MUFF interview with Roger Ward Australian Screen Legend

Interviewer Richard D Wolstencroft

Roger's career began at an early age with roles on stage and radio. In his late teens he travelled to Tahiti to begin writing what became the controversial novel and film, The Set. The film was produced in 1970 but the novel was not published until 2011.

He was script editor for Homicide, adapted his novel Reflex into the film Brothers and wrote other documentaries and specials. Ward has featured or starred in over fifteen hundred television shows and more than fifty films with such stars as Marlon Brando, Trevor Howard, Richard Harris, Barry Sullivan, Robert Lansing, Ryan O'Neal, Richard Benjamin, Tom Selleck, Paula Prentiss, Peter Graves, Alan Rickman, Steve Railsback, Olivia Hussey and Laura San Giacomo.

In Mad Max (1979), he created the memorable bald headed police hall captain "Fifi"; The Man From Hong Kong had him as the bumbling Australian policeman, Bob Taylor. In Stone he was the comedic biker, "Hooks". Turkey Shoot saw him as "Ritter" the guard from hell, and in Quigley Down Under he played "Brophy", one of the outlaw gang. He was an Irish mounted policeman in the 1978 film The Irishman and an all-singing, dancing pirate in The Pirate Movie.

He played popular characters in TV series including long-running character Frank "Weppo" Smith,[3] the Shakespeare-spouting garbage collector in Number 96,[4] a boxer in Boys from the Bush and also appeared in The Sullivans.

Later independent films in which he was featured include Long Weekend (2008), Bad Behaviour (2010), Elimination Game, Death's Waiting Room, Choir Girl, Debt Collector, Devils Detour, Boar and Faceless Man.

He was engaged to appear in another film in 2019.[5]