He worked with actors including Laurence Olivier, Peter Sellers, Sean Connery, Judi Dench, Rex Harrison, Rod Steiger, Henry Fonda and Ava Gardner.

[5] After graduation from the University of Toronto, he became a journalist and began writing for Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's nascent television service.

In 1954, his production of Waiting For Gillian won the Daily Mail's National TV Award with actors Patrick Barr and Anne Crawford also honoured.

In 1955, on the night commercial TV first appeared in the UK he was asked by the BBC to offer the main opposition, The Hole In The Wall with Mervyn Johns and Sidney Tafler, of which The Times wrote: "Mr. Rakoff who seems to be a master of this medium".

In 1964, when the new channel BBC 2 was launched Rakoff was selected to direct plays filling the first three Sunday-night drama slots (The Seekers).

[6] In his 1978 production of Romeo & Juliet for the BBC Television Shakespeare series he cast the then unknown actor Alan Rickman as Tybalt.

[7] In 1997 he produced and co-directed the award-winning A Dance to the Music of Time with John Gielgud, Simon Russell Beale, and Miranda Richardson.

In 2010, Rakoff directed A Sentimental Journey, the story of Doris Day, at Wilton's Music Hall, London, and subsequently (2012) El Portal Theatre, Hollywood.

(Nicholas Jones) (written and directed) The Mill at Sonning (Anthony Valentine, Glynis Barber) (Steven Pacey, Shona Lindsay) (Sally Hughes, Glyn Kerslake)