He became a stage star at age 24 and, two years later, was chosen for his first film role, in Claude Whatham's That will Be the Day (1974), produced by David Puttnam -- based in part on the producer's boyhood and set in the early '60s, principally at a holiday camp, the movie (which co-starred Ringo Starr, then still basking in the glow of post-Beatles stardom, the it is Keith Moon, and one-time roc