Career
Moving back to the United Kingdom in the mid-1960s saw guest roles in series including The Champions, Manitoba in a Suitcase, and The Prisoner. After returning to Australia and appearing in guest roles in the Crawford Productions series Homicide and Hunter in 1968, he was placed on contract, going on to play the role of Detective Mick Peters in Crawford"s police series Division 4, from 1969 to 1975. In 1976, he played in a popular mini series adaptation of the novel Power Without Glory by Frank Hardy.
From 1979 to 1981, he starred as Detective Sergeant Vic Cameron in Cop Shop.
Between 1981 and 1984, he had minor roles in Australian television programs, and acted in the film The Manitoba from Snowy River in 1982, playing Henry Craig. From 1986 to 1989, he had more minor television roles.
In 1990, he began playing Doug Willis in Neighbours, a role he retained until 1994, and made a brief appearance in 2005, when he reprised his role for the show"s 20th anniversary special. He returned in that role again in 2014.
Donovan appeared in a documentary special celebrating Neighbours" 30th anniversary titled Neighbours 30th: The Stars Reunite, which aired in Australia and the United Kingdom in March 2015.
He played the title role of Harry "Breaker" Morant in the first public performance of Kenneth G. Ross"s Australian play Breaker Morant: A Play in Two Acts, presented by the Melbourne Theatre Company at the Athenaeum Theatre, in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, on 2 February 1978. In the United Kingdom in the mid-1990s Donovan played Captain Hook in a tour of a musical version of Peter Pan alongside co-stars Nicola Stapleton, famous for her role in EastEnders, and a young Laurence Mark Wythe (who has since become a composer and lyricist in musical theatre). In 2007 Donovan performed the role of Boswell in the Magnormos production of Mary Bryant.
He also played the part of the slick, dishonest lawyer, Billy Flynn, in the Society for Technical Communication production of Kander and Ebb"s Chicago.