Woodward starred as Police Sergeant Neil Howie in the 1973 cult British horror film The Wicker Man, and in the title role of the 1980 Australian biopic Breaker Morant.

[7] In 2004, Woodward, alongside Australian actor Daniel MacPherson, appeared as God in a revival of The Mystery Plays at Canterbury Cathedral.

From a cast of hundreds of local actors, Joseph McManners and Thomas James Longley also featured with smaller speaking roles.

[8] He made occasional appearances until taking the role of Police Sergeant Neil Howie in the thriller The Wicker Man in 1973.

[citation needed] Robin Hardy, who directed The Wicker Man, said, "He was one of the greatest actors of his generation, without a doubt, with a broad career on American television, as well as on British film.

His casting as Guy Crouchback in the 1967 adaption of Evelyn Waugh's Sword of Honour trilogy, dramatised by Giles Cooper and directed by Donald McWhinnie, established him as an actor of quality and standing.

Crouchback was the central character in Waugh's three novels set against the background of Britain's involvement in World War II.

However, the 1967 dramatisation enjoyed a high profile at the time, and it featured several leading actors of that era, including Ronald Fraser, Freddie Jones, Vivian Pickles, Nicholas Courtney, and James Villiers.

Moreover, Evelyn Waugh had met and approved Giles Cooper as the scriptwriter, having their schooling at Lancing College in common, albeit more than a decade apart.

[11] The late 1970s, he spent time on both stage and film, but he had not found recognition and popularity exceeding that of Callan until he took the lead role in the American television series The Equalizer (1985–89) as a former intelligence operative.

[citation needed] During this period, he also starred in the Cold War espionage thriller, Codename: Kyril (1988), as an MI6 double agent.

Subsequently, he starred in the short-lived CBS series Over My Dead Body, which ran in 1990, playing a mystery writer who gets involved in solving real crimes.

His career continued with TV guest-star roles, including an appearance in The New Alfred Hitchcock Presents and Mr. Jones (or Philip, codename Flavius) in the series La Femme Nikita.

Woodward was a wargamer and hosted a series of programmes for Tyne Tees Television[13] in 1978 about the hobby with fellow enthusiast Peter Gilder, who built and owned the beautiful Gettysburg diorama used for one of the gaming scenes from the 1974 film Callan.

His vocal ability and acting skill enabled him to make a number of appearances when time allowed on the BBC's Edwardian era music hall programme, The Good Old Days.

[18] In July 2009, a planned performance of Love Letters, co-starring his wife Michele, was to be postponed because of damage caused to his hip when he fell down the stairs at his West Country home.