| Maggie Jones |
| Born |
Margaret Jones
21 June 1934(1934-06-21)
London, England |
| Died |
2 December 2009 (aged 75)
Salford, Greater Manchester, England |
| Occupation |
Actress |
| Years active |
1961–2009 |
| Spouse(s) |
John Stansfield (1971–1999) |
Margaret "Maggie" Jones (21 June 1934 – 2 December 2009) was an English actress, best known for playing Blanche Hunt in the British soap opera Coronation Street, a role which she first portrayed in 1974 and played regularly from the late 1990s until shortly before her death.
Career
Jones graduated from the drama school RADA and performed in numerous plays including Pride and Prejudice and The Women on the West End stage. Her first television role came in 1961 when she appeared in one episode of Coronation Street as a policewoman. Several years later, she made another guest appearance as a shoplifter. However, it was in 1974 that she appeared for the first time as Blanche Hunt, the mother of Deirdre. The role had originally been played by actress Patricia Cutts, who committed suicide after appearing in only two episodes. Jones, who had previously auditioned for the role, accepted an offer to take over the part at short notice as storylines had already been written for Blanche, and she remained a regular cast member until 1976. She re-appeared in the show briefly when Blanche's grandchild Tracy was born in 1977, when Deirdre's marriage to Ray Langton collapsed in 1978 and when Deirdre married Ken Barlow in 1981.
Jones's first major television role was as the maid, Smither, a small but recurring part in the BBC's blockbuster adaptation of The Forsyte Saga, and - prior to Coronation Street - her best-known role was in Sam with Mark McManus. Throughout the 1980s, she was a regular face on British television, appearing in several shows over the years, including The Barchester Chronicles, The Beiderbecke Tapes, In Sickness and in Health, Sharon and Elsie, We'll Think Of Something, The Nesbitts Are Coming and Lovely Couple, alongside Pauline Quirke.
After guest appearances in shows such as Dalziel and Pascoe, Goodnight Sweetheart, Heartbeat and Peak Practice in the 1990s, Jones reprised the role of Blanche Hunt in Coronation Street in 1996. She became a regular cast member again in 1999. Blanche's trademark withering one-liners and no-nonsense attitude made her a firm favourite of fans of the long-running show. In 2005 and 2008 Jones won a British Soap Award for Best Comedy Performance in a British Soap even though the actress herself never thought of her character as funny. [1]
She also appeared in the video of the Mike + The Mechanics song The Living Years.
She married John Oliver Stansfield in 1971; he died aged 72 in Westminster, London,[2] on 1 January 1999. They had no children.
On 18 April 2008, Jones fell, injuring her knee and shoulder at the Manchester hotel in which she stayed while filming Coronation Street. She took two weeks off work on Coronation Street to recover from the accident.[3] She was written out of the series again when she fell ill in October 2009.
Death
In October 2009, Jones was admitted to Salford Royal hospital in Salford, Greater Manchester, for undisclosed major surgery; she was reported to be making a slow and steady recovery.[4][5][6] However, her condition later deteriorated, and she remained in the same hospital until she died peacefully in her sleep on the morning of 2 December 2009. She is survived by her sister Joan.[5]
Her final appearance as Blanche was aired on 11 December 2009.
Jones' funeral was held at St. Peter's Catholic church in Clerkenwell, London on 15 December 2009.[7]
References
External links
