Character: Group Captain Lawrence Smythe
Actor: Peter Blythe
Episode: Enemy Fire

Peter Blythe drew on his experience of National Service to create Group Captain Lawrence Smythe in Foyle's War.

"I grew up near Sheffield and as we lived in a coal and steel area we were bombed regularly. It was so exciting for a young boy to pick up pieces of shrapnel the next morning and I couldn't wait to go into the Royal Air Force.

"I did three years of National Service and I was on a station where pilots, navigators and gunners used to come for refresher courses. It was very interesting. I really enjoyed the comradeship and being away from home with lots of people from very different backgrounds.

"Having had the experience of being in the RAF, I knew people like Group Captain Smythe who lived for their work. You bumped into characters like him all the time. I wasn't terrified of them - I just didn't understand them."

Military doctor Smythe is unimpressed by surgeon Patrick Jamieson (Bill Paterson), who puts on parties for his patients as part of their recovery process.

"I played him as someone who had been married, quite unhappily. His wife went off with someone who was not quite their social strata and he was never interested in women after that. He lives for his rules and disciplines and is very buttoned up. I think he envies people who have a free spirit," says Peter.

"I had an authentic uniform and that helped terribly once I put it on, it made me a bit more rigid and quite anonymous. It was very comfortable and warm to wear, too - I loved it.

"Smythe is totally opposite to me, thank God, as he is very confrontational. But it was fun to do and good to work with Bill Paterson who has such a gregarious nature. He is great and it was very easy to work against that."

Peter has worked with Michael Kitchen on an episode of Inspector Morse, filmed in Italy. His other credits include playing Tom King in The Alan Clark Diaries, The Falklands Play, My Family, Dalziel and Pascoe, Moving Story, Love on A Branch Line and Only Fools and Horses. He recently appeared in Henry V at the National Theatre.