Anecdotes

Studied modern languages at Trinity College, Dublin, and was qualified to teach both Latin and French.

Suffered from Acromegaly for many years.

He was an extremely talented musician, according to friends and co-workers, and played the piano beautifully; but he never did so in any professional venue on stage or screen.

When he played a Cretan character in the TV series Who Pays the Ferryman? (1977) his accent was so good it fooled a group of Greek film makers visiting the set into believing he was actually Greek.

Because of his craggy looks, he was usually typecast as tough guys and villains.

Foreign languages were one of his personal hobbies, but he also put his language skills to use professionally, speaking French in Freewheelers (1968) and Greek in Who Pays the Ferryman? (1977).

Son of a dentist.

McCarthy played Will Thoday in The Nine Tailors (1974) which ends with a disastrous flood in the fen country; McCarthy grew up in the area (Sleaford, Lincolnshire), and witnessed such a flood as a schoolboy in 1947.

Among his contemporaries at the Stamford School were cricketer M. J. K. Smith and author Colin Dexter, creator of Inspector Morse (as well as Morse himself, whom Dexter made an Old Stamfordian).

Buried at Fordingbridge Cemetery, Fordingbridge, New Forest District, Hampshire, England.