Googie Withers

One of my favourite actresses of all time Googie ( Georgette ) Withers has died at 94.

They used to show classic British Black and White films on the TV constantly when I was a kid - by the time I'd left home I knew everything about British Cinema - I knew all about The Servant, Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, A kid for Two Farthings, The League of Gentlemen, The Dambusters - you name it - I loved British Films, and I always preferred them in black and white.

There are a couple of films in particular that really fascinated me - and they all starred the same actress. Googie Withers has been described in obituaries as having the 'Grand' theatrical manner - she was a fairly successful stage actress - much loved and very successful in Rattigan and Coward on the West End stage - but equally at home in the more stagey British classics. She was frighteningly malevolent as the faithless wife with murder on her mind in 'Pink String and Ceiling Wax' - charming and beautiful as the confident young woman who saves her husband from a truly horrible fate in 'Dead of Night' - Her great film - The Loves of Joanna Godden made me want to move to the flat, wild open spaces of Romney Marsh ( I still do ) - but my absolute favourite role, The tragic and frustrated wife who is the unwilling catalyst for all sorts of disaster in 'It Always rains On Sundays', must be my favourite film of al.

Set in an East End that was still very familiar when I lived there myself - it's powerful claustraphobia and plausible characters and plots really caught my imagination. A clever, witty, talented actress - she had the kind of enigmatic face that looked painted or conjoured up by the set designers. It's worth remembering that everyone my age remembers her role in 'Within These Walls' - a role that she only actually inhabited for a year, such was her appeal.

She was married to John McCallum - her staggeringly handsome Co-Star in 'Sundays' for over 60 years - they lived in his native Australia, where she continued to act - and helped her producer husband in projects such as... devising and developing Skippy the Bush Kangaroo.