Sir David Jason shared the difficulties of being an older actor, revealing that there are not many parts available for performers in their eighties.
The acting legend told Radio Times: “I’m trying desperately to convince producers and directors that I’ve got many characters still left to play. Senior actors have got a tremendous amount to offer.”
Sir David recently spoke on how he lost out on roles due to other actors Jim Broadbent and Michael Caine who had bagged the parts he wanted.
Being pipped by Jim was particularly ironic as the Moulin Rouge star famously auditioned to play Del Boy in Only Fools and Horses, but turned it down due to theatre commitments.
But he was glad the part eventually went to Sir David, who played the market trader from 1981 to 2003.
Broadbent said: “Luckily, David Jason was available, so my biggest contribution to British culture is not being available.”
Sir David, however, has never had quite the same impact on the big screen.
He said: “I would love to be able to declare that my collected film work on DVD would make an elegant shelf of high-class cinematic experiences to browse among an evening.
“I fear, however, that it may look more like the contents of a box pulled out from under a table at a car boot sale”.
The actor was up for lead roles in two 2023 movies — The Unlikely Pilgrimage Of Harold Fry and The Great Escaper.
Broadbent beat him to the first, which he found out via a newspaper.
And Sir Michael Caine pipped him to the role of a Dunkirk veteran who flees his care home to attend a memorial across the Channel in The Great Escaper.
Writing in his new book This Time Next Year, out now, Sir David says: “I thought it was going to be me escaping from the care home and going to look for my Dunkirk chums.
“It’s the hope that kills you.”
The star also put to bed any rumours of bad blood between him and Only Fools co-star Nicholas Lyndhurst, Sir David clarified in his memoir how what appeared as a “feud” may well have been misconstrued.
That stemmed, he said from an anecdote in a previous book.