English Heritage will install a blue plaque for Peter Cushing, the actor perhaps best known for his performance as Grand Moff Tarkin in Star Wars.

The announcement was made today on Star Wars Day, a date that annually celebrates the film franchise. Star Wars Day takes place on May the fourth, in reference to the movie's famous catchphrase 'may the force be with you'.

The plaque will be installed at his former home in what is now the London Borough of Croydon in July. Cushing lived here with his family during his school years.

Appearing on the radio, stage, television and in a staggering 91 films, Cushing is acclaimed as one of Britain's finest actors. He specialised in the genres of fantasy and horror, appearing in 23 films by Hammer Film Productions (of 'Hammer Horror' fame) including The Curse of Frankenstein (1956), Dracula (1958) and The Mummy (1959).

As Tarkin in Star Wars (1976), Cushing played a high-ranking Imperial governor and commander of the Death Star. Fans welcomed his posthumous return to the screen in the recent Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), which saw Tarkin brought back to cinematic life by state-of-the-art visual effects.

Howard Spencer, Senior Historian for English Heritage Blue Plaques, said:

'Described as never having given a bad performance, Peter Cushing was an incredibly accomplished actor with a varied career ranging from Shakespearean theatre to blood-curdling horror, or 'fantasy' as he preferred it to be called.

'His early portrayal of Baron Frankenstein in Hammer Film Productions' The Curse of Frankenstein (1956) took his career to another level with a legion of films to follow, but it was the epic Star Wars for which he gained international fame.

Cushing died of cancer at the Pilgrim's Hospice in 1994, aged 81.

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