Television and film
Warrington originally became well known for playing Philip Smith in Rising Damp, from 1974 to 1978, alongside Leonard Rossiter, Richard Beckinsale, and Frances de la Tour. Warrington also appeared as series regular in the crime drama C.A.T.S. Eyes, as government contact Nigel Beaumont (1985–1987); as General Harris in Impact Earth (2007), and as Judge Ken Winyard in New Street Law.
In 1993 Warrington played television reporter Graham Gaunt in To Play the King, the second part of the BBC's House of Cards trilogy.
He has had smaller roles in many programmes including Red Dwarf, Lovejoy, Manchild, and Diamond Geezer. Warrington portrayed the founder of Time Lord society, Rassilon, in several Doctor Who audio plays, and also appeared as the President of an alternative-universe Great Britain in the Doctor Who episode "Rise of the Cybermen" (2006). Soon after, he recorded an abridged audio book of the Doctor Who novel The Art of Destruction by Stephen Cole.
He is one of the interviewees on the BBC 2 series Grumpy Old Men, and he appears in a series of Kenco coffee advertisements in the United Kingdom in which he plays an African coffee plantation owner. He regularly provides voice-overs for both BBC television and radio.
Warrington has also appeared in BBC1 sitcom The Crouches, which aired from 9 September 2003 until 2005. He played Bailey, who was Roly's boss at a London Underground station in South London. Roly was played by Robbie Gee. Warrington played the role of the Hospital Chaplain in Casualty, assuming the role of Trevor. He also starred in the 2010 film It's a Wonderful Afterlife.
He also appeared in Grange Hill as Mr Peters, the father of pupil Lauren Peters.
He provided voiceover links, reading out the various methods of contacting the show on The Chris Evans Breakfast Show on BBC Radio 2, which was broadcast from 11 January 2010.
Since 2011, Warrington has played Commissioner Selwyn Patterson in the BBC show Death in Paradise.
He also appeared as jazz musician Frederick J. Louden in a BBC radio production of The Devil's Music, written by Alan Plater. In 2011, Warrington played the father of a suspected terrorist in the last series of the BBC drama Waking the Dead. In 2012, he played master of the college Marcus Harding in “Generation of Vipers”, S6:E2 of Lewis.
His film roles included the movie version of Rising Damp (1980), the Kenny Everett horror comedy Bloodbath at the House of Death (1983), The Lion of Africa (1987), Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet (1996), Peter Greenaway's 8½ Women (1999), and the horror film Lighthouse (1999).
