RTS Programme Awards 2014

“[The] recipient has had an extraordinary career in theatre as well as television, appearing in All My Sons, Othello, The Merchant of Venice, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, A Long Day's Journey Into Night, The Way We Live Now, Great Expectations, Maxwell and Blott on the Landscape, amongst many, many others.  He is currently in rehearsal for a world tour of The Last Confession. There is, however, one role with which he is synonymous...
In November last year a legendary TV series came to an end. After an extraordinary 25 years the final episode of Agatha Christie's Poirot was broadcast on ITV, and there can be few actors who have made a role so their own as the man who played Hercule Poirot for that quarter century.
The Christie family were delighted to see our recipient suggested for the part and it's now hard to imagine a better choice for playing the little Belgian with his "little grey cells."  In fact Mathew Prichard, Agatha Christie's grandson, has said how he wishes his grandmother had had the chance to see the portrayal which, as he put it, "conveys to the viewer just enough of the irritation we always associate with a perfectionist."
The very public mourning as the curtain came down on Poirot is a testament to the affection held for the series and David, but it's also worth noting how there was a slight undercurrent of surprise in some commentators' reactions - it's as though Poirot had become such a familiar part of the furniture that we simply hadn't imagined a world without him. This is a testimony to David's performance, it was immaculate but unshowy, so true that he simply was Poirot, so real and part of television's DNA that we couldn't conceive of him not being there; to borrow part of a famous quote from Prince Charles, Poirot was "an elegant and much-loved friend."
But perhaps the funniest moment in the reaction to Poirot's death was during Channel 4's Googlebox. Whilst we watched a family watching Curtain, a teenage boy (and certainly not the most obvious Poirot fan), was absolutely flabbergasted when David peeled off his moustache. "You mean to say the moustache was false!!!," he stammered.
It was perhaps the most famous moustache on TV and David's fame will live on as he goes down in television history as the exemplar of an actor delivering a definitive performance.  To do that for a quarter of a century is truly extraordinary.”