Timothy Spall explains his two simple weight-loss rules

Actor Timothy Spall has explained his two simple – but not necessarily easy to follow – weight-loss rules.

The BAFTA-nominated star returns to our screens in The Sixth Commandment. He play Peter Farquhar in the new BBC drama about the murders committed by Ben Field in Buckinghamshire in 2015 and 2017.

Spall rose to fame as Brummy builder Barry in Auf Wiedersehen, Pet. And he was the villainous Peter Pettigrew in Harry Potter movie franchise.

However, as Spall’s star rose, his waist-line started to shrink. He has previously told the Radio Times: “I wanted to change my lifestyle and lose weight and it’s done what I’d always hoped it might.

“As a character actor, it’s put me in a position where I’m not hobbled by being a certain shape. I’m no longer that avuncular round bloke. It does feel liberating on many levels.”

However, his change of image also felt like a risk. He told The Independent: “I knew it was risky because it can shut doors. But I knew that if I was lucky it would also liberate me.

“I don’t know whether I’ve missed out on [parts], but only because nobody’s ever called me up and said, ‘Ahh, we were going to use you when you were fat but now we can’t’.”

So, how did he manage his dramatic transformation? Spall told ITV star Lorraine Kelly: “If I was going to write a diet book, it would be two pages. The first one is, food and booze is lovely and exercise is horrible.

“Right, turn over the page. If you eat too much and drink too much, you put on weight. If you eat about the right amount, you don’t. And that’s it really.”

In his latest role, he plays the much-admired former teacher Peter Farquhar – who was brutally murdered by Ben Field, a warden at Stowe Parish Church in Buckinghamshire.