"I have spent most of my life working in the theatre - which is always my greatest love - but the films and television were the providers of the little luxuries of life."
The utterly marvellous Hermione Baddeley would have been 110 years old today...
Facts:
- She started her long acting career in the 1920s, but her big breakthrough was as 'Ida' in the classic film noir Brighton Rock in 1947.
- Her sister Angela was most famous for playing 'Mrs Bridges' in Upstairs Downstairs.
- Her first marriage was to the arch-decadent aesthete Stephen's brother The Hon. David Pax Tennant, socialite and BBC announcer; their first date was a double-date with none other than Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon (later HM The Queen Mother) and her escort.
- Miss Baddeley was teamed up with her inimitable namesake Hermione Gingold in Noël Coward's stage comedy Fallen Angels, though the two women were apparently "no longer on speaking terms" by the end of the run.
- Her 1961 LP A Taste Of Hermione Baddeley is notable for the presence of the rather brilliantly-titled track I Changed My Sex A Week Ago Today (a copy of which - inevitably! - we have in our collection here at Dolores Delargo Towers; it does not, however, appear to be anywhere on the interwebs now).
- After her success playing the maid in Mary Poppins, she had a lucrative career on US television, in such shows as Bewitched, Little House on the Prairie and Maude; she died at her home in Los Angeles.
and and and she was mrs. cratchit in 1951 "a christmas carol".
ReplyDelete"There never was such a goose!"
DeleteJx
"sit yourself down by the fire and have a nice warm, the lord bless you!"
DeleteIs Hermione another of Laurence Harvey's older women? Didn't she have that tiny part in his ROOM AT THE TOP ?
ReplyDeleteIndeed. She famously said at dinner: "I think I shall risk the halibut. It can't be too awful, can it? After you've lived with Laurence Harvey, nothing in life is ever really too awful again."
DeleteJx
Love it. I will be quoting that remark later today at the Kings Arms pub in Poland Street, where I am meeting a movie buff pal who is partial to Larry and his older dames. She got an Oscar nomination as best supporting actress for that few minutes in ROOM AT THE TOP.
DeleteWe love Stanley Baxter sending up her sister Angela as Mrs Bridges in his UPSTAIRS DOWNSTAIRS spoof.
Glad to hear the Kings Arms continues to provide a space for we theatrical types who are "partial to Larry"... Jx
DeletePS We adore Mr Baxter - one performing genius who is, thankfully, still with us!