The Only Fools and Horses star who only got the part when his Oscar winning friend had to turn down the role
Things could have been very different!
Such is the popularity of Only Fools and Horses even today, that even actors who only feature in a handful of episodes are sometimes best known for their role in the show. One of the few this probably wouldn’t apply to is Sir Anthony Hopkins, 84, who came very close to playing one of the nasty Driscoll brothers in the episode Little Problems.
Known to be a huge fan of the show, two-time Oscar winner Anthony had been offered the role in Only Fools and accepted it. But when the filming in 1990 clashed with that of perhaps his career-defining performance in Silence of the Lambs as the cannibal psychopath Hannibal Lecter, he had to back out of the Peckham sitcom. It was probably best for him that he did too, given the movie propelled him to international superstardom and won him his first Oscar.
This was all revealed last year by Boycie actor John Challis who said to the Mirror at the time: “He is a big fan of the show and was really interested in doing it. He would have been fantastic. I can imagine those disarming blue eyes staring at Boycie or Del Boy. It would have been truly terrifying. He’s probably thinking ‘if only I did that, I’d have been an even bigger success’, while clutching his Oscar.”
What many may not realise though, is that when Sir Anthony was forced to turn down the part, he still made his influence felt by recommending a friend of his for the role, Roy Marsden. The two had met while working at a theatre in Nottingham as young men, and it was actually Roy, 80, who convinced the Oscar winner he should go to RADA (Royal Academy of Dramatic Art). The two also lived together in their youth and remain great friends today.
Roy has been acting since the early 1960s when he was with the Royal Shakespeare Company on stage and starred in his own TV dramas in 1982’s Airline and as poetry writing police commander Adam Dalgliesh over 15 years in the P.D. James novels series of feature length adaptations. It was in the middle of this role that his friend Tony tipped him off to the role of Danny Driscoll in Only Fools.
Fans of the show will remember the incredible way that 6’4″ Roy towered over Del Boy in the role. He went on to reprise the role alongside John Challis as Boycie in the Only Fools spin off The Green Green Grass in 2005.
He has also starred in Silent Witness (2011), New Tricks (2010), The Palace (2008), Doctor Who (2007), Foyle’s War (2006), King Solomon’s Mines (2004) and A Certain Justice (1998) amongst many many more.
