The character actor Stephen Greif, who has died aged 78, performed with the Royal Shakespeare Company and at the National Theatre during Laurence Olivier’s time as artistic director before carving out a television career, best remembered for playing the villain of the piece in the cult sci-fi series Blake’s 7 and the sitcom Citizen Smith.
In Blake’s 7, he played Travis, the evil Terran Federation’s ruthless one-eyed space commander hunting down the resistance group on Earth led by Roj Blake (played by Gareth Thomas). As well as wearing black leather, Travis was distinctive for his eyepatch and prosthetic arm with a built-in Lazeron destroyer – the result of wounds sustained in a previous encounter with his nemesis.
