He attended the Coopers' Company's School in Tredegar Square, Bow, London, and became interested in acting after visits to the Hackney Empire.

Bresslaw's catchphrase, in his strong Cockney accent, was "I only arsked" (sic), first used in The Army Game,[5] and later revived in Carry On Camping (1969).

Because of his height, he was briefly considered for the part of the Creature in Hammer's Curse of Frankenstein (1957), which ultimately went instead to 6 ft 5 in (1.96 m) Christopher Lee.

[citation needed] Bresslaw, together with Miriam Margolyes, appeared with English comedienne Maureen Lipman in a series of British Telecom advertisements in the late 1980s.

Bresslaw and Margolyes played Gerald and Dolly, a nervous couple who drop in unannounced on Lipman's character Beatrice "Beattie" Bellman and her husband Harry.

[3] He had collapsed in the green room at the Open Air Theatre in Regent's Park, London, where he was to play Grumio in the New Shakespeare Company's production of Taming of the Shrew.