Alexander Gauge
Alexander Gauge was a British character actor best known for playing Friar Tuck in The Adventures of Robin Hood from 1955 to 1959.
Biography
Gauge was born in a Methodist Mission station in Wenzhou, China. He attended school in California before moving to England. He served in the British Army in India during World War II, where he became acquainted with John Masters. He first appeared on the New York stage in 1945. He acted in many of Shakespeare's plays and usually played villains in British films, but many considered his forte to be comedy. He was a great hit in the London stage production of The Seven Year Itch.Gauge appeared in the films The Interrupted Journey in 1949. In 1952, he appeared in Murder in the Cathedral, Mother Riley Meets the Vampire, with Old Mother Riley and Béla Lugosi, and The Pickwick Papers as the flirtatious Tracy Tupman. He also appeared in the Martin Luther, Beau Brummell, The Green Man and The Iron Petticoat starring Bob Hope. In 1955 he joined the cast of both The Scarlet Pimpernel and The Adventures of Robin Hood, as Friar Tuck, a role he played until 1960. In 1959, Gauge starred as Brigadier Wellington-Bull in the series The Adventures of Brigadier Wellington-Bull alongside Valerie Singleton.
In 1960, just weeks before his death, he played the Duke of Norfolk in the original West End production of A Man for All Seasons at the Globe Theatre. His last performance was a posthumous appearance in the 1961 film Nothing Barred starring Brian Rix.
Gauge married Phyllis Anne Young in Penzance in 1957. He died aged 46 in Woking in Surrey in 1960 from an overdose.