Cole, Stephanie 1941-

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COLE, Stephanie 1941-

PERSONAL: Born October 5, 1941, in Solihull, Warwickshire, England; married Henry Marshall (a director; divorced); married Peter Birrell (died June 23, 2004); children: Emma. Education: Attended Bristol Old Vic Theatre School.

ADDRESSES: Home—Somerset, England. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Hodder & Stoughton, Limited, 338 Euston Rd., London, GBR NW1 3BH, England.

CAREER: Actress in theater, film, and television; writer. Credits include television series Open All Hours, 1973, 1976-1985; Tropic, 1979; Tenko, PBS, 1981-84; A Bit of a Do, 1989; Waiting for God, BBC, 1990-94; Keeping Mum, 1997-98; Other Animals, 1999; Life As We Know It, BBC 1, 2001; miniseries appearances include Lillie, 1978; Talking Heads, 1987; television movies include Afternoon Off (also known as Six Plays by Alan Bennett: Afternoon Off), 1979; Tenko Reunion, 1984; Amy, 1984; Tears in the Rain, Showtime, 1988; also appeared in television shows Agony, 1979; Memento Mori, PBS, 1992; Going Gently and Return of the Antelope. Film appearances include International Velvet, MGM/United Artists, 1978; That Summer, 1979; Grey Owl, Remstar Distribution, 1999. Stage appearances include A Passionate Woman, 1994, and Quartet, Albery Theatre, London, England, 1999-2000. Also appeared in Soldiering On. Radio appearances include Woman's Hour Drama and Afternoon Play. Worked as an acting teacher and in book binding; also involved with Age Concern (a senior citizens' charity) and National Schizophrenia Fellowship.

AWARDS, HONORS: Comedy Actress Award, 1992, for Waiting for God.

WRITINGS:

(With Liz Barr) A Passionate Life (autobiography), Hodder & Stoughton (London, England), 1998.

SIDELIGHTS: While she has made her mark in such dramatic presentations as the World War II drama Tenko, Stephanie Cole remains a favorite among comedy fans in the United Kingdom. Cole has parlayed her talent for playing what Yours writer Margaret Mason called "tough old ladies" into several hit television sitcoms, including the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) series Waiting for God. That show, set in the Bayview Retirement Home, stars Cole as the scheming Diana Trent. The role won Cole an acting award and international fans when the series was syndicated to the United States.

Cole's penchant for playing elders began early. At age fifteen the young actress from England's West Country auditioned for the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School and was accepted. At age seventeen, she was cast as a ninety-year-old. "I suppose I had one of those faces that looked younger as I grew older, if that makes any sense," she told British Television interviewer Aaron Berman. "I've always got on well with people much older than myself the whole of my life, partly because I was brought up around my grandparents and my great aunt. Maybe I had an innate understanding of what it was like to be older." Thus Cole began playing pensioner Diana Trent when the actress was barely fifty.

In Waiting for God, Cole and costar Graham Crowden match wits as outspoken elders with an offbeat attitude. "We never thought a sitcom set in a retirement home would be such a hit," Cole told Mason. "Although we both loved the wonderful, witty scripts, we never for a moment guessed that the great British public would become so hooked on one completely loopy old man and a stubborn old boot of a woman. Somehow it plugged into the national psyche and took off like a rocket." Other television series for Cole include the dotty mother in Keeping Mum, and the show she described as her favorite, A Bit of a Do.

During her early years in show business, Cole weathered the employment ups and downs typical of any acting career. She took up bookbinding as a second career but found it unsuccessful; "That trade is a bastion of male chauvinism," she said, as quoted by Mason. An opportunity to teach acting rekindled Cole's desire to perform. In recent years she has taken to the stage in Quartet and A Passionate Woman. The latter centers on a middle-aged woman—a role closer to Cole's real age at the time—and takes place on her son's wedding day. "She suddenly realizes that she's going to be left with just her husband who she hasn't communicated with for years," as the actress described it to Berman. "She goes up into the attic to reminisce about her life and they try to persuade her to come down. She won't be persuaded, and it's really just what happens and how she works out her life and finally gets free of it. It's wonderful." Cole's autobiography, A Passionate Life, was released in 1998.

Given free rein to end her British Television interview with any remark she wished, Cole replied that she found interviewers often asked people to write their own epitaphs: "And I guess I'd like my epitaph to be: SHE WALKED HER TALK. That would be nice if everybody walked their talk. I think it would be a better world."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Contemporary Theatre, Film, and Television, Volume 34, Gale (Detroit, MI), 2001.

PERIODICALS

Atlanta Journal-Constitution, April 14, 1995, Phil Kloer, review of Waiting for God, p. P25.

British Television, Volume 1, issue 4, Aaron Berman, "A Passionate Woman."

Guardian (Manchester, England), November 9, 1994, Michael Billington, review of A Passionate Woman; October 2, 1999, Rosanna Greenstreet, "The Questionnaire: Stephanie Cole," p. 91; July 23, 2001, Nancy Banks-Smith, review of Life as We Know It, p. 22.

Variety, September 13, 1999, Matt Wolf, review of Quartet, p. 58.

Yours, December 1996, Margaret Mason, "Stephanie's Real-Life Dramas."