Cleo Sylvestre

Cleo Sylvestre, born Cleopatra Mary Sylvestre on 19 April 1945 and died 20 September 2024, was a British actress who made history as the first Black woman to play a leading role at the National Theatre in London. She also holds the distinction of being the first woman to record with The Rolling Stones. Over a career spanning more than six decades, Sylvestre worked across theatre, television, and film, accumulating a body of work that ranged from classical stage productions to landmark British television.

Sylvestre grew up in Euston, north London, raised by her mother Laureen Sylvestre, a cabaret artist of mixed English and probable African heritage who performed at the Shim Sham Club in Wardour Street. Laureen had been born in Yorkshire in 1911 and married Owen Oscar Sylvestre, a Trinidadian Flight Sergeant in the Air Force who had been awarded the Distinguished Flying Medal; the couple divorced in 1955. Sylvestre long believed Owen to be her biological father, but her daughter Zoë later discovered, while working in Sierra Leone, that her biological father was Ben Lewis, a Sierra Leonean lawyer known to the family as Uncle Ben, and that Sylvestre had 15 half-siblings. At the age of eight, Sylvestre made her film debut in Johnny on the Run. She was educated at Camden School for Girls and trained at the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts.

In 1964, recording under the name Cleo, Sylvestre released the single "To Know Him Is to Love Him," produced by Andrew Loog Oldham and backed by The Rolling Stones. Following Brian Jones's departure from the band in 1969, she agreed to rehearse with his new group but ultimately set aside music to focus on her stage and television career.

Her West End debut came in 1967 at Wyndham's Theatre in Simon Gray's Wise Child, where she appeared alongside Sir Alec Guinness and received a nomination for most promising new actress. Two years later she took the leading role in Peter Nichols's The National Health at the National Theatre, becoming the first Black actress to hold a leading role at that institution. Her Broadway appearance came in 1974 with Scapino, a production drawn from Molière's Les Fourberies de Scapin that she performed as part of several seasons with the Young Vic Company, which also included a tour of Mexico. Beyond London and New York, Sylvestre worked extensively in regional theatre, with credits at the Theatre Royal Lincoln, the Theatre Royal Brighton, the Theatre Royal York, the Derby Playhouse, and the Belgrade Theatre in Coventry. She played Phaedre at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2007 and portrayed Rosa Parks, Josephine Baker, and Wangari Maathai in Alison Mead's A Century of Women at Leicester Square Theatre in 2011. Other notable stage work included Antony Sher's ID at the Almeida Theatre in 2003, English Touring Theatre's Far from the Madding Crowd in 2008, Northern Broadsides' Medea in 2010, and Under Milk Wood alongside Michael Sheen at the Royal National Theatre in 2021. She also completed seasons in children's theatre at the Unicorn Theatre and the London Bubble Theatre Company.

On television, Sylvestre appeared in Ken Loach's Up the Junction in 1965, Doctor Who in 1965, Cathy Come Home in 1966, and Poor Cow in 1967. A brief appearance as a factory worker in Coronation Street in 1966 preceded a more significant milestone: from 1970 to 1972 she played Melanie, Meg Richardson's adopted daughter, in the original series of Crossroads, making her the first regular Black British female character in British television history. She was also a regular cast member in Grange Hill and Happy Families, and presented Play School and Merry-Go-Round. Additional television credits include the original Till Death Us Do Part, Z-Cars, Callan, Doctors, New Tricks, The Armando Iannucci Shows, Chambers, The Bill, Who Do You Do, and a Tube Tales episode directed by Jude Law. In 2020 she joined the cast of All Creatures Great and Small as Anne Chapman, a role she reprised in 2023.

Her film work includes Till Death Us Do Part and The Smashing Bird I Used to Know, both from 1969, as well as Trog and My Lover My Son in 1970, The Alf Garnett Saga in 1972, Sammy and Rosie Get Laid in 1987, The Love Child in 1988, The Punk and the Princess in 2003, Kidulthood in 2006, and Paddington in 2014. She also appeared in several short films with director Isaac Julien, among them The Attendant in 1992 and Vagabondia in 2000, the latter of which was shortlisted for the Turner Prize that year.

For twenty years until 2016, Sylvestre served as joint Artistic Director of the Rosemary Branch Theatre alongside Cecilia Darker, where she also performed live music regularly. Her acclaimed one-woman show, The Marvellous Adventure of Mary Seacole, was staged at venues including the House of Lords, the National Portrait Gallery in London, the Mercury Theatre in Colchester, the Mill Studio at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre in Guildford, and the Edinburgh Festival. She was an Ambassador for the Mary Seacole Memorial Statue Appeal and in April 2019 received Screen Nation's Trailblazer Award. In the 2023 New Year Honours she was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire for services to drama and charity.

Sylvestre contributed a chapter to Theatre in a Cool Climate, published by Amber Lane Press in 1999, and wrote reviews for The Listener magazine and the Times Educational Supplement. She served as a council member of Equity and sat on the boards of the Young Vic, Hoxton Hall, Quicksilver Theatre for Children, and the Free Form Arts Trust. She also judged the Race in the Media Awards and Croydon Warehouse Theatre's International Playwriting Competition. She was the inspiration for the character of Honey in Zeb Soanes's Gaspard the Fox children's book series, illustrated by James Mayhew, beginning with Gaspard: Best in Show published by Graffeg in 2019. In August 2024 she appeared on the BBC's Antiques Roadshow, presenting mementos from her early career including a hand-made Christmas card from Jimmy Page.

Sylvestre's godparents were composer Constant Lambert, Labour peer Tom Driberg, and Daria Hambourg, daughter of pianist Mark Hambourg. She married Ian Palmer in 1977; he died in 1995. They had three children: Zoë, Lucy, and Rupert. Sylvestre died on 20 September 2024 at the age of 79.