Only Fools and Horses

The Only Fools and Horses star who ran a market stall and was in the RAF before getting his big break at 44

Not all stars make it when they're young!

Some people are born to be actors, enrolled into prestigious arts academies at a young age or find fame as a child star. That wasn’t the case for Roy Heather, who you might know as café owner Sid from Only Fools And Horses. Heather didn’t get his big break until he was 44-years-old.

In the BBC Sitcom Sid’s Café was a run-down greasy spoon couldn’t even serve up a bowl of porridge without there being a hair floating in it. He later took management of The Nags Head when landlord Mike Fisher was sent to prison for trying to embezzle the brewery

Sid was first seen in 1982 and from then on was a top-tier character who was often seen wearing a dirty fat stained apron on. Heather was new to the acting game when he got that gig at 47-years-old, and before that he’d had a pretty varied career including working in the RAF and running a market stall.

Sid
Sid at his famous Peckham cafe in Only Fools and Horses (Image: BBC)

Roy was born in 1935 in Buckinghamshire. Whilst at school in Slough he performed in plays before going on to work for an asbestos company and then doing his National Service in the RAF.

He then took a job as a sales rep but left in favour for more casual jobs, including running a market stall, following the break-up of his marriage.

At the same time, he acted with the Riparians amateur dramatics group in Berkshire, and then came his big break. At the age of 44-years-old, Roy was persuaded by his director friend David Tudor to turn professional in acting.

Tudor directed him in productions at the Little Theatre, Sheringham, then at Henley Rep, where he acted alongside cult horror actress Ingrid Pitt in the world premiere of Aurelia (Kenton Theatre, 1979), an adaptation of the Jean-Paul Ferriere novel.

He also enjoyed other roles on the stage including playing the part of Pistol in the Peter Mottley play After Agincourt at the Southsea Arts Festival in 1986, and tours of Sink or Swim and See How They Run, and a season with the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon (1991), amongst appearances in other productions.

But it was in 1981 when Roy’s TV career took off as he played a corporal in the series It Ain’t Half Hot Mum, before landing the role of Tom in Scene.

One year later Roy starred in Seconds Out before arriving in legendary sitcom Hi-de-Hi in two different roles between 1981 and 1982.

He landed in Only Fools and Horses as Sid Robertson, but he was in high demand for TV work and appeared in a long list of shows regularly switching between sitcoms to drama.

His other regular role on television was as Pops, a filthy old man among the losers frequenting the unnamed pub in both series of Time Gentlemen Please (2000-02), starring Al Murray in his pub landlord persona. Pops’s catchphrase was: “Look at his face – it’s a picture.”

He also appeared in Bottom, London’s Burning, The Bill, The Green Green Grass, Casualty and My Family – amongst others.

At the time of his death in 2014 at 79 years old, Roy was married to Sara Taylor (from 1993) and left three children.

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