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Gretchen Franklin AI simulator
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Gretchen Franklin AI simulator
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Gretchen Franklin
Gretchen Gordon Franklin (7 July 1911 – 11 July 2005) was an English actress and dancer with a career in show business spanning over 70 years. She played Ethel Skinner in the long-running BBC1 soap opera EastEnders on a regular basis from 1985 until 1988. Following this, she made intermittent returns to the show, her appearances becoming increasingly infrequent and brief. Her final appearance was in 2000, marking the demise of her character.
Gretchen Gordon Franklin was born on 7 July 1911 in Covent Garden, Central London, into a theatrical family. She was the only child of her parents Gordon and Violet Franklin. Her father had a song-and-dance act, while her grandfather was a well-known music-hall entertainer at the turn of the 20th century. Her younger cousin was the comedian Clive Dunn (1920–2012).
Franklin entered show business as a teenager, making her début as a pantomime chorus girl in Bournemouth. In 1929, she took dancing lessons at the Theatre Girls Club in Soho in London's West End and she later became a tap dancer and founder member of a quartet known as Four Brilliant Blondes. Franklin was a Tiller Girl, known for their high kicks, at the London Palladium.
Franklin toured in variety with the comedians Syd and Max Harrison and on the Gracie Fields Show, and performed with another dance group, The Three Girlies, before making a gradual switch to straight dramatic roles.
Franklin's break came during the Second World War when she was cast in Sweet and Low, the first of a series of highly successful West End revues. Staged at the New Ambassadors Theatre, the revues starred Hermione Gingold. Franklin and Gingold became close friends and were reunited in another revue, Slings & Arrows (Comedy Theatre, 1948).
Franklin also appeared in several plays and made one of her early screen appearances in Before I Wake (1955). Her other films included Cloak Without Dagger (1956), Flame in the Streets (1961), Ticket to Paradise (1961 film), The Murder Game (1965), Twisted Nerve (1968), The Night Visitor (1971), The Three Musketeers (1973), Quincy's Quest (1979), and Ragtime (1981), among others.
Franklin appeared in several productions for the BBC and on stage. One of Franklin's best known stage roles was playing Mrs Roper in the 1958 play Verdict by British mystery writer Agatha Christie. It was produced by Peter Saunders and directed by Charles Hickman, and ran for 250 performances.
Franklin was acting on stage in the West End in Spring and Port Wine in 1965 when she was cast as the first Mrs Alf Garnett in a pilot episode of Till Death Us Do Part, with Warren Mitchell. However, she missed the chance to become a permanent part in what was to become a successful series – because she couldn't obtain her release from her stage role (unable to take a regular role in the series, it was Franklin who recommended her friend Dandy Nichols for the part in the series). Franklin and Nichols have cameo parts in two films directed by Richard Lester, the Beatles film Help! (1965) and How I Won the War (1967) which stars John Lennon.
Gretchen Franklin
Gretchen Gordon Franklin (7 July 1911 – 11 July 2005) was an English actress and dancer with a career in show business spanning over 70 years. She played Ethel Skinner in the long-running BBC1 soap opera EastEnders on a regular basis from 1985 until 1988. Following this, she made intermittent returns to the show, her appearances becoming increasingly infrequent and brief. Her final appearance was in 2000, marking the demise of her character.
Gretchen Gordon Franklin was born on 7 July 1911 in Covent Garden, Central London, into a theatrical family. She was the only child of her parents Gordon and Violet Franklin. Her father had a song-and-dance act, while her grandfather was a well-known music-hall entertainer at the turn of the 20th century. Her younger cousin was the comedian Clive Dunn (1920–2012).
Franklin entered show business as a teenager, making her début as a pantomime chorus girl in Bournemouth. In 1929, she took dancing lessons at the Theatre Girls Club in Soho in London's West End and she later became a tap dancer and founder member of a quartet known as Four Brilliant Blondes. Franklin was a Tiller Girl, known for their high kicks, at the London Palladium.
Franklin toured in variety with the comedians Syd and Max Harrison and on the Gracie Fields Show, and performed with another dance group, The Three Girlies, before making a gradual switch to straight dramatic roles.
Franklin's break came during the Second World War when she was cast in Sweet and Low, the first of a series of highly successful West End revues. Staged at the New Ambassadors Theatre, the revues starred Hermione Gingold. Franklin and Gingold became close friends and were reunited in another revue, Slings & Arrows (Comedy Theatre, 1948).
Franklin also appeared in several plays and made one of her early screen appearances in Before I Wake (1955). Her other films included Cloak Without Dagger (1956), Flame in the Streets (1961), Ticket to Paradise (1961 film), The Murder Game (1965), Twisted Nerve (1968), The Night Visitor (1971), The Three Musketeers (1973), Quincy's Quest (1979), and Ragtime (1981), among others.
Franklin appeared in several productions for the BBC and on stage. One of Franklin's best known stage roles was playing Mrs Roper in the 1958 play Verdict by British mystery writer Agatha Christie. It was produced by Peter Saunders and directed by Charles Hickman, and ran for 250 performances.
Franklin was acting on stage in the West End in Spring and Port Wine in 1965 when she was cast as the first Mrs Alf Garnett in a pilot episode of Till Death Us Do Part, with Warren Mitchell. However, she missed the chance to become a permanent part in what was to become a successful series – because she couldn't obtain her release from her stage role (unable to take a regular role in the series, it was Franklin who recommended her friend Dandy Nichols for the part in the series). Franklin and Nichols have cameo parts in two films directed by Richard Lester, the Beatles film Help! (1965) and How I Won the War (1967) which stars John Lennon.