FERN Britton's actor and director dad Tony has died aged 95.

The TV presenter announced the heartbreaking news this morning on social media as she paid tribute to the legendary actor.

She wrote: "Our father, Tony Britton, died early this morning. Great actor, director and charmer. May flights of angels sing thee to thy rest."

Tony had roles in Operation Amsterdam, Sunday Bloody Sunday and The Day of the Jackal.

He also starred in BBC sitcom Don't Wait Up alongside Nigel Havers and Dinah Sheridan between 1983 and 1990 and had appearances in Robin's Nest and ...And Mother Makes Five.

Tony became an actor after his service in the army during World War Two.

The then 20-year-old was spotted by a local critic in an amateur dramatic production in Weston-super-Mare.

He began his career on stage and appeared at the Old Vic with the Royal Shakespeare Company.

But he moved to TV and film in the 1950s onwards - with his first move role in British action film Operation Amsterdam alongside Peter finch and Eva Bartok.

Tony, who has another daughter named Cherry, split from Fern's mum Ruth when she was a baby.

He remarried sculptor and member of the wartime resistance Eva Castle Britton and had son Jasper.

Speaking about Fern previously, he revealed she shunned a career in acting and instead begged him to do stage management.

He said: "Fern one day presented me with a form and said, 'Dada, sign that,' and it was the form for the Central School of Drama in London.

MOST READ IN TV & SHOWBIZ

"And I saw she had put in, not for acting, but for stage management. And I said, 'What? Why? What? Why don't you want to do the acting?'

"There you are – you're beautiful, you're brilliant, you've got a beautiful personality, you're intelligent, you're all those lovely things! What do you mean, stage management?

"And she said, 'No dada, no acting, not for me!' So she did the stage management course – and killed it absolutely - number one in the class."

ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7tbTErKynZpOke7a3jq2tmqaUqLWww8GisWhpYGqAc4KSa2atp56ueqO%2ByK2rqKZdmbKisIyamq2nomKzpr7NZpmroaSpvK95w5qbaA%3D%3D