Heather Chasen

Heather Jean Chasen (20 July 1927 – 22 May 2020) was an English actress born in Singapore whose career spanned stage, television, film, and radio across several decades. Her father, F.N. Chasen, was an English ornithologist who had left England in 1921 to work at the Raffles Library and Museum in Singapore, having previously served as a trooper with the Norfolk Yeomanry during World War I. He married Agnes H. McCullock in 1926, and Heather was born the following year. A sister, Christine Elizabeth, arrived on 4 May 1931. The family was fractured when her parents separated in 1938, both subsequently remarrying. Before the Japanese occupation that preceded the Battle of Singapore in World War II, Chasen and her mother departed Singapore on the last available vessel. Her father was not among them; he perished on 12 February 1942 when his ship, HMS Giang Bee, was sunk by Japanese forces. Her stepfather, G.C.R. Franks, also died in the fighting, on 22 March of the same year.

Chasen and her mother relocated to the United Kingdom, where she trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. Early stage work included a tour with Frankie Howerd in Hotel Paradiso and an appearance with Sybil Thorndike in Call Me Jacky, in which she played an alcoholic lesbian, a characterisation she later said was partly drawn from her acquaintance with the novelist and playwright Patricia Highsmith. She also toured with Douglas Fairbanks Jr. in The Pleasure of His Company in Toronto.

Her Broadway career brought her to New York for a production of A Severed Head, in which she appeared between 1963 and 1965. The role earned her a nomination for the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Musical. That production represents her sole verified Broadway credit.

On British television, Chasen became widely recognised for playing Valerie Pollard in the ITV soap opera Crossroads from 1982 to 1986. She had initially appeared in the series as a journalist before being invited back and asked to change her hair colour from red to blonde to take on the recurring role of Pollard. In 2011, she joined the cast of the BBC soap opera EastEnders as Lydia Simmonds, the maternal grandmother of Janine Butcher and mother of Norman Simmonds. She stepped into the role after Margaret Tyzack withdrew for personal reasons, with two episodes featuring Tyzack having already aired. Chasen began filming on 15 April for scenes broadcast from 21 April, and made her final on-screen appearance on 13 June 2011, also providing uncredited voice-over work for episodes broadcast on 14 and 28 June. EastEnders executive producer Bryan Kirkwood stated that Chasen had made the part her own, and actress Charlie Brooks, who played Janine Butcher, praised the scenes they shared together.

Beyond those prominent soap roles, Chasen accumulated an extensive range of television credits. She voiced numerous characters in BBC Radio 2's The Navy Lark from 1959 to 1977, including WREN Heather Chasen and the character Ramona Povey. She appeared in Marked Personal from 1973 to 1974, playing Isabel Neal alongside Stephanie Beacham, and had guest roles in Z-Cars, Dixon of Dock Green, The Bill, and The Harry Hill Show. She played Caroline Kerr in The Newcomers, Sylvie Leigh in Holby City, and Madge Bennet across five episodes of the Channel 5 soap opera Family Affairs. Her appearances in the BBC soap opera Doctors totalled four separate roles, the most recent in 2014 when she reprised her character Grace Barberry from 2012.

Her stage work included The Rat Trap, in which she played Burrage the maid, reviewed by Michael Billington of The Guardian with a three-star rating. She appeared in Pardon Ma Prime Minister alongside Gerald Flood and Paul Curran, a play written by Edward Taylor and John Graham. Other theatrical credits included My Three Angels, in which she played Madame Parole, The Man Who Came to Dinner, Who Bombed Birmingham in which she portrayed Margaret Thatcher, and The Lizard of Rock, in which she appeared alongside Jack Hawkins. She also played Miss Marple in A Murder is Announced alongside Richard Todd and Barbara Murray, and appeared as the headmistress in Schoolgirls in Uniform at the Battersea Arts Centre.

In film, Chasen appeared in The Kiss of Tosca in 2000, The Toybox in 2003, Cat Run in 2011, and the 2009 Anglo-Russian feature Season of Mists, in which she played Jane alongside Marina Blake, Sergei Chonishvili, Ifan Huw Dafydd, and Dudley Sutton. Season of Mists received awards internationally. In 2012 she appeared in a film version of Les Misérables.

In her personal life, Chasen married John Webster in 1949. They had one son, Rupert, who appeared in Lindsay Anderson's film if.... Rupert also appeared with his mother in a 2013 short documentary, A Stage of Development. Chasen died on 22 May 2020 at the age of 92.