RUSSELL Hunter was one of Scotland's great character actors, whether appearing in a Shakespearian play or on television as the malodorous informant Lonely in the seedy spy series Callan. You have to make ends meet however and here in 1974, the year the Callan series morphed into a feature film, he is wearing a flat cap in a bath while a Mrs Slocombe-type character pretends to wash his armpits. In the background the pinstripe-suited directors of the bathroom fitting company who hired him think it is hilarious. We suspect the younger suit with the blow-dried hair is the chap who came up with the wheeze of hiring Russell to publicise whatever showroom opening it is.
Russell, from Glasgow, was a shipyard apprentice before joining the left-wing Unity Theatre company, and he was admired for his realistic portrayals of gritty, often down-at-heel characters. But we think he deserves an Oscar for pretending here that there was any point in sitting in an empty bath wearing a cloth cap.
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