Anne Reid (born 28 May 1935)
is BAFTA Award-nominated English
film and
television actress from Newcastle upon Tyne
, best known for her roles as Valerie Tatlock in Coronation
Street
and Jean in Dinnerladies.
Television
Val Barlow
Reid's
first major role was Valerie Tatlock
on Coronation
Street. Her character was very popular with
the fans with Valerie's marriage to
Ken Barlow being an early
example of a soap
supercouple. Her
character Valerie was the mother of the twins Susan and Peter. Reid
joined the cast, initially for two months, starting in August 1961
and leaving in October 1961. She returned to the programme to marry
Ken Barlow on August 1, 1962 in a wedding watched by 15.8 million
viewers. Her character was very popular and in 1965 when she and
Ken had twins, Granada TV received numerous flowers, cigars,
candies, and cards addressed to Val as congratulations. An
estimated 17.8 million watched the christening episode of the
twins.
In 1968 Reid played one of the most difficult parts in Coronation
Street, when Val was held hostage by a rapist. Although Val wasn't
harmed, viewers sent in hate mail to the actor who played the
rapist. In November 1970 she announced she was leaving Coronation
Street as she was now pregnant with her first child. On January 27,
1971, more than 19 million viewers watched as her character was
killed off, dying of an electrocution by a hairdryer. On February
5, 1972, her funeral was shown and more than 20 million
watched.
Later Work
From 1998 to 2000, Reid played the major role of Jean in the BBC
comedy series
dinnerladies by
Victoria Wood, and has appeared in
other television programmes including
The Adventures of Robin
Hood,
The Benny Hill
Show,
Hancock's Half
Hour,
Casualty,
Boon, and
Hetty Wainthropp
Investigates. She also made an appearance in the
Doctor Who serial
The Curse of Fenric which was
broadcast in October 1989.
In 2003, Reid had a part in
Midsomer Murders in the episode "A
Tale of Two Hamlets", and a main part in the comedy drama
The Booze Cruise. She also
had a major role in the
ITV drama series
Life Begins, which ran from
2004 to 2006, in which she appeared alongside
Caroline Quentin and
Frank Finlay. In October 2005 she had a role in
the
BBC's adaptation of
Bleak House and in 2006 made a brief
appearance in
Jane
Eyre.
On
31 March 2007, Reid
appeared for a second time in the series
Doctor Who in the episode "
Smith and Jones". In the
episode she played
Florence
Finnegan, a blood-sucking alien called a
Plasmavore,
but took on the guise of a normal human.
In February 2008 Anne appeared as the mother of
Monica Gallagher,
Joan, who was suffering from
Alzheimer's
in the Channel 4 drama
Shameless.
In October 2008, she played the title role in
In Love with Barbara on
BBC Four, a biopic of
Barbara Cartland.
In 2009, Reid appeared in the television series
Marple in the episode "Nemesis" and
in the ITV television adaptation of the novel
The Bad Mother's Handbook, in
which she co-starred alongside
Catherine
Tate. She also starred as Vera alongside
Maureen Lipman as Irene in an
ITV3 adaptation of the
BBC Radio
4 series
Ladies of
Letters, a series which charts the correspondence of two
ladies via a series of letters.
Film
In 1995 Reid was the voice of Wendolene Ramsbottom in the
Wallace and Gromit film
A Close Shave. Her other film
appearances include
Love and Death on Long
Island and
The
Mother, the latter performance secured her a nomination
for the
BAFTA Award for
Best Actress in a Leading Role in 2003.
She filmed a minor role as a
lesbian
headmistress in the 2003 film
Love Actually, but is not
credited in the cast list as all her scenes were ultimately
deleted, as they were not central to the main plot. They can
however, be viewed in the deleted scenes on the
Love
Actually DVD. She also appeared in the film
Hot Fuzz in 2007.
Theatre
In 2002
she appeared in the premiere of The
York Realist at the Royal Court Theatre
, which later transferred to the West
End
. From September 2005 to January 2006, she
appeared on stage in the West End in
Epitaph for George
Dillon, and in July 2006 starred in School Run, a
short series of plays on BBC Radio 4's
Woman's Hour.
In June
2007 she played the role of Jack's mother in Stephen Sondheim's Into The Woods at the Royal Opera
House
in Covent
Garden
.
From
January to May 2008 she appeared in the National
Theatre
's production of Happy
Now? - a new play by
Lucinda Coxon.
From March
to May 2009 she will be appearing at the Donmar
Warehouse
in
Dimetos, a 1975 play by Athol
Fugard.
Selected film and television appearances
Notes
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