STARS from television and North-East sporting heroes gathered last night to mark a special birthday for one of the region's most popular actors.

Robson Green held a fundraising charity dinner at the Gateshead Hilton Hotel to celebrate his 40th birthday.

Celebrity friends on the guest list included actor Stephen Tompkinson, former Newcastle United manager Sir Bobby Robson and Magpies legend Peter Beardsley, Newcastle Falcons manager Rob Andrew and agony aunt Denise Robertson.

Proceeds from the £75-a-ticket event will go to child-ren's charity, the Variety Club.

The party was also a chance to celebrate Mr Green's contribution to the region's television industry.

Green, who is married with a four-year-old son, Taylor, set up his own company, Coastal Productions, eight years ago, with business partner Sandra Jobling.

So far, it has produced the likes of Grafters, in which he starred with Stephen Tompkinson as a pair of sibling builders, Touching Evil III, Wire In The Blood and Take Me.

Next year, viewers can see BBC drama Beaten, where Green stars as a Geordie who abuses his wife.

For fans who can't wait that long, he appears on Monday with fellow North-East actor Mark Benton in Christmas Lights, a one-off ITV comedy about neighbours whose competition to outdo each other's festive illuminations goes too far.