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Anton Rodgers (10 January 1933 – 1 December 2007) was an English actor best known for his appearances in television sitcoms.^[1][2]

His early education was at Westminster School. Later he was educated at the Italia Conti stage academy and LAMDA. He appeared on stage from the age of 14. He was well known for his television performances, specifically his long-running roles in the television sitcoms Fresh Fields in the 1980s and May to December from 1989 to 1994.

However, he also had a long career as an actor on both stage and film, with his stage roles ranging from contemporary comedy and satirical farce to Restoration comedy, Ibsen, Shaw and Wilde, and Peter Nichols. He appeared in films such as The Fourth Protocol (1987) and Scrooge (1970) (in which he performed the Academy Award-nominated Best Original Song "Thank You Very Much" while dancing on Scrooge's coffin). He also narrated the children's animated TV series Old Bear.

Rodgers' second wife was the actress Elizabeth Garvie, whom he met while filming the 1982 drama series, Something in Disguise. They often appeared on stage together, and toured giving readings from the works of Jane Austen and Robert Browning, among others.

Anton Rodgers made his first West End appearance in 1947, aged 14, in Carmen at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. He followed this in 1948 with a tour of an adaptation of Charles Dickens' Great Expectations playing Pip, and played the title role in a production of The Winslow Boy which toured the UK in 1949. He was a member of the original cast of the 1963 musical Pickwick, in which he played Mr Jingle.

• Jim in Passion Play (Peter Nichols), RSC Aldwych Theatre, January 1981
• Walter Burns in Windy City, Victoria Palace, July 1982
• Richard de Beauchamp in Saint Joan (George Bernard Shaw), National Theatre Olivier, February 1984
• Tudor Phillips in Some Singing Blood, Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, March 1992
• Gerry Stratton in Time of My Life (Alan Ayckbourn), Vaudeville Theatre, August 1993
• Dr Feldman in Duet for One revival (Tom Kempinski), Riverside Studios. May 1996
• Etienne in Under the Doctor, Comedy Theatre. February 2001
• Grandpa Potts in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, London Palladium, April 2002

• Scrooge (1970)
• The Man Who Haunted Himself (1970)
• The Day of the Jackal (1973)
• The Fourth Protocol (1987)
• Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988)

• The Old Curiosity Shop as Dick Swiveller
• Danger Man as Attala
• Man in a Suitcase as Max Stein
• The Prisoner episode "The Schizoid Man" as Number Two.
• Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) as Calvin Bream
• The Elusive Pimpernel (1969) as Sir Percy Blakeney
• Upstairs, Downstairs: The Mistress and the Maids as Scone
• Jason King as Philippe de Brion
• The Duchess of Duke Street: A Test of Love as Newdigate
• Murder Most English as Detective Inspector Purbright
• Rumpole of the Bailey: Rumpole and the Honourable Member as Ken Aspen
• Lillie as Edward Langtry
• Disraeli as Bentinck
• Zodiac as David Gradley
• After the War as Samuel Jordan
• May to December as Alec Callender
• Midsomer Murders: Market for Murder as Lord James Chetwood
• Longford as William Whitelaw

• Anton Rodgers at the Internet Movie Database
• Anton Rodgers at the Internet Broadway Database
• Obituary in The Times, 4 December 2007
• Newley, Patrick. "Actor Anton Rodgers dies", The Stage, 2007-12-03. Retrieved on 2007-12-03.