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He might be the only professional actor to have portrayed both Sherlock Holmes and his arch-enemy, having played the iconic detective in the 1979 TV series Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson, as well as the 'Napoleon of Crime,' Professor Moriarty, in the radio burlesque spoof The Newly Discovered Casebook of Sherlock Holmes performed before a live audience.
A 1960 graduate of RADA, Geoffrey Whitehead has had a prolific career in classical theatre, performing with the Bristol Old Vic and the Royal Shakespeare Company ensemble for several seasons. Since 1962, his television credits include guest roles in The Avengers (1961), The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes (1971), Reilly: Ace of Spies (1983), Scarecrow and Mrs. King (1983), and Poirot (1989). In the police drama Z Cars (1962), he portrayed two distinct characters over four seasons: PC Ken Baker in season 4, and DS Wilf Miller in seasons 7, 8, and 10. He also held a regular role as the managing director of a major property firm in the business drama Second Thoughts (1991).
Whitehead frequently portrayed influential figures in period dramas, including the stern suitor St. John Rivers in Jane Eyre (1973), Roman general Scipio Africanus in The Cleopatras (1983), Russian statesman Vasily Golitsyn in Peter the Great (1986), the family lawyer for the renowned Austrian composer family in Strauss Dynasty (1991), and a doctor in the BBC adaptation of Little Dorrit (2008).
Highly skilled in comedy as well, he co-starred on television in Second Thoughts (1991) as the head of a style magazine, Reggie Perrin (2009) as Reggie's food-obsessed father-in-law, Still Open All Hours (2013) as Wilburn Newbold, and in the long-running sitcom Not Going Out (2006) as Geoffrey Adams. On BBC Radio 4's Bleak Expectations, he voiced various ill-fated members of five villainous families—the Hardthrashers, Sternbeaters, Whackwallops, Grimpunches, and Clampvultures—in a parody of the classic 1949 Ealing comedy Kind Hearts and Coronets. Additionally, Whitehead lent his voice to Death in radio adaptations of Terry Pratchett's novels Eric and Mort.
Since 1964, Whitehead has been married to Mary Hanefey, an Irish-born stage and screen actress.
