Graham Seed

Description

Born in London in 1950, Graham realised he wanted to be an actor at a young age. He had just left Charterhouse School, where he had performed in a school play and felt he knew exactly what he wanted to do in life.

While attending school, Graham had been greatly encouraged by his English teacher, David Summerscale. He had gone on to Charterhouse from the preparatory school he joined at the age of seven, enjoying the school sports of football and cricket.

Graham’s application to RADA resulted in an audition at the age of 17. Along with fellow hopeful Jane Seymour, he was asked to stay behind after giving his performance of Richard III. Graham was the one offered a place and went on to make his professional debut with Sir John Clement’s Chichester Festival Company, and then to play many roles in rep.

“Everything,” he says, “in acting, is luck”; no surprise then that the present editor of The Archers was in the audience when Graham appeared in Shaw’s Major Barbara at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre.

This stroke of luck resulted in Graham getting his start in radio drama at the BBC Pebble Mill studios. After a successful run of plays he was asked to audition “for a small part for a few weeks” in The Archers in 1983. As Nigel Pargetter, Graham has been part of the series ever since.

He is an accomplished and regular theatre, TV and film actor. On stage, his appearances include the West End hit, Me and my Girl. Other roles include Toad of Toad Hall, Noel Coward’s Design for Living and Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night.

Graham’s small screen appearances include parts in I Claudius, Brideshead Revisited and Jeeves and Wooster as well as long spells in Crossroads and Brookside. He also appeared in the hit American mini-series Band of Brothers, while film roles include Ghandi, Honest and These Foolish Things.

When not working, Graham’s membership of the MCC enables him to indulge his love of cricket at Lords.