Stuart Golland was born in Sheffield on 3rd August 1945, the third of four children of John and Florence Golland, who lived in the Pitsmoor area of the city, later moving to Shiregreen. He left school at fifteen, and eventually settled on an apprenticeship as a plasterer, taking the opportunity to work in various parts of Britain. During a plastering contract in Cardiff, he attended evening classes at the Welsh College of Music and Drama, and was inspired to pursue a career as an actor by seeing a performance of the Royal Shakespeare Company’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ directed by Peter Brook.

In 1972, Stuart Golland successfully applied to the Phildene Stage School in Chiswick, London, obtained his Equity card and sought work as an actor. Between 1974 and 1978, he worked with seven alternative theatre companies, including Rough Theatre and Foco Novo. In the late 1970s, he returned to Yorkshire and became a founder member of the Broken Glass Theatre Company, later working for a number of other regional and touring companies. In the 1980s, he directed and appeared in a range of stage plays in York, Bradford, Manchester, Leeds, and at the National Theatre in London. In the early 1990s, he was deeply involved in the establishment of Joseph’s Well Theatre in Leeds, and acted in and directed a number of plays locally.

Stuart Golland wrote a number of plays, most notably ‘Scrap’ (1979), a one-man comedy about a Sheffield scrap merchant, ‘The Understudy’ (1988), and ‘The Boy from Philadelphia’ (1992), a play about W.C. Fields.

Stuart Golland also worked on radio, in film and on television, including a number of well-known television series such as ‘All Creatures Great and Small’, ‘Last of the Summer Wine’, ‘The New Statesman’, ‘Rumpole of the Bailey’, ‘Emmerdale Farm’, and ‘Waterfront Beat’. He was perhaps best known for playing George Ward, landlord of the Aidensfield Arms, in ‘Heartbeat’, and his last role was as Ernie Wagstaff in ‘Coronation Street’.

Stuart Golland died on 11th September 2003.