John Grieve was a Scottish

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

 actor

Actor

An actor is a person who acts in a dramatic production and who works in film, television, theatre, or radio in that capacity...

, best known as the engineer

Engineer

An engineer is a professional practitioner of engineering, concerned with applying scientific knowledge, mathematics and ingenuity to develop solutions for technical problems. Engineers design materials, structures, machines and systems while considering the limitations imposed by practicality,...

 Macphail in the 1970s BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 adaptation of Neil Munro

Neil Munro (Hugh Foulis)

Neil Munro was a Scottish journalist, newspaper editor, author and literary critic. He was born in Inveraray and worked as a journalist on various newspapers....

's Para Handy

Para Handy

Para Handy, the anglicized Gaelic nickname of the fictional character Peter Macfarlane, is a character created by the journalist and writer Neil Munro in a series of stories published in the Glasgow Evening News under the pen name of Hugh Foulis....

 stories, The Vital Spark.

Born in Maryhill

Maryhill

Maryhill is an area of the City of Glasgow in Scotland. Maryhill is a former burgh. The population of Maryhill is about 52,000. Maryhill stretches over along Maryhill Road...

, Glasgow

Glasgow

Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...

, Grieve attended the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama

Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama

The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland is a conservatoire of music, drama, and dance in the centre of Glasgow, Scotland. Founded in 1845 as the Glasgow Educational Association, it is the busiest performing arts venue in Scotland...

, before joining the Citizen's Theatre in 1951. Grieve worked in variety alongside many familiar Scottish comedians, including Stanley Baxter

Stanley Baxter

Stanley Baxter is a Scottish comic actor and impressionist, best known for his British television shows. He worked in radio, theatre, television and film.-Early life:...

 and Jimmy Logan

Jimmy Logan

Jimmy Logan OBE, FRSAMD , born as James Allan Short, Dennistoun, Glasgow, was a Scottish performer, producer, impresario and director.-Family:...

. Although principally known for his comic roles, he appeared in drama films such as The Thirty-Nine Steps (1978), Eye of the Needle

Eye of the Needle (film)

Eye of the Needle is a 1981 film directed by Richard Marquand, based on the novel of the same title by Ken Follett, and starring Donald Sutherland...

(1981) and the BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 docudrama

Docudrama

In film, television programming and staged theatre, docudrama is a documentary-style genre that features dramatized re-enactments of actual historical events. As a neologism, the term is often confused with docufiction....

 Square Mile of Murder

Square Mile of Murder

The Square Mile of Murder relates to an area of west-central Glasgow, Scotland. The term was first coined by the Scottish journalist and author Jack House, whose 1961 book of the same name was based on the fact that four of Scotland's most infamous murders were committed within one square mile of...

(1980). His stage roles include the part of the King's Jester in the premier of The Burning (1971) by Stewart Conn

Stewart Conn

Stewart Conn is a Scottish poet and playwright, born in Hillhead, Glasgow . His father was a minister Kelvinside Church but the family moved to Kilmarnock, Ayrshire in 1941 when he was five. During the 60s and 70s he worked for the BBC at their offices off Queen Margaret Drive and moved to...

.

He had a brief recurring role as Frank Marker's probation officer

Probation officer

Parole officers and probation officers play a role in criminal justice systems by supervising offenders released from incarceration or sentenced to non-custodial sanctions such as community service...

 in the Thames Television

Thames Television

Thames Television was a licensee of the British ITV television network, covering London and parts of the surrounding counties on weekdays from 30 July 1968 until 31 December 1992....

 series Public Eye

Public Eye

Public Eye is a British television series that ran from 1965 to 1975 . It was produced by ABC Television for three series, and Thames Television for a further four series...

. He played Sandy Duncanson in BBC's adaptation of Neil Munro's The New Road, in a BBC drama about the Union of the Parliaments in 1707 he played John Hamilton, 2nd Lord Belhaven and Stenton

John Hamilton, 2nd Lord Belhaven and Stenton

John Hamilton, 2nd Lord Belhaven and Stenton was a Scottish politician.He was the eldest son of Robert Hamilton, Lord Presmennan...

who delivered a controversial speech against the Union, and appeared on BBC Scotland's Hogmanay celebrations.

External links

• Obituary John Grieve, The Scotsman, January 28, 2003