Dora Bryan

Dora May Broadbent, known professionally as Dora Bryan, was an English actress of stage, film, and television, born on 7 February 1923 in Southport, Lancashire, and died on 23 July 2014 at the age of 91. Her father worked as a salesman, and she attended Hathershaw County Primary School in Oldham, Lancashire. Bryan's performing career began in pantomime before the Second World War, during which she served with ENSA in Italy, entertaining British troops.

Bryan made her stage debut as a child in a Manchester pantomime and, encouraged by her mother, joined the Oldham Coliseum as a teenager. After six years there, she relocated to London and established herself as a regular West End performer. During a production of Noël Coward's Private Lives, Coward encouraged her to adopt a stage name. She chose Dora Bryant, reportedly inspired by a box of Bryant and May matches on a nearby table, but a typographical error on the theatre credits dropped the final letter, and she became Dora Bryan.

In 1955, Bryan made her West End musical comedy debut playing Lily Bell in A.P. Herbert's The Water Gipsies, performing the songs "Why Did You Call Me Lily?", "You Never Know with Men", and "It Would Cramp My Style." Her reception was strong enough that the theatre's billing was changed after opening night to place her name above the title. She continued performing in musicals throughout her career, including Gentlemen Prefer Blondes in 1962 and Hello, Dolly! from 1966 to 1968. She also headlined stage revues including The Dora Bryan Show in 1966, My Name Is Dora in 1967, and An Evening with Dora Bryan and Friends in 1968. Her first Shakespearean role came in 1984, when she played Mistress Quickly in The Merry Wives of Windsor, followed by Mrs. Hardcastle in She Stoops to Conquer in 1985 and a celebrated turn in Kander and Ebb's 70, Girls, 70 in 1991.

Bryan made her Broadway debut in 1987, appearing in Pygmalion as Mrs. Pearce alongside Peter O'Toole and Amanda Plummer. In 1994, she appeared with Trevor Peacock in the National Theatre's revival of Harold Pinter's The Birthday Party, a production that earned her the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role in 1995. In 1996, she was awarded the OBE for her services to acting.

Her screen career began in the late 1940s, with early film appearances including The Fallen Idol in 1948 and the Ealing production The Blue Lamp in 1950. Further film credits included Gift Horse in 1952, The Cockleshell Heroes in 1955, The Green Man in 1956, and Carry On Sergeant in 1958. Her most celebrated screen performance came in A Taste of Honey in 1961, for which she won the BAFTA Award for Best British Actress, part of four BAFTA awards the film received including Best British Film. In 1963, she recorded the Christmas single "All I Want for Christmas Is a Beatle," which reached number 20 on the UK charts. She played the Headmistress in The Great St. Trinian's Train Robbery in 1966 and starred in her own BBC television series, According to Dora, from 1968 to 1969. Her autobiography, also titled According to Dora, was published in 1987.

Bryan appeared in the UK-Argentine thriller Apartment Zero in 1988, directed by Martin Donovan and starring Hart Bochner and Colin Firth, a film that featured in the 1988 Sundance Film Festival. In 1990, she appeared in two episodes of the BBC sitcom On the Up as Mrs. Carpenter. Later television work included an appearance in Victoria Wood's dinnerladies in 1998, joining the cast of Last of the Summer Wine as Auntie Ros in 2000, and a guest role in Absolutely Fabulous in 2001. Her final screen appearance was in the short film Gone to the Dogs in 2006. Bryan was the subject of This Is Your Life on two occasions: in April 1962, when Eamonn Andrews surprised her at her Brighton home, and in January 1989, when Michael Aspel surprised her onstage at the Opera House during a curtain call for Hello, Dolly!

Bryan was married for 54 years to former Lancashire and Cumberland cricketer Bill Lawton, whom she met in Oldham during the Second World War. They married at Werneth St Thomas, Oldham in 1954, and Lawton died in August 2008. The couple lived for more than 40 years at Clarges Hotel, which Bryan once owned at 115–119 Marine Parade on Brighton's seafront. Financial difficulties led them to sell the bulk of the building, though they retained a first-floor flat. By 2013, Bryan was a wheelchair user residing in a nursing home in Hove. Her funeral was held on 6 August 2014 at St George's Church, Brighton.