Legendary broadcaster Ralph Pixton, MBE, has died, almost 40 years after the former Shakespearean actor first swept into RTHK's offices to ask for a job.
Over the decades that followed until he retired last October, he became recognised for many years as the voice of English-language radio in Hong Kong.
His Open Line programme built a large and loyal audience and helped solve difficulties great and small, from passports to pollution, for many listeners.
Associates were shocked and saddened to hear that Pixton, 65, had died in the early hours of yesterday morning of pneumonia at Prince of Wales Hospital, after a long period of declining health.
The man who recruited him in 1963, Ted Thomas, praised Pixton as a consummate broadcaster, an icon and a Hong Kong institution. Bachelor Pixton had been part of a travelling troupe of Shakespearean actors run by Geoffrey and Laura Kendal, parents of British actress Felicity, when they met.
Mr Thomas recalled Pixton, a tall and dramatic figure, sweeping into his office wearing a cape and asking for a job in his commanding baritone. Asked if he had relevant experience, he had boomed: 'I am an act-or.' Pixton had also been a tea planter in India and a policeman in Britain.