Ian Carmichael

Yet the charm that lit up the series of classic Boulting Brothers comedies from the 1950s that made Carmichael one of Britain's most bankable film stars of the era was an accurate reflection of the real man. Carmichael was warm, open, amusing, candid and impeccably well-mannered. Visitors to the 200-year-old farmhouse in the Esk Valley, near Sleights, that he called home for the last 33 years of his life invariably found him the most genial and generous of hosts.

If there was a tinge of regret on his part that he had been typecast as an upper-class silly ass when he had harboured dreams of being a romantic lead in the mould of one of his idols, Rex Harrison, Carmichael's success had its compensations, allowing him at 56 to opt for semi-retirement to the North York Moors where he had met and married his wife of 40 years.

His characterisations of gauche, well-meaning types in films including Private's Progress, Lucky Jim and I'm All Right Jack also brought him a huge following. At the height of his success, he was the best-known British comic actor after Alec Guinness and even an unlikely sex symbol, receiving 600 letters a week from adoring female fans.

Ian Gillett Carmichael, who died on February 5, aged 89, was born in Hull on June 18, 1920, the son of Arthur Carmichael, a prosperous jeweller and silversmith. He sent his son to a boarding school at Scarborough, which he loathed, and later to Bromsgrove College, after which Carmichael studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, before being called up into the 22nd Dragoons in 1940. Early in the war, whilst stationed at Whitby, he met Jean "Pym" Maclean at a dance, and they married in Sleights in 1943.

Carmichael went ashore in Normandy three days after D-Day, but after an accident with a tank turret that amputated part of a finger was moved into a staff officer job, where he proved a brilliant administrator, not least in organising shows for the troops that gave early breaks to comedians Tommy Cooper and Frankie Howerd.

After being demobilised with the rank of major in 1947, Carmichael resumed acting, moving into the West End and doing some work on the fledgling television service. Real success started to come his way in the early 50s, with acclaimed comic performances in a series of revues and then a part in the runaway hit Simon and Laura in 1954, which brought him to the attention of producers John and Roy Boulting, who signed him to a five-film deal that made him a star.

By the mid-60s, Carmichael's film career was on the wane, though starring roles in the West End were as plentiful as ever. It was television that put him back on top with the wider public. After some reluctance, he agreed to play Bertie Wooster in the BBC's adaptations of P G Wodehouse's stories opposite Dennis Price as Jeeves. The series was a huge hit between 1965 and 1968, with Wodehouse himself proclaiming Carmichael as the definitive Wooster.

Carmichael scored another big popular success in the 70s as the aristocratic sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey in adaptations of Dorothy L Sayers's detective stories. Carmichael found the role and its popularity particularly satisfying, since he had spent some six years persuading the BBC to make the series.

In 1976, a year after the last of the Wimsey adaptations, Carmichael sold up in London and began looking for a home in Yorkshire, finding his farmhouse and moving in 1977. From then on, he accepted roles as they took his fancy, joining touring productions, narrating an animated version of the Wind in the Willows, and reprising his roles as Wooster and Wimsey on radio.

Carmichael also continued to accept sporadic roles on TV, appearing as a Scottish laird in the BBC's Strathblair, and Mr Middleditch in ITV's The Royal, making his final appearances in two episodes that have yet to be broadcast.

He was a lifelong devotee of cricket, a member of the MCC, and a past chairman of the Lords' Taverners. He was appointed OBE in 2003.

Carmichael devoted much time and energy to causes close to his heart in the area where he lived, serving as president of the local male voice choir and patron of the Whitby Amateur Dramatic Society. He was a keen collector of fine wines, and also enjoyed hillwalking and salmon fishing in the Esk.

His first wife died in 1983. Nine years later, he married novelist Kate Fenton, who survives him, along with two daughters from his first marriage.