Georgina Cookson

Antoinette Georgina Cookson, born on 19 December 1918 and died on 1 October 2011 in Sydney at the age of 92, was a British actress whose career spanned film, stage, and television across several decades. The daughter of racing driver Roger Cookson and Sybil Taylor, Cookson came from a distinguished family; her mother published novels under the pseudonym Sydney Tremayne and contributed to The Tatler, and Cookson was the great-granddaughter of psychiatrist Sir James Crichton-Browne. She left Benenden School at fifteen to train at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. She was married four times, twice divorced and twice widowed, and had two children, a son and a daughter.

Following her graduation from RADA, Cookson built a steady presence in both regional theatre and the West End. Among her early credits was the wartime revue Rise Above It, in which she appeared alongside Hermione Gingold at the Q Theatre in 1940 and at the Comedy Theatre in 1941. Later in the same decade she appeared in Love Goes to Press with Irene Worth, first at the Embassy Theatre in Swiss Cottage and then at the Duchess Theatre in 1946, before the production transferred briefly to Broadway the following year. Additional stage work in the 1940s included School for Spinsters at the Criterion Theatre in 1947, Portrait of Hickory at the Embassy in 1948, and Don't Listen, Ladies! opposite Jack Buchanan at the St James's Theatre in 1949.

Cookson's Broadway appearances, which spanned 1947 to 1950, included Love Goes to Press and Ring Round the Moon. Her work in the 1950s continued at a comparable pace. She appeared in Lionel Shapiro's The Bridge for Bristol Old Vic in 1952, followed by 13 for Dinner at the Duke of York's Theatre in 1953. In 1954 she was part of the world premiere cast of I Capture the Castle, which featured Virginia McKenna, Bill Travers, and Roger Moore; the production opened at the Grand Theatre in Blackpool before transferring to the Aldwych Theatre. Robert Morley's Six Months' Grace at the Phoenix Theatre in 1957 rounded out a particularly active decade on stage.

Cookson remained active in theatre well into later life. In 1988 she undertook a national tour of My Fair Lady, and in 1990 she appeared alongside Peggy Mount and Jack Douglas in A Breath of Spring.