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justforbooks · 5 months

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The actor Brigit Forsyth, who has died aged 83, made her name as Thelma in the BBC television series Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads? One critic described Thelma as so prim that she could turn the lifting of a lace curtain into an art form.

Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais’s creation, which ran from 1973 to 1974, was the sequel to the popular 1960s sitcom The Likely Lads, which starred Rodney Bewes and James Bolam as Bob Ferris and Terry Collier, two single north-east England factory workers who share a flat and the same interests – women, drink and football.

Thelma Chambers was brought in as a girlfriend for the upwardly mobile Bob, now in the white-collar class with a house, car and annual holiday on the Costa Brava, scoffed at by Terry, who clings on to his working-class roots. Thelma and Bob were married halfway through the two series of the show.

“Up until then, I had done a lot of drama on telly,” said Forsyth. “If I wasn’t being murdered, I was murdering somebody or I was a disturbed art teacher. I was playing quite a lot of deranged people, so comedy was a nice change.”

She created laughs again with the sitcom Sharon and Elsie (1984-85), in which she co-starred as the middle-class Elsie Beecroft alongside Janette Beverley as the more down-to-earth Sharon Wilkes, two employees in a greetings card manufacturing company.

But Forsyth’s own favourite television part was Francine Pratt in Playing the Field (1998-2002), the on- and off-pitch women’s football drama created by Kay Mellor. Her character, who hates the game, is married to the Castlefield Blues’ sponsor, played by Ricky Tomlinson, and keeps him happy in return for designer clothes and other luxuries.

“I have never played awful glamour before,” she said. “I had a blond wig, six-inch heels, makeup and my bosom hitched up high.”

Forsyth was born in Malton, North Yorkshire, to Scottish parents, Anne (nee Forsyth), an artist, and Frank Connell, an architect and town planner, and brought up in Edinburgh. She was mesmerised by Stanley Baxter’s performances as a pantomime dame at the city’s King’s theatre and, aged 18, landed her own first lead role, as Sarat Carn, on her way to the gallows, in Charlotte Hastings’s play Bonaventure with the Makars amateur drama group.

But when she left St George’s school, Edinburgh, her parents insisted she learn a skill, so she trained as a secretary. After a couple of jobs, she headed for London and Rada (1958-60), where she won the Emile Littler prize.

She began her professional career back in Edinburgh with the Gateway theatre company (1960-61) before moving on to the Theatre Royal, Lincoln (1961-62) and the Arthur Brough Players in Folkestone (1962). With other actors already named Brigit McConnell and Bridget O’Connell, she changed her professional name to Forsyth on her return to Lincoln in 1962.

At the Edinburgh festival three years later, she played one of the witches in a headline-making production of Macbeth. “That show caused an absolute uproar because they wanted the witches to have the bodies of young girls and the faces of old women, and they wanted us to have our top half naked,” Forsyth recalled. “But the Earl of Harewood, who was running the EIF at the time, said ‘No’. So they put nipple caps on us, which looked absolutely disgusting – and they used to drop off each night. It was absolutely hysterical.”

Later, in the West End, Forsyth played Annie in The Norman Conquests (Globe, now Gielgud, and Apollo theatres, 1974-76) and Dusa in the feminist play Dusa, Fish, Stas and Vi (Mayfair theatre, 1976-77). She put her TV breakthrough down to cutting her hair short. “It proved a tremendously lucky omen,” she said.

That break came with Adam Smith (1972), in which she played the younger daughter of the title character, a Scottish minister (Andrew Keir). The director, Brian Mills, then worked with Forsyth on the psychological thriller Holly (1972), when she took the part of a young art teacher kidnapped by a mentally unstable student. Forsyth and Mills married in 1976.

Television roles kept on coming. She was Veronica, one of the product-promotion team, in The Glamour Girls (1980-82), Harriet in the inter-generational sitcom Tom, Dick and Harriet (1982-83), and Helen Yeldham, a hotelier, in the 1989 series of Boon.

There were also appearances in soap opera: as GP Judith Vincent in The Practice (1985-86); Babs Fanshawe, Ken Barlow’s escort agency date who dies of a heart attack, in a 1998 Coronation Street episode; Delphine LaClair, a sales rep for a French company interested in buying Rodney Blackstock’s vineyards, for two short runs in Emmerdale (2005 and 2006); Cressida, mother of the millionaire Nate Tenbury-Newent, in Hollyoaks in 2013; and three roles in Doctors between 2000 and 2012.

Forsyth also played the miserable Madge, who frustrates her sister Mavis’s attempts at a relationship with Granville, in the sitcom sequel Still Open All Hours (2013-19).

A cellist from the age of nine, Forsyth starred as the real-life virtuoso Beatrice Harrison in a 2004 tour of The Cello and the Nightingale. Also on tour, she was a remarkably believable Queen Elizabeth II in A Question of Attribution (2000) and played Marie in Calendar Girls (2008). “I’m Mrs Frosty-Knickers, the one who doesn’t approve of it all.”

In 2017, she played a terminally ill musician in the stage comedy Killing Time, written by her daughter, Zoe Mills, who acted alongside her. At the time, Forsyth revealed that her maternal grandfather, a GP in Yorkshire, had helped dying patients to end their lives. Declaring herself a supporter of euthanasia, she said: “He bumped off probably loads of people with doses of morphine.”

In 1999, Forsyth separated from her husband, but they remained friends until his death in 2006. She is survived by their children, Ben and Zoe.

🔔 Brigit Forsyth (Brigit Dorothea Connell), actor, born 28 July 1940; died 1 December 2023

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

#just for books #Brigit Forsyth #in memoriam

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sesiondemadrugada · 3 years

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Island of Terror (Terence Fisher, 1966).

#island of terror (1966)#terence fisher #s.o.s.: el mundo en peligro #thelma connell #reginald h. wyer #john earl #w.t. partleton #fred hole #island of terror

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badgaymovies · 3 years

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Only Two Can Play (1962)

SIDNEY GILLIAT Bil’s rating (out of 5): BBBB United Kingdom, 1962. Vale Film Productions. Screenplay by Bryan Forbes, based on the novel by That Uncertain Feeling by Kingsley Amis. Cinematography by John Wilcox. Produced by Leslie Gilliat. Music by Richard Rodney Bennett. Production Design by Albert Witherick. Costume Design by Muriel Dickson. Film Editing by Thelma Connell. Breezily funny…

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steveskafte · 5 years

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LOVE AND FEAR Jake Turksma was the pastor of my childhood church, and my great-uncle. He emigrated with his parents and three sisters from Holland in the 50s, including my paternal grandmother, Wilma. The Turksmas left with brutal memories of the war, especially patriarch Jacob (called "Opa"), who'd narrowly survived his nine-month stint in a Nazi work camp. Jake, his seven-year-old son and namesake, became a Canadian along with the rest. That boy grew up to be the most intense and vibrant man I've ever known. Jake and his wife left Ontario for Nova Scotia with big dreams in the mid-70s, and he began building his church from the ground up. They first met in a drafty old farm building in Paradise, called the "Born Again Barn". After some time in the basement of his Inglewood home, they constructed a permanent meeting house from another repurposed barn in Beaconsfield – the somewhat eccentric-looking Living Word Fellowship. They also took over and ran a camp way out in Albany Cross, far from the coast on the shores of Connell Lake. My summers revolved around that place, and the kind of easy magic that comes with a wilderness within reach. Uncle Jake was the bright and shining center of attention in my childhood. He had a wild sense of humor, and you could hear his laughter echoing like thunder from anywhere in the house. He had a deep and weighty voice, and everything he said carried the gravity of a true believer. He was what some folks called a "holy roller", shaping his heart around a spirituality that impacted every aspect of his life. This was no weekend religion, no part-time belief system. Everyone he met has a distinct memory of the encounter, because Jake had this incredible depth of personality, an honest humanity that really shook me as a child. So many adults seemed dry and disconnected, and he was one of the few still fully alive. You couldn't restrain his heartfelt passion, a boundless and overpowering energy for his many plans and projects. Few people cared so deeply or worked so hard to do good for their community as him. But there was a dark side to the man that many never knew. Pastor Jake had a brutal temper, and kept an iron fist on the members of his tiny church. You'd never know it as a visitor, but the longer you stayed, the more submission was expected. We were told what to wear, how to raise our children, what movies to watch, and what music to listen to. Anyone who questioned his doctrine was sternly shouted down, and sometimes suggested it'd be best if they left quietly. Growing tired of the conflict, most who matched his resolve relocated to other churches, leaving a meeker bunch behind. Jake grew used to not being challenged, and discussions became more one-sided than before. As for us children, no excuses were believed, no apologies accepted for even the smallest slight. I once tripped on his heels while he carried a piece of furniture down the driveway. Jake dropped his end abruptly and chased me around my house, shouting wildly. Once I was caught, he grasped my arm and dragged me inside, demanding that I be punished immediately. Control was big for Jake Turksma, so mowing the church lawn unevenly or "ruining God's beauty" by leaving footprints in the perfect snowy surface could be enough to push him over the edge. He'd grab me by the ear for talking out of turn, and on several occasions, lift me by the collar and hold me dangling, Darth Vader style, gasping for breath three feet off the ground – and I had it easier than some. Uncle Jake would sometimes tell a childhood story about stabbing his sister's hand with a fork, retribution for stealing from his plate during dinner. It was meant as a funny anecdote, but I remember thinking: "I could almost see him doing that to me right now." I was never more afraid of another human being than Jake Turksma, with his sharp-edged, simmering, unhinged intensity. He brushed it off as righteous anger, justifying the lack of self-control under a guise of God's will. Truth was, Jake got plenty angry for his own sake, even with no religious matters at play. You could never see it coming, like a switch suddenly tripped. Ten years after that 1993 photo of him doing dishes, Jake Turksma got sick. It was a quick transition from force to weakness, dizzying and savage. Cancer was brutal to him, shaking loose the old anger and replacing it with a mix of humility and remorse. He lost his hair and his strength, like the story of Samson. His later sermons circled around apologies and regrets for past mistakes, finally admitting that he was fallible as everyone – something we never would've dreamed of hearing before. But the folks he'd hurt most weren't there to hear it, deaf to the after-echo of someone who waited too long to give in. For the final six months, I spent every Sunday afternoon sitting on his living room couch. Uncle Jake was across the room in an easy chair, skin and bones wrapped against the chill, telling stories. It became clear just how desperately he wanted to love and be loved, and how he regretted the things that he'd allowed to stand between that. Those days would drag for hours, just him and me talking until he drifted off to sleep. When summer came, he left for his cottage in central Nova Scotia – taking first a temporary, then a permanent sabbatical from the church he hadn't let loose for three decades. I made a final visit in the late summer of 2006, out to the camp on Connell Lake. Jake Turksma was lying in bed when I climbed the second-floor stairs, looking like I'd imagined his father did in that Nazi camp. There was a thin sheet with bones beneath, and he spoke softly with eyes fluttering around the room. The waves of the lake lapped softly through the trees, as a breeze of coming autumn slipped from the high porch window. There was peace and sadness sharing the same place, and neither seemed likely to overtake the other. Uncle Jake was gone by the morning, and it was a kind of relief. His leaving left a hole and a kind of fulfillment, a feeling that everything ended exactly as it should. I felt love and fear in equal measure for the man, and it's hard to say just how conflicting those emotions can be to each other. But the dead deserve a little honesty, more than we ever dared at that funeral thirteen years ago. We stacked up the honor and respect, and left out the pain (like you always do). Too often in my family, we've said no bad of the ones we loved, and no good of the ones we hated. We create saints and villains of ordinary people, when they were neither. Someone said that there's no such thing as grown-ups – we're all just children, with all our fear and anger, love and wonder intact. It takes the whole true story to reconcile our hearts. As for me, love is all that's left. * * * Left photo: Karen Skafte 1993 – Beaconsfield, Nova Scotia Right photo: Thelma Mitchell 1982 – Inglewood, Nova Scotia

Love is all that's left. The last picture of me with Uncle Jake, taken in 2006, not long before he died. I was 18, he was 58.

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csenews · 7 years

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Notice to Creditors

Madison County Probate 110 Irby Street, Room 102 Jackson, TN 38301 (731)988-3025Notice to Creditors As required by TCA §30-2-306Case Number 57pr1-2017-PR 17048Estate of joseph connell crenshaw, Deceased Notice is hereby given that on April 10 of 2017 Letters Testamentary (or of Administration as the case may be) in respect of the estate of joseph connell crenshaw, who died March 25, 2017, were issued to the undersigned by the Probate Court of Madison County, Tennessee. All persons, resident and non-resident, having claims, matured or unmatured, against the estate are required to file the same with the Clerk of the above-named Court on or before the earlier of the dates prescribed in (1) or (2) otherwise their claims will be forever barred (1) (A) Four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting, as the case may be) of this notice if the creditor received an actual copy of this notice to creditors at least sixty (60) days before date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting); or (B) Sixty (60) days from the date the creditor received an actual copy of the notice to creditors, if the creditor received the copy of the notice less than sixty (60) days prior to the date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting) as described in (1)(A); or (2) Twelve (12) months from the decedent’s date of death. All persons indebted to the above Estate must come forward and make proper settlement with the undersigned at once. Date: 4/10/2017 thomas malcolm crenshaw, jr. Personal Representative Date: 4/10/2017 nancy l. choate Attorney Published: April 20 and 27, 2017 Madison County Probate 110 Irby Street, Room 102 Jackson, TN 38301 (731)988-3025Notice to Creditors As required by TCA §30-2-306Case Number 57pr1-2017-PR 17049Estate of jennifer nance crenshaw, Deceased Notice is hereby given that on April 10 of 2017 Letters Testamentary (or of Administration as the case may be) in respect of the estate of jennifer nance crenshaw, who died March 25, 2017, were issued to the undersigned by the Probate Court of Madison County, Tennessee. All persons, resident and non-resident, having claims, matured or unmatured, against the estate are required to file the same with the Clerk of the above-named Court on or before the earlier of the dates prescribed in (1) or (2) otherwise their claims will be forever barred (1) (A) Four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting, as the case may be) of this notice if the creditor received an actual copy of this notice to creditors at least sixty (60) days before date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting); or (B) Sixty (60) days from the date the creditor received an actual copy of the notice to creditors, if the creditor received the copy of the notice less than sixty (60) days prior to the date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting) as described in (1)(A); or (2) Twelve (12) months from the decedent’s date of death. All persons indebted to the above Estate must come forward and make proper settlement with the undersigned at once. Date: 4/10/2017 david wayne nance Personal Representative Date: 4/10/2017 nancy l. choate Attorney Published: April 20 and 27, 2017 Madison County Probate 110 Irby Street, Room 102 Jackson, TN 38301 (731)988-3025Notice to Creditors As required by TCA §30-2-306Case Number 57pr1-2017-PR 17046Estate of hubert howard williams, Deceased Notice is hereby given that on April 10 of 2017 Letters Testamentary (or of Administration as the case may be) in respect of the estate of hubert howard williams, who died March 17, 2017, were issued to the undersigned by the Probate Court of Madison County, Tennessee. All persons, resident and non-resident, having claims, matured or unmatured, against the estate are required to file the same with the Clerk of the above-named Court on or before the earlier of the dates prescribed in (1) or (2) otherwise their claims will be forever barred (1) (A) Four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting, as the case may be) of this notice if the creditor received an actual copy of this notice to creditors at least sixty (60) days before date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting); or (B) Sixty (60) days from the date the creditor received an actual copy of the notice to creditors, if the creditor received the copy of the notice less than sixty (60) days prior to the date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting) as described in (1)(A); or (2) Twelve (12) months from the decedent’s date of death. All persons indebted to the above Estate must come forward and make proper settlement with the undersigned at once. Date: 4/10/2017 clara ellen williams Personal Representative Date: 4/10/2017 nancy l. choate Attorney Published: April 20 and 27, 2017 Madison County Probate 110 Irby Street, Room 102 Jackson, TN 38301 (731)988-3025Notice to Creditors As required by TCA §30-2-306Case Number 57pr1-2017-PR 17047Estate of shirley gray cogar, Deceased Notice is hereby given that on April 10 of 2017 Letters Testamentary (or of Administration as the case may be) in respect of the estate of shirley gray cogar, who died March 17, 2017, were issued to the undersigned by the Probate Court of Madison County, Tennessee. All persons, resident and non-resident, having claims, matured or unmatured, against the estate are required to file the same with the Clerk of the above-named Court on or before the earlier of the dates prescribed in (1) or (2) otherwise their claims will be forever barred (1) (A) Four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting, as the case may be) of this notice if the creditor received an actual copy of this notice to creditors at least sixty (60) days before date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting); or (B) Sixty (60) days from the date the creditor received an actual copy of the notice to creditors, if the creditor received the copy of the notice less than sixty (60) days prior to the date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting) as described in (1)(A); or (2) Twelve (12) months from the decedent’s date of death. All persons indebted to the above Estate must come forward and make proper settlement with the undersigned at once. Date: 4/10/2017 tamela bryant Personal Representative Date: 4/10/2017 nancy l. choate Attorney Published: April 20 and 27, 2017 Madison County Probate 110 Irby Street, Room 102 Jackson, TN 38301 (731)988-3025Notice to Creditors As required by TCA §30-2-306Case Number 57pr1-2017-PR 17054Estate of thelma junell bearden, Deceased Notice is hereby given that on April 10 of 2017 Letters Testamentary (or of Administration as the case may be) in respect of the estate of thelma junell bearden, who died March 30, 2017, were issued to the undersigned by the Probate Court of Madison County, Tennessee. All persons, resident and non-resident, having claims, matured or unmatured, against the estate are required to file the same with the Clerk of the above-named Court on or before the earlier of the dates prescribed in (1) or (2) otherwise their claims will be forever barred (1) (A) Four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting, as the case may be) of this notice if the creditor received an actual copy of this notice to creditors at least sixty (60) days before date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting); or (B) Sixty (60) days from the date the creditor received an actual copy of the notice to creditors, if the creditor received the copy of the notice less than sixty (60) days prior to the date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting) as described in (1)(A); or (2) Twelve (12) months from the decedent’s date of death. All persons indebted to the above Estate must come forward and make proper settlement with the undersigned at once. Date: 4/10/2017 donald hearn Personal Representative Date: 4/10/2017 larry f. mckenzie Attorney Published: April 20 and 27, 2017 Madison County Probate 110 Irby Street, Room 102 Jackson, TN 38301 (731)988-3025Notice to Creditors As required by TCA §30-2-306Case Number 57pr1-2017-PR 17053Estate of golda l fitzsimmons, Deceased Notice is hereby given that on April 10 of 2017 Letters Testamentary (or of Administration as the case may be) in respect of the estate of golda l fitzsimmons, who died March 22, 2017, were issued to the undersigned by the Probate Court of Madison County, Tennessee. All persons, resident and non-resident, having claims, matured or unmatured, against the estate are required to file the same with the Clerk of the above-named Court on or before the earlier of the dates prescribed in (1) or (2) otherwise their claims will be forever barred (1) (A) Four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting, as the case may be) of this notice if the creditor received an actual copy of this notice to creditors at least sixty (60) days before date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting); or (B) Sixty (60) days from the date the creditor received an actual copy of the notice to creditors, if the creditor received the copy of the notice less than sixty (60) days prior to the date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting) as described in (1)(A); or (2) Twelve (12) months from the decedent’s date of death. All persons indebted to the above Estate must come forward and make proper settlement with the undersigned at once. Date: 4/10/2017 deborah dunaway a/k/a debbie dunaway Personal Representative Date: 4/10/2017 matthew r. west Attorney Published: April 20 and 27, 2017 Madison County Probate 110 Irby Street, Room 102 Jackson, TN 38301 (731)988-3025Notice to Creditors As required by TCA §30-2-306Case Number 57pr1-2017-PR 17051Estate of paul m. reyling, Deceased Notice is hereby given that on April 10 of 2017 Letters Testamentary (or of Administration as the case may be) in respect of the estate of paul m reyling, who died March 2, 2017, were issued to the undersigned by the Probate Court of Madison County, Tennessee. All persons, resident and non-resident, having claims, matured or unmatured, against the estate are required to file the same with the Clerk of the above-named Court on or before the earlier of the dates prescribed in (1) or (2) otherwise their claims will be forever barred (1) (A) Four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting, as the case may be) of this notice if the creditor received an actual copy of this notice to creditors at least sixty (60) days before date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting); or (B) Sixty (60) days from the date the creditor received an actual copy of the notice to creditors, if the creditor received the copy of the notice less than sixty (60) days prior to the date that is four (4) months from the date of the first publication (or posting) as described in (1)(A); or (2) Twelve (12) months from the decedent’s date of death. All persons indebted to the above Estate must come forward and make proper settlement with the undersigned at once. Date: 4/10/2017 nancy e. oberg Personal Representative Date: 4/10/2017 laura a. williams Attorney Published: April 20 and 27, 2017

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