Fortune's early work included contributions to
Peter Cook's
Establishment Club team Fortune's other work with John Bird included their series of satirical sketches
The Long Johns, in which one interviewed the other, the latter being in the guise of a senior figure such as a politician, businessman or government consultant. The sketches earned several BAFTA award nominations, winning the Television Light Entertainment Performance award in 1997. In one episode, they were two of the very first to predict the
2008 financial crisis during an episode of
The South Bank Show broadcast on 14 October 2007. In Fortune's latter years, he featured in the
Radio 4 sitcom ''
Ed Reardon's Week, playing the head of a literary agency and as theatrical agent Mel Simons in a 2008 episode of New Tricks''. Fortune died on 31 December 2013, aged 74. His agent Vivienne Clore said he died peacefully, with his wife Emma and dog Grizelle at his bedside. == Filmography ==