Renowned actor and voiceover artist David Graham has passed away at the age of 99. Graham contributed his voice to several iconic TV series, including the evil Daleks in Doctor Who, Aloysius Parker in Thunderbirds, and Grandpa Pig in Peppa Pig. In Doctor Who, Graham only made two on-screen appearances, but it was his unemotional and harsh voice as the Daleks that became his most recognized role. Graham recalled the process of how he came up with the voice of the Daleks when he said, “We adopted this staccato style then they fed it through a synthesizer to make it more sinister.”
Alongside voicing Aloysius Parker for Thunderbirds, Graham also played the show’s pilot Gordon Tracy and Brains the engineer until 1966. He reprised the role of Parker for an ITV remake of the show called Thunderbirds Are Go! in 2015 and was the only original cast member to make a return. In Peppa Pig, Graham was known for his voice portrayal of Grandpa Pig, the husband of Granny Pig, and father of Mummy Pig and Aunt Dottie. He was referred to as “Papa Ig” by his young grandson George.
Graham was born in London and always knew he wanted to act. However, the outbreak of World War Two meant that he had to postpone his acting aspirations and work as a radar mechanic. After his service, he later attended a theatre school in New York before returning to the UK. He worked in repertory theatre before finally getting work in the original Doctor Who series. Outside of his work as a voiceover artist, Graham also made brief appearances in several popular British TV series, including Coronation Street, The Bill, London’s Burning, and BBC dramas Doctors and Casualty.
In an interview with The Mirror in 2015, Graham shared how Gerry Anderson, the creator of Thunderbirds, inspired the voice of Parker. Anderson took him to lunch, where Graham met a wine waiter who had previously served as a butler to the former Prince of Wales. The waiter’s voice and demeanor inspired Graham, who created Parker’s voice. He made it a bit more villainous and wasn’t sure the waiter ever knew, jokingly suggesting that he might have demanded a royalty
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