On January 10th, Valentine Palmer, best known for his role as Monia in the Doctor Who serial, Day of the Daleks, passed away aged 86, after a short illness.Valentine, born in 1935, was from London but grew up in Buckinghamshire, then moved to Malta and recently lived in Grantham. He leaves five children and six grandchildren.

His son Luke Palmer said:

“Valentine, Val, Dad, G-Pa Pops was always the life and soul of the party! Greatly missed by his five children and six grandchildren.

“He would have loved any donation to go to the homeless charities EMMAUSCrisis or CRISIS.”

He studied music and singing at Guildhall School of Music in London and was awarded the King George VI Scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and subsequently appeared in almost 100 of Britain’s best loved TV series, including Doctor Who, Minder, The Saint, The Professionals, The Sweeney, Emmerdale, Dixon of Dock Green, Crossroads and The Six Wives of Henry VIII.

He also played leading roles in numerous West End musicals including: Rogers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella with Tommy Steele, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes with Dora Bryan, The King and I with Peter Wyngarde and Oliver with Helen Shapiro.

He also wrote, produced, and directed his feature film Fanny Hill which was a commercial success. As a result, he later worked in Hollywood as a script editor and later, in the UK, as a screenwriting coach and was also an established writer and was commissioned to write the screenplay for The Singer as a vehicle for Cliff Richard.

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