ELIZABETH SPRIGGS. Born in England, 1929. Educated at the Royal School of Music. Married: 1) Marshall Jones; 2) Murray Manson. Began career as a stage actress with the Bristol Old Vic and the Birmingham Repertory, 1958; joined the Royal Shakespeare Company, 1962; joined the National Theatre Company, 1976; numerous appearances on television and in motion pictures. Recipient: SWETM Best Supporting Actress Award, 1978.

TELEVISION SERIES

1982 Shine On Harvey Moon
1992 The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles

TELEVISION PLAY

1978 Love Letters on Blue Paper

TELEVISION MINISERIES

1976 The Glittering Prizes
1980 Fox
1990 Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
1994 Middlemarch
1995 Martin Chuzzlewit

MADE-FOR-TELEVISION MOVIES

1979 Julius Caesar
1982 Merry Wives of Windsor
1984 The Cold Room
1989 Young Charlie Chaplin
1992 The Last Vampyre

FILMS

Work is a Four-Letter Word, 1967; Three Into Two Won't Go, 1969; An Unsuitable Job For a Woman, 1981; Richard's Things, 1981; Lady Chatterly's Lover, 1981; Going Undercover, 1988; Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, 1989; Impromptu, 1991; Hour of the Pig, 1993; Sense and Sensibility, 1995; The Secret Agent, 1996; Paradise Road, 1997.

STAGE (selection)

Cleopatra, 1958; The Cherry Orchard, 1958; The Beggar's Opera, 1963; The Representative, 1963; Victor, 1964; Marat/Sade, 1965; The Comedy of Errors, 1965; Timon of Athens, 1965; Hamlet, 1965; The Governor's Lady, 1965-66; The Government Inspector, 1965-66; Henry IV, 1966; Henry V, 1966; All's Well That Ends Well, 1966; Macbeth, 1966; Romeo and Juliet, 1966; Julius Caesar, 1968; The Merry Wives of Windsor, 1968; A Delicate Balance, 1969; Women Beware Women, 1969; Twelfth Night, 1970; London Assurance, 1970; The Winter's Tale, 1970; Twelfth Night, 1970; Major Barbara, 1970; Much Ado About Nothing, 1972; Blithe Spirit, 1976; The Country Wife, 1977; Volpone, 1977; Love Letters on Blue Paper, 1978.

 

 

   

Elizabeth Spriggs is amongst Britain's most established and well loved character actresses. An Associate Artiste with the Royal Shakespeare Company, her illustrious work in the theatre has run parallel with her lengthy and successful career in television. Work in the two media converge with her characterisation of Sonia in Wesker's Love Letters on Blue Paper--a role she originally created for television--then transferred to the stage, winning her the West End Managers Award for 1978.

Her versatility is revealed by both her skill at adapting her style for television, resisting the tendency of many actors with a theatrical background to "play to the gallery", and by her work in a diverse set of television genres. Listed among her credits are the particularly noteworthy roles of the long suffering and self sacrificing wife and mother, Connie Fox, in the drama series Fox; Harvey Moon's no nonsense and strong willed mother in the situation comedy series Shine On Harvey Moon; the god fearing gossip, May, in the critically acclaimed and highly popular drama, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit; and the wayward and wonderfully funny nurse, Sairey Gamp in the much praised BBC adaptation of Martin Chuzzlewit.

Whilst to a great extent subject to the standard type casting of older actresses, Spriggs takes the crones, gossips and suffering matriarchs and transforms them with her engagingly strong and rooted presence. In doing so, she imbues the usual fare with additional weight and dimension.

Although there has been interest, particularly within feminist television criticism in analysing the representations of older female characters, and the contributions of actresses to these characterisations, most of the attention has been paid to work with the soap opera genre. The wider terrain remains largely unexplored and unevaluated within television studies.

-Nicola Strange