Parliamo Bafta? Showbusiness legend Baxter honoured by stars at awards
Sir Billy Connolly, Ford Kiernan, Alan Cum ming and Elaine C Smith were among the S cots stars to pay tribute to Stanley Baxter as he was recognised for an outstanding contribution to film and TV at the Bafta Scotland Awards.
The Glasgow-born enterta in er made a rare public appearance during the awards.
Sir Billy said: “I know that you don’t like this kind of thing, but you deserve it. Nobody deserves it more. The work you put in in the 60s and 70s it stands on its own. You’re a marvel.”
Baxter ,94, spent decades in the lime light thanks to his long-running TV shows, which featured sketches such as Parliamo Glasgow, a spoof of a popular Tv-based Italian language course, and his appearance sin Christmas pantomimes until he bowed out in the early 1990s.
In a video message recorded at his home in London, Baxter said: “I don’t think I could have been anything else but a performer. I was so rotten at everything else I tried to do.
"Normally at school, you know, you find out there, what you have a talent for, and it turned out I had no talent at all, but really it gave me all my interest with showbusiness.”
Cumming said: “I really do think that Stanley has – inadvertently probably – given me the sort of outlook I have on acting and writing and eve - rything I do really, because so many of the things he was parodying, those sketches and big musical numbers and ever ything I saw as a little boy.” The event saw the time-travel fantasy series Outlander, which is made in Scotland, win a new audience award, ahead of hit dramas River City, Guilt and The Nest.
Edinburgh-set crime thriller Guilt won the categories for best scripted TV programme and best director.
Scottish-Rwandan actor Ncuti Gatwa, who was brought up in Edinburgh and Fife, was named best TV actor for his starring role in the hit Netflix comedy-drama Sex Educ ation.
Being Gail Porter, which portrayed the Edinburgh-born star’ sri se to fame and subsequent battles with“depression, anorexia, self-harming and homelessness”, was named best single documentary.
In a video message accepting the award, Porter said: “This is so cool. My bathroom is going to look fabulous.”
The entertainment category was won by a Scot Squad spinoff which saw Jack Docherty’s character Chief Commissioner Cameron Miekelson grill Scotland's political leaders.
Veteran actress Glenda Jackson won the best TV actress award for her role as a dementia suffer erin the BBC Scotland drama Elizabeth is Missing, an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Emma Healey.
She said :“Dementia is an issue I’ ve been banging on about for quite some time.
"We live in a society where we are living longer and illnesses which we didn’t know about because we died before they could strike us are striking is now. It was a wonderful book and an excellent script.
"It was a real privilege to be part of it.”
Screen writer Paul Laver ty was honoured for Sorry We Missed You, his latest collaboration with director Ken Lo ach, which depicts the struggles of a deliver y driver on a zero hours contract.