Actress and comic Janet Brown, who was best known for impersonating former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, has died aged 87. Her agent said she died in her sleep at a nursing home in Hove, East Sussex, after a short illness.
In a career beginning in the 1930s, she gained national TV fame in the 1970s and 1980s for her impersonations on The Mike Yarwood Show. She also played Lady Thatcher in the James Bond film For Your Eyes Only. Over the years, the Scottish-born star worked with a number of stars including Hughie Green, Tony Hancock and George Cole.
In 1987 she wrote her autobiography, Prime Mimicker, chronicling her childhood and career as impressionist. More recently she appeared in dramas including Midsomer Murders, Casualty and Hotel Babylon. Her final stage role was in a production of The Country Wife at the Theatre Royal Haymarket in 2007.
Graham Spicer is a writer, director and photographer in Milan, blogging (under the name ‘Gramilano’) about dance, opera, music and photography for people “who are a bit like me and like some of the things I like”. He was a regular columnist for Opera Now magazine and wrote for the BBC until transferring to Italy.
His scribblings have appeared in various publications from Woman’s Weekly to Gay Times, and he wrote the ‘Danza in Italia’ column for Dancing Times magazine.
