Michael Brandon reveals his pain on ITV’s Stepping Out and excitement for A View From The Bridge

To say Michael Brandon has had a long and varied career is something of an understatement.

There’s the iconic Dempsey and Makepeace, of course, not to mention playing Jerry Springer in a stage musical, voicing Thomas the Tank Engine and dancing badly with wife Glynis Barber on ITV show, Stepping Out.

While he’d happily step back into any of those aforementioned roles, it’s unlikely we’ll ever see him on the dancefloor again.

His experience two years ago on Stepping Out, where celebrity couples competed against each other, was a rather painful one and not, he says, what he and Glynis signed up for.

He said: “On the first day, we had no warm-up and then worked for 12 hours with six choreographers. We were doing some serious dancing so they could see where our attributes lay.

“I broke my foot years ago and as I shifted my weight I heard it go pop. It turned out to be a fracture. Every night I had to soak my foot in ice and get physiotherapy.

“No one ever said anything about it on air. I asked the producer if we should mention it and he said I could if I wanted, but if I’d done it then it would just have sounded like I was whingeing.

“And on the day of filming, judges were added to the format. We were only doing it for fun and would never have taken part if we knew we were going to be judged. My foot took almost a year to heal afterwards.”

Not that Michael, who turns 70 this month, is bitter about the experience. In fact, it’s hard to imagine him getting wound up about anything.

As he chats from his hotel room while preparing for another night on stage in Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge, he seems completely relaxed with where he is in his life and career.

“I learned a long time ago to just take each day as it comes.

“One day you might be shooting a movie with Anthony Hopkins and Shirley MacLaine (A Change of Season) where you have a huge trailer and your own coffee machine, and the next you could be doing a play like the last one I was in, Long Road South, where we had no dressing rooms and needed to change behind the toilets.”

As for TV, he’ll next be seen reprising his role of network boss Elliot Salad in the fourth series of the Golden Globe-winning Episodes, starring Matt LeBlanc.

He’s also appeared in everything from The Bill and Casualty to Doctor Who and the Catherine Tate Show. But it’s Dempsey and Makepeace, the smash-hit cop show first shown 30 years ago, that he’ll forever be remembered for.

Audiences peaked at 20 million but it gave him more than just a ratings winner.

“It was where I met Glynis and we’ve been married 25 years now. We had a great time, but unfortunately the show ended all too soon. I didn’t know what to expect when I signed up for it.

“I was leaving my country and it just felt like everything was different over here. Who could ever have imagined it would turn out like it did? It could have run longer, it should have run longer and it could still come back.

“If they don’t hurry up with it, we would have to chase down the bad guys in our zimmer frames!

Seriously, if the show ever does come back, we would need to be in the background while a young new couple took over.

“My attitude to it now is if it happens, it happens, but it would be great to do it while people still remember.”

Michael was nominated for a Laurence Olivier Theatre Award for his performance in the controversial Jerry Springer The Opera.

“It was a brilliant piece and I loved it. The music was fantastic and it was hysterically funny.

“When I was doing the show, I didn’t see any protests. It was only when the BBC did a telecast of it, at a time I wasn’t involved in the show, that the protests began.

“I think the fallout from that cancelled my opportunity to take it to Broadway, which was a shame.”

Less controversial is Arthur Miller’s masterpiece, A View from the Bridge, which Michael brings to Edinburgh’s King’s Theatre from April 28, playing Alfieri.

“As a Brooklyn ghetto-born street kid, this play takes me home and I’ve used a lot of personal stuff to bring it to life. This is the first time I’ve done it and it’s been great.”

A View From The Bridge, Edinburgh’s King’s Theatre, April 28 to May 2.