Softly Softly: Task Force · S08E10
At Risk
First broadcast 1976-11-10 · Derek Thompson as Dave Marshall
Grant is not sent to a crime scene this week but to a committee room — a Social Services case review asking whether a baby has been harmed by the people who should be caring for it, a question with no good answer in it. Thompson is Dave Marshall in a quiet, weighted episode written by Elwyn Jones and Alan Plater, where the word everyone is careful with is proof.
Minder · S02E10
The Old School Tie
First broadcast 1980-11-13 · Derek Thompson as Harry
Two old friends of Terry's return at once, neither visit good news: George Palmer out of prison early wanting his conviction overturned, and Rose Mellors, once Terry's flame, now married to a gangster. Thompson is Harry in the episode where a stolen car, a bag of diamonds and Arthur's genuine innocence — for once — add up to nobody believing a word of it.
Bergerac · S02E07
Miracle Every Week
First broadcast 1983-02-20 · Derek Thompson as Guest star
A world the series had not touched before: faith, fraud and a young man's inheritance. Ravi Chavan, a faith healer and figurehead of a two-million-pound foundation, has just turned twenty-five and gained the right to take charge of it — which is why the foundation's chairman has been sending him anonymous death threats to keep him where his money stays safe. Thompson appears in one of Bergerac's stranger hours.
The Price · S01E01
Episode 1
First broadcast 1985-01-10 · Derek Thompson as Frank Crossan
The kidnapping serial that opened both his and Harriet Walter's genre decade: Geoffrey Carr's grand gesture of buying back his wife's childhood home is both generous and slightly mad, and Thompson is Frank Crossan, the fixer inside the plan as it stops sounding romantic and starts being complicated. His co-star Adrian Dunbar is also on the kidnapper side of the story — three careers crossing in one six-part hour.
The Price · S01E03
Episode 3
First broadcast 1985-01-24 · Derek Thompson as Frank Crossan
The ransom stands at three million and the episode runs two struggles in parallel, neither going well: Geoffrey scrambling between banks, the officers coaxing a boy witness who may or may not talk. Thompson's Crossan moves through the pressure that shows in everyone — the sum so large that suspicion spreads through every interaction and the money sits in the room like a third character.
The Price · S01E04
Episode 4
First broadcast 1985-01-31 · Derek Thompson as Frank Crossan
Inside the kidnappers' group things come apart — Kate's paranoia rising, forced cooperation eating through its seams — while Geoffrey learns things about his wife's family he cannot unlearn. Thompson's Frank Crossan is on the institutional side of a story whose sharpest observation is that the people holding Frances are frightened people with guns rather than a disciplined unit.
The Price · S01E06
Episode 6
First broadcast 1985-02-14 · Derek Thompson as Frank Crossan
The endgame: Geoffrey abandons the official route and turns vigilante, hunting the kidnappers through the network of people connected to the case while the police pull the other way. Thompson's Crossan crosses his path alongside Grehan's Kate and Reid's Clare, in the hour where the two investigations start getting in each other's way.