He then trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama and changed his name to Christopher Blake, because there was another Peter Gray registered with the actors' union, Equity.

After That's My Boy, Blake continued in character parts in episodic television, but never managed to land the more prominent roles that he had enjoyed earlier in his career.

He wrote two episodes ("Dancing in the Dark" and "Endangered Species") of the ITV crime serial A Touch of Frost with his writing partner Tony Charles.

A talented all-round cricketer since his youth in Australia, he played the game throughout his life, including for The Lord's Taverners and William Franklyn's team, the Sargentmen, which raised money for the Malcolm Sargent Cancer Fund for Children.

In early 2004 after an aggressive and rare form of Non-Hodgkin lymphoma was diagnosed, Blake received treatment at the Royal Marsden Hospital in Surrey.