Actor and comedian John Sessions has died at the age of 67.
He was best known as a panellist on 1980s and 90s improvisation TV show Whose Line Is It Anyway?, and appeared on QI and Have I Got News for You.
His other credits included Stella Street and Spitting Image, and films like Kenneth Branagh’s Henry V.
Fellow comedian Ronni Ancona described him as “a genius”, while Helen Lederer remembered him as “such an original force of clever wit and talent”.
The Ayrshire-born star died from a heart condition, his agent said.
During his career, he provided voices on Spitting Image in the 1980s – the only person to both provide impressions and be featured as a puppet on the satirical show.
The programme was among the trailblazers of alternative comedy, he told BBC Radio Scotland in September. “You really felt you were at the cutting edge of comedy. Even though we just did the voices, we were the real assault troops along with Alexei Sayle and Ben Elton,” he said.
His impressions were also at the heart of Stella Street, a spoof soap opera about megastars like Keith Richards, Joe Pesci and Roger Moore who live on the same suburban road, which launched in 1997.
Sessions recalled meeting Richards and the other members of the Rolling Stones. “They watched the show,” he told Radio Scotland. “Keith said he really enjoys it and he’s thinking of getting a little corner shop.”
He also had a string of his own BBC TV shows, such as a self-titled solo improvisation series in the late 1980s, followed by John Sessions’s Tall Tales and John Sessions’s Likely Stories.
His other TV credits included Just William, Victoria, The Loch, Porterhouse Blue and Gormenghast; and he had film roles in The Good Shepherd, The Merchant of Venice and The Bounty.
Recently, he had narrated a 10-part radio adaptation of children’s book series The Adventures of Captain Bobo.
