Peggy Ashcroft

Peggy Ashcroft
Born	Edith Margaret Emily Ashcroft 22 December 1907(1907-12-22) Croydon, England, UK
Died	14 June 1991 (aged 83) London, England, UK
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1929 – 1991
Spouse(s)	Rupert Hart-Davis (1929 – 1933) Theodore Komisarjevsky (m. 1934) Jeremy Hutchinson (1940 – 1965)

Dame Peggy Ashcroft, DBE (22 December 1907 – 14 June 1991) was an English actress.

Early years

Born as Edith Margaret Emily Ashcroft in Croydon, Ashcroft attended the Woodford School, Croydon and the Central School of Speech and Drama.^[1] A prolific stage actress from a young age, she first gained notoriety playing Naemi in Jew Suss in 1929, and Desdemona opposite Paul Robeson's Othello two years later.

Career

Stardom came in 1934 when she played Juliet in a legendary production of Romeo and Juliet, at the New Theatre, in which Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud alternated in the roles of Romeo and Mercutio. She and Gielgud would later be acclaimed as Beatrice and Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing which they played together a number of times, including a London engagement and European tour for the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre in 1955 (she also played Cordelia to his King Lear during that tour). When she first played Beatrice with him in 1950, Gielgud found her performance "a revelation - an impish, rather tactless girl with a curious resemblance to Bea Lillie," while a teenage Peter Hall observed in her "English containment and decency, contrasted with a wild passion." She stayed at the top of the British theatrical profession throughout her career, with some of the highlights Three Sisters (1937) in which she played Irina, The Heiress (1949), Antony and Cleopatra (1953), As You Like It and Cymbeline (as Imogen) (1957), The Taming of the Shrew (1960), and The War of the Roses, the Royal Shakespeare Company's massive landmark compendium of the three Henry VI plays and Richard III, directed by Peter Hall for the RSC in 1963.

Ashcroft's film and television appearances were rare but memorable. One of her earliest film roles was the minor part of the crofter's wife in the Robert Donat version of The Thirty-Nine Steps. In 1937, she appeared in a 30 minute excerpt of Twelfth Night on the BBC Television Service, alongside Greer Garson, the first known instance of a Shakespeare play being performed on television.

In 1973 she starred in the Academy Award-nominated and Golden Globe-winner for Best Foreign Language Foreign Film of 1974, Der Fußgänger (English title: The Pedestrian). The film was directed by Austrian actor-director Maximilian Schell, and starred international former early screen peers Käthe Haack, Lil Dagover and Françoise Rosay.

Possibly her best known celluloid role was that of Mrs. Moore in the 1984 film A Passage to India — a role for which she won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. Although Ashcroft did not appear in person at the telecast to accept the Oscar, Angela Lansbury accepted it on her behalf.

On television, Ashcroft appeared in the role of Barbie Batchelor on the internationally acclaimed British mini-series The Jewel in the Crown (1984), for which she won a BAFTA Best Television Actress award.

Other

In May 1986 Ashcroft was awarded an honorary degree from the Open University as Doctor of the University.^{[citation needed]}

Honours

Ashcroft was appointed Commander of the British Empire (CBE) in 1951, and raised to Dame Commander (DBE) in 1956.

Personal life

She was married three times, first to Rupert Hart-Davis (from 1929-33), and then to Theodore Komisarjevsky (1934). She had two children with her last husband, Jeremy Hutchinson, whom she married in 1940 and divorced in 1965. Her granddaughter is the French singer Emily Loizeau.^{[citation needed]}

Death

Peggy Ashcroft died in London of a stroke in June 1991, aged 83.

Legacy

She was commemorated with memorial plaque in Poet's Corner, Westminster Abbey (just above the grave of fellow Central School of Speech and Drama pupil and friend Laurence Olivier and 18th Century actor David Garrick).

Filmography

Film

• The Wandering Jew (1933) — Olalla Quintana
• The 39 Steps (1935) — Margaret, the crofter's wife
• The Nun's Story (1959) — Mother Mathilde
• Secret Ceremony (1968) — Hannah
• Sunday, Bloody Sunday (1971) — Mrs Greville
• The Pedestrian (German: Der Fußgänger) - Lady Gray
• A Passage to India (1984) — Mrs Moore
• When the Wind Blows (1986) - Hilda Bloggs (voice)
• Madame Sousatzka (1988) — Lady Emily

Television

• Twelfth Night (1937)
• The Wednesday Play: Days in the Trees (1967)
• Play of the Month: The Cherry Orchard (1971)
• Hullabaloo Over Georgie and Bonnie's Pictures (1978)
• Edward and Mrs Simpson (1978) — Queen Mary
• Caught on a Train (1980) — Frau Messner
• Play of the Month: Little Eyolf (1982) - The Rat Wife
• The Jewel in the Crown (1984) — Barbie Batchelor
• A Perfect Spy (1987)
• She's Been Away (1991) - Lillian Huckle

References

External links

• Peggy Ashcroft at the Internet Broadway Database
• Peggy Ashcroft at the Internet Movie Database
• Peggy Ashcroft at Find a Grave
• Dame Peggy Ashcroft biography at BFI Screenonline