Danny Webb
Danny Webb is an actor, born 1958.
The credit that follows him everywhere is a prisoner called Morse. Webb, a Londoner, played him in Alien3 in 1992, and three decades of English television and film since have not dislodged it from the top of the page, which is slightly unfair to the three decades.
He is a specialist in a job British drama could not run without: the man with authority who is not the lead. Thomas Cromwell in Henry VIII, Ron Conrad in Our Friends in the North, John Ripper in Pennyworth, DS Rory Maxwell in Liar, Hobb in Humans, George Wigg in The Trial of Christine Keeler, Laskin in The Regime, Alan Brooke in Churchill, Inspector Lestrade in a Hound of the Baskervilles. He also did the Doctor Who two-parter in 2006 as John Maynard Jefferson, which is missing from the credits here and which a whole generation knows him for.
What he does well is arrive with a history already attached. Give him a scene of pure procedure and he plays it as a man who has done this before, is not enjoying it, and is not going to explain himself. That reads as depth for free, and directors keep buying it.
The interesting outlier is Locke, where he is Cassidy, one of the voices on the other end of the phone in a film that is otherwise one man in a car. It is a performance with no face at all, and it works.
The range runs from No End in 1985 to Ser Arlan of Pennytree in A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms in 2026, which is a long time to be the person everyone recognises and nobody can name.
Movies (23)
- Alien³ (1992)
- Valkyrie (2008)
- Hummingbird (2013)
- Criminal (2016)
- A Little Chaos (2015)
- The Dig (2021)
- Locke (2014)
- Henry V (1989)
- Churchill (2017)
- Robin Hood (1991)
- Silent Hours (2021)
- On the Sea (2025)
- The Upside of Anger (2005)
- Defence of the Realm (1986)
- True Blue (1996)
- Never Grow Old (2019)
- Attack Force (2006)
- The Courageous Heart of Irena Sendler (2009)
- City of Tiny Lights (2016)
- The Hound of the Baskervilles (2002)
- Crow (2016)
- No End (1985)
- Pegasus Bridge
TV (19)
- A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (2026)
- Pennyworth: The Origin of Batman's Butler (2019)
- Humans (2015)
- Lark Rise to Candleford (2008)
- Boon (1986)
- Plebs (2013)
- The Regime (2024)
- Land Girls (2009)
- Our Friends in the North (1996)
- Cardiac Arrest (1994)
- Liar (2017)
- Murder in Suburbia (2004)
- Jo (2013)
- Life Begins (2004)
- Murder City (2004)
- Shackleton (2002)
- Henry VIII (2003)
- The Trial of Christine Keeler (2019)
- The Scarlet Pimpernel (1999)
Where to start with Danny Webb
Alien³ is where most people meet him and it is a reasonable start, though be warned that the film is the most argued-over entry in its franchise and Morse is a supporting part in a large, angry ensemble.
The better introduction to what he actually does is Our Friends in the North, which is one of the finest things British television has made and a far better showcase for the register he works in.
Then take your period. Henry VIII has him as Cromwell, the most substantial historical role on the list. The Trial of Christine Keeler is the sharpest of the recent dramas, and Pennyworth: The Origin of Batman's Butler is the pulpiest, with him plainly enjoying himself as John Ripper.
For a curiosity, Locke is a film in which he never appears on screen and is still one of its best performances. Humans is the science fiction pick, and A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is the 2026 role that will introduce him to a much larger audience.