He played the villainous Al Simpson - father of Sophie (Rebekah Elmaloglou) - in Home and Away for a brief period. Then, a year or so later, newspapers began hyping up that 'Jason Donovan's dad has joined Neighbours' which was quite a big deal considering how Jason had become such a gigantic star stemming from his time on the Australian soap.
I didn't make any connection until I saw Doug Willis in Neighbours. It caused me to realise 'Ohhh, he's the guy who played Al Simpson in Home and Away!'
Donovan's Doug Willis character became a regular and was your typical Aussie. The funny and very random thing, for yours truly, about Doug's building business - Willis Construction - is, during this time, there was business local to me also named 'Willis Construction'. It would be hysterical to see the company's van drive around my area as I made my walk to school.
As an aside, I checked to see if Willis Construction is still in business. I'm happy to report it is!
I believe Terry Donovan left Neighbours somewhere close to the mid-nineties. Maybe a little earlier. He made a few brief returns over the years. His last appearances - as part of a key storyline - saw Doug lose his battle with dementia.
In a fun wrinkle to Doug's return, his character was involved in scenes with his son - Brad (then played by a different actor) and his wife - Terese. The trivia note is Terese was played by Rebekah Elmaloglou, so Donovan's Neighbours and Home and Away characters were both related to those played by Elmaloglou.
Over the past few years, previous work by Donovan has popped up on my screen. He was in a few episodes of Prisoner Cell Block H when I caught old Prisoner eps last year. I also found him in an Aussie heist movie - 1978's Money Movers - on Talking Pictures TV sometime within the past five years or so.
It was recently announced that Terence Donovan has passed away at the age of ninety.
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