Shaw.
In 2002, he starred as Grandad Pete Clulow in the Channel Four school drama and educational series "Looking After the Penneys," produced by Libra Television, and later that year played shopkeeper Bob Southall in BBC’s police drama Merseybeat.
In 2003, he appeared as Ufologist Mr. Skip in six episodes of Emmerdale, a Security Man in Granada TV’s comedy Stan the Man, and the Greengrocer in YTV’s Heartbeat spin-off series The Royal. In 2004, he returned to Heartbeat and played Arthur Digweed in the comedy Dead Man Weds, starring Johnny Vegas and Dave Spikey.
In 2005, he portrayed cancer sufferer Neville Tweedy in several episodes of the BBC drama Cutting It, where he also performed "Puff the Magic Dragon" at a funeral, and appeared in the Gala Bingo TV advertisement.
In 2007, he played John Langdale in the BBC’s New Street Law and released a song he wrote, "Bless Your Whiskers, Father Christmas," as a single performed by the Northern folk band The Houghton Weavers. Dave is the author of 14 books and has experience as a newspaper reporter, songwriter, performer, and radio presenter.
