William Ash

Chadderton, Greater Manchester, England, UK

Biography

William Ash, (born 13 January 1977) is a British TV and film actor. His appearances include Mad About Mambo, Lilies, Burn It, All the King's Men, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Doctor Who and more recently Hush and Waterloo Road. He began his career in the ITV series Where the Heart Is. His stage credits include the premiere production of How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found with Sheffield Theatres. In 2009, Ash played the leading role of "Zakes Abbott" in the British horror film HUSH. Ash also has minor roles in programmes such as Coronation Street and has completed voice-over work for TV advertisements. He also appeared in Heartbeat back in 1992 where he played a cheeky school boy for one episode. He is currently playing Deputy Headteacher 'Chris Mead' in Waterloo Road. On 12th April 2011, Ash played a young Yuri Gagarin in the BBC Radio 4 Afternoon Play; Titatium, broadcast in honour of the 50th anniversary of the first manned flight into space. He prefers to be known as "Will". His second cousin is Peter Ash, who is also an actor.

Movies

Children's Ward is a British children's television drama series produced by Granada Television and broadcast on the ITV network as part of its Children's ITV strand on weekday afternoons. The programme was set – as the title suggests – in Ward B1, the children's ward of the fictitious South Park Hospital, and told the stories of the young patients and the staff present there. Aimed at older children and teenagers, Children's Ward was a long-lived series for a children's drama, starting life in 1988 as a contribution to the Dramarama anthology strand, "Blackbird Singing In The Dead of Night", then first broadcast as a series 1989 and running from then until 2000. The series was conceived by Granada staff writers Paul Abbott and Kay Mellor, both of whom went on to enjoy successful careers as award-winning writers of adult television drama. At the time, they were both working on the soap opera Coronation Street, and had recently collaborated on a script for Dramarama. Abbott, who had been through a troubled childhood himself, had initially wanted to set the series in a children's care home rather than a hospital, but this was vetoed by Granada executives. During the course of its run, however, Children's Ward won many plaudits for covering difficult issues such as cancer, alcoholism, drug addiction and child abuse in a sensitive manner. The programme won many awards, including in 1996 a BAFTA Children's Award for Best Drama, won by an episode in which a serial killer lures children to him via the internet and is – highly unusually for children's television – not eventually caught.

More info
Children's Ward
1989