My friend Willie Payne, who has died aged 94, was a Nigerian actor and dancer from the generation of West Africans who arrived in the UK as seamen during the second world war.
He was born William Ishola Payne in Lagos, the son of Ishmael, a civil servant of Ijebu descent, and his wife, Angelina (nee Johnson). His paternal great-grandfather, John Augustus Ontonba Payne, served in the British administration of Nigeria in the 1860s and published diaries and almanacs that are a key source for modern historians.
When he was seven, an uncle took Willie east to Calabar to do missionary work and he remained there until he was 12. He then returned to Lagos to live with his grandmother and go to secondary school. He went to sea soon after the start of the war, eventually landing in Hull in 1942. He made his way to Liverpool, where he worked at a munitions factory in Kirby and linked up with his fellow countrymen, including the future bandleader Bobby Benson, before moving to London.
At the Caribbean Club, near Piccadilly, he met Josie Woods, a dynamic, mixed race East Ender who taught him to tap dance and introduced him to Brixton’s then small black community, which predated the arrival in 1948 of West Indian people aboard the Empire Windrush.
Calling themselves Ken Ross and Lucille, Willie and Josie toured Sweden with the band of the Jamaican trumpeter Leslie “Jiver” Hutchinson. Then in 1952 they returned to Lagos, where they opened a dance school.
Willie, who had taken saxophone lessons while with Hutchinson, formed a band he named the Squadronaires in which he played tenor saxophone and sang calypsos. Josie soon went back to Britain, but Willie remained in Nigeria for a further four years, working as a dance compere and on the radio.
He married Olayinka de la Cruz and and returned to the UK with her and their son, Olusegun. After recording a song in praise of three Nigerian political leaders, he abandoned his musical career in favour of the theatre.
With Yemi Ajibade, Willie Jonah and others he formed the pioneering West African Drama Group and worked extensively in film, television, radio and theatre. In 1968 he donned a kilt in the McGregor Brothers, a vocal quartet that a long friendship with entertainer Des O’Connor helped to establish. While working at the London Palladium around that time, Willie met Jackie Young, who became a studio administrator at Pye Records and his partner.
On television and in film, Willie worked alongside Bob Hope, Lauren Bacall, Patrick McGoohan, Alec Guiness, Joan Fontaine, Spike Milligan, Dudley Moore, Bruce Forsythe, David Kossoff and Peggy Mount. He appeared in Dixon of Dock Green, The Professionals and EastEnders and acted until the loss of his sight forced his retirement in the 1990s.
He is survived by Jackie and his son, Segun.