He played Baldrick in the BBC television sitcom Blackadder and has presented many historical documentaries, including the Channel 4 series Time Team and The Worst Jobs in History.

[1] Too young to attend the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, Robinson enrolled at the Central School of Speech and Drama in 1963, graduating in 1966.

Through genealogical research, Robinson found that one of his great-great-great grandmothers, Julia Levy, was Jewish; his father, unaware of this ancestry, had been beaten by Fascists in the East End of London in the 1930s who assumed he was a Jew.

[12] He also appeared in the award-winning Horizon documentary Joey, and in the title role in the BBC production of The Miracle of Brother Humphrey.

In addition to his acting on Blackadder, Robinson also wrote and narrated several Jackanory-style children's programmes, encouraged by Richard Curtis.

After Blackadder, Robinson became the narrator and one of the lead actors for the British animated series Nellie the Elephant, based on the song of the same name.

Robinson also presented the early-Saturday evening series Stay Tooned for BBC 1, which featured a selection of classic Warner Bros. and MGM cartoons.

In 1989, after attending a pantomime at Tyndale Baptist Church, Bristol, which was based on the Robin Hood story but featuring Maid Marian as the lead role, he created the children's comedy series Maid Marian and her Merry Men, a loose retelling of the legend of Robin Hood in which he appeared as the Sheriff of Nottingham.

In 1999, Robinson returned to star as Baldrick in a one-off short film in the Blackadder series, made to celebrate the new millennium.

Robinson also contributed the voiceover for the television series Airline screened from 1999 and focusing on the daily routine of EasyJet staff at a selection of airports.

In addition to telling his own stories, Robinson narrated the abridged audiobook versions of Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels.

He followed on this Discworld work by playing a role in the live action television dramatisation of Hogfather, broadcast on Sky over the Christmas season in 2006.

He revealed on the BBC Radio 2 feature "Tracks of My Years" that his favourite songs are: "I Can Help" by Billy Swan, "Bleeding Love" by Leona Lewis, "Chasing Cars" by Snow Patrol, "Beautiful" by Christina Aguilera, "Unfinished Sympathy" by Massive Attack, "Tangled Up In Blue" by Bob Dylan, "Shoulda Woulda Coulda" by Beverley Knight, "This Woman's Work" by Maxwell, "He's So Fine" by the Chiffons, and "Falling Slowly" by the Frames.

In July 2009, Robinson appeared in the light-hearted BBC1 series Hotel Babylon as a sly hit-man named Arthur Barnes.

[14] In September 2013, Robinson played the Fool in the Gala Performance of William Shakespeare's King Lear at the Old Vic in London, directed by Jonathan Miller .

[15] In 2014, Robinson played the title role in a touring production of The Hypochondriac, Richard Bean's new translation of Molière's Le malade imaginaire, directed by Lindsay Posner.

In 1994, Robinson began presenting Time Team, a TV programme devoted to archaeological investigations limited to three days.

[citation needed] Also with Channel 4, he presented Tony Robinson's Crime and Punishment, Catastrophe and Man on Earth focusing on humanity's struggle with climate change in the past 200,000 years.

Filmed in High Definition, the series roughly follows a chronology from the earliest sightings of Terra Australis Incognita through to the present with each era defined by a theme rather than equal blocks of time.

The series uncovers stories that shaped the character of various cities and suburbs around Australia, including Fremantle, Melbourne, Hobart, Woolloomooloo, Bendigo, Newcastle, Carlton, Brisbane, St Kilda, Adelaide, Canberra, Kalgoorlie, Townsville and Launceston.

The show's ratings were falling, causing Channel 4 to pursue an alternative "innovative" approach to historical documentary programming.

Featuring such key figures as Wyatt Earp, Geronimo and Buffalo Bill,[30] it included artefacts and stereographic images.

[45] From 1996 to 2000, Robinson was vice-president of the actors' union Equity, helping with a restructuring programme which turned a £500,000 deficit into a small surplus.

[13] Robinson was active in the Make Poverty History campaign in 2005,[47] and is the patron for UK-based charity Street Child Africa.

[50] Robinson has shown his support for the Burma Campaign UK, an NGO that aims to highlight human rights violations in Myanmar under the State Peace and Development Council.

[52][53] On 23 June 2018, Robinson appeared at the People's Vote march in London to mark the second anniversary of the referendum to leave the European Union.

People's Vote was a campaign group calling for a referendum on the final Brexit deal between the UK and the European Union.

[citation needed] In late 2009, Robinson was invited to be guest speaker at the Pride of Craegmoor Awards, where he gave a speech about his time with his mother and finding a care home.