Actor Glenda Jackson Has Died

She was one of a generation of great British actors like Vanessa Redgrave, Dame Judi Dench, Dame Maggie Smith and Dame Joan Plowright. Like many of those who are now better known, she started her career doing odd jobs and taking small parts in theatres around Britain. It was when she joined the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1964 that she had some of her greatest stage successes, starting with Peter Brook's production of Marat/Sade, in what several critics claimed "changed British theatre forever." 

She came to attention of much larger audiences with her performance in the Ken Russell movie of D. H. Lawrence's Women in Love, a role for which she won the first of her two Best Actress Oscars. I particularly remember her in John Schlesinger's 1971 Sunday Bloody Sunday in which she played the girlfriend of a bisexual young man played by actor Murray Head. His full-on kiss in that movie with the doctor played by the hithertoo seemingly aggressively heterosexual actor Peter Finch shocked many. 

In 1992 she gave up acting to become a member of the British parliament. A strong socialist she seemed to have found her niche and remained in parliament for 23 years. She emerged from her Westminster duties triumphantly to return to the stage to play the role of Shakespeare's King Lear at the age of 82. It is believed by most that she was offered the honour of becoming a Dame but turned it down. It would not have fitted her strong socialist principles. The great actor died aged 87.