Grand dames
MARION MCMULLEN looks back at who else has been made a Great British dame as Mary Berry and Maureen Lipman join their ranks
BAKING queen Mary Berry and Coronation Street’s Maureen Lipman were both made dames in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list and join an illustrious list of groundbreaking women.
Former Great British Bake Off judge Mary was marked out for the honour after six decades of cookery broadcasting and writing.
The 85-year-old also received a CBE eight years ago for services to culinary arts and has written more than 70 cookbooks.
Maureen is being recognised for services to charity, entertainment and the arts following her 50-year career in TV and film. The 74-yearold, who plays Evelyn Plummer on Corrie, made one of her early big screen appearances in 1968 film Up The Junction, starring alongside Dennis Waterman and Suzy Kendall. She also appeared in the BT adverts of the 1980s as doting gran Beattie.
Those that have been given the royal seal of approval in the past include Helen Mirren who was made a dame in 2000. Talk show host Michael Parkinson called her “the sex queen of the Royal Shakespeare Company” in 1975, and the 75-year-old star of The Queen and has played a monarch six times in films.
She once said: “Actors are rogues and vagabonds – or they ought to be. I can’t stand it when they behave like solicitors from Penge. I’m a would-be rebel. The good girl who’d like to be a bad one.”
Movies like Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music made Julie Andrews an international star, but she first appeared on the stage when she was just a child. Both her parents were music hall performers. By the age of 20 she was starring in Cinderella at the London Palladium.
The 85-year-old became a dame in 1999 and has said: “I was raised never to carp about things and never to moan because in vaudeville, which is my background, you just got on with it...”
Maggie Smith has won two Oscars and appeared in Downton Abbey and the Harry Potter films. She was made a dame in 1990.
The 85-year-old began her career at the Oxford Playhouse in the 1950s, appearing alongside Laurence Olivier in Othello in 1965. “I longed to be bright and most certainly never was,” she said. “I was rather hopeless, I suspect.”
Oscar winner Judi Dench, aged 85, has played James
Bond’s boss M, Queen Elizabeth I and booked into The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. She was made a dame in 1988, but said earlier this year she loathes being referred to as a national treasure because she does not want to be a relic. The late Diana Rigg caused a stir as action woman Emma Peel in 1960s TV series The Avengers before going on to appear in the James Bond film On Her Majesty’s Secret Service as 007’s wife. The 82-yearold, who became a dame in 1994, made her professional stage debut in 1957 and won a new generation of fans in TV hit Game of Thrones as the waspish Olenna Tyrell. “I think I was quite daring,” she has said of her early career. “I was once escorted out of a restaurant because I was wearing a trouser suit. It wasn’t considered good breeding for a woman to go around in trousers after 6pm.” Gosford Park’s Eileen Atkins has been a dame since 2001 and the 86-year-old created 1970s TV series Upstairs Downstairs with Jean Marsh. She was born in a Salvation Army Women’s Hostel in north London and a drama teacher helped her lose her Cockney accent. Keeping Up Appearances star Patricia Routledge said when she was made a dame three years ago: “I’m very surprised indeed, but very pleased that the honour pertains to theatre.”
The 91-year-old studied English at Liverpool University and began her career at the Liverpool Playhouse.
Joan Collins, aged 87, joined the dame ranks in 2015 and once explained: “I came into this business to be a theatre actress. I was nine when I first appeared on stage.”
Murder, She Wrote and Bedknobs and Broomstricks star Angela Lansbury, aged 94, has been a dame since 2014. Her career spans almost eight decades, and she first came to prominence in the 1944 film Gaslight. She also starred as sleuth Jessica Fletcher in 264 episodes of Murder, She Wrote.
Angela has been nominated for three Oscars during her career and played Elvis Presley’s mother in 1961 film Blue Hawaii – even though she was only 10 years older than him.
She said on being made a dame: “I’m joining a marvellous group of women I greatly admire like Judi Dench and Maggie Smith. It’s a lovely thing to be given that nod of approval by your own country.”
ACROSS
1. Man losing a mouth organ to the orchestra (12) 7. Move flesh to the ledge (5) 8. Fool from Antwerp (5) 9. Animal you might sound like (3) 10. He makes shorts (9) 11. Support for a monarch? (6) 12. Demonstrate at the cricket match (6) 15. Cut trees, perhaps, for three months (9) 17. Estimated time of arrival of a Greek character (3) 18. Leaves out nothing before the motorway meets the backstreet (5) 19. Separate what the actor wants (5) 21. A boost when winged (4,2,3,3)
DOWN
1. 2. 3. 4. Strong Some Don’t The toper instance to hurry tailor at accept of declaration (3) Euston, (12) the leaving thieves rubbish for in about have (6) 5. One better perfect transaction condition? (5) that’s (9) 6. Belief communication? in a medium (12) of 7. Curse terrible wares (5) 10. Plates, bowls, etc. made of denser tin, perhaps (6,3) 13. Build upright (5) 14. Strive to get a melody (6) 16. Hibernian girl at the hospital (5) 20. Remains of a smoking tree? (3)