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Re: sad news

Messages in this topic: 2 View All
Robert L. TorresOct 31, 2007
 

 
this is indeed sad, because for a one off appearance, I thought
Moira did rather well. she had a very distinctive voice that was
lovely to listen to.

i seem to recall that she was some very early episodes of 'Hancock's
Half Hour' or at the very least in the pilot before she left the
series and was replaced by Andree Melly.

she was a delightful woman, and will be missed.

--- In just-a-minute@..., Dean Bedford <dbedford@...>
wrote:

>
> JAM guest Moira Lister has died, aged 84.
>
> Moira appeared once on JAM, in 1969, enraging Kenneth Williams

with her

> fun and competitive spirit. He wrote about the clash in his diary.

RIP

> Moira.
>
> This obituary is from The Independent.
>
> Moira Lister
> Actress often cast in glacial roles
> Published: 29 October 2007
>
> Moira Lister, actress: born Cape Town, South Africa 6 August 1923;
> married 1951 Vicomte D'Orthez (died 1989; two daughters); died

Cape Town

> 27 October 2007.
>
> Moira Lister was an accomplished actress whose regal bearing found

her

> often cast in patrician roles, though she also had a splendid

sense of

> humour – she was a regular on the first radio series of Hancock's

Half

> Hour – and a versatility that ranged from acclaimed performances

in

> Shakespearean tragedy to her award-winning display of farcical

expertise

> in Move Over, Mrs Markham.
>
> She was an actress whose name evoked keen anticipation of a

sharply

> etched, value-for-money performance, and as recently as 2002 she

was

> still commanding the stage in a sterling revival of Maugham's The
> Constant Wife, as the mother aghast that her daughter should react

with

> such stoicism to her husband's infidelity. Always elegant and
> meticulously groomed (it is fitting that she became the wife of a
> Vicomte) she disliked seeing theatre audiences in jeans and

sandals, and

> with backpacks, feeling that it showed lack of respect for the
> performers.
>
> The daughter of Major James Lister and his wife, Margaret, she was

born

> in Cape Town, South Africa, in 1923, and educated at the Parktown
> Convent of the Holy Family, Johannesburg – later she was a member

of the

> British Catholic Stage Guild. She was given acting lessons as a

child,

> and made her début with the University Players of Johannesburg at

the

> age of six, playing a Prince in The Vikings of Helgeland.
>
> In 1936 she appeared in Johannesburg with Sir Seymour Hicks in

Vintage

> Wine, and Hicks was so impressed that he invited her to appear

with him

> in a proposed play in the UK. They arrived on the day of Edward

VIII's

> abdication to find the play cancelled, but Lister made her London

début,

> aged 14, in the play Post Road at Golders Green Hippodrome, before
> returning to South Africa to continue her education. Further plays

in

> South Africa included When We Are Married and The Women, then in

1944

> she returned to the UK, where she had a featured role on stage in

The

> Shop at Sly Corner and had her first film role with a small part

in The

> Shipbuilders (1944).
>
> A highly successful season with the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre

at

> Stratford-on-Avon in 1945 included acclaimed portrayals of Juliet,
> Desdemona, Olivia in Twelfth Night and Kate Hardcastle in She

Stoops to

> Conquer. In 1947 she starred opposite Noël Coward in Present

Laughter at

> the Haymarket, and many years later she performed a one-woman show
> devoted to Coward. She made her Broadway début in 1948 in the

farce

> Don't Listen Ladies!, returning to have a string of personal

successes

> in Rattigan's French Without Tears (1949), the revue Sauce

Piquante

> (1950) and Ustinov's The Love of Four Colonels (1951).
>
> On screen she made an impression with her small role in the

effective

> thriller Wanted for Murder (1946), playing a well-groomed

secretary who

> titivates herself before going into her boss's office to take

shorthand,

> flirting with him unaware that he is, in fact, a notorious

strangler

> sought by Scotland Yard. More typically glacial roles were those

of a

> gold-digger out to fleece a naïve Welsh miner spending a weekend

in

> London in A Run for Your Money (1950), and a shrewish wife who

meets a

> violent end in Grand National Night (1953 – the film's US title

was The

> Wicked Wife). Other notable films included Pool of London (1950),

White

> Corridors (1951), Trouble in Store (1953), The Cruel Sea (1953),

in

> which she was the wife of a sailor (Denholm Elliott), Abandon Ship
> (1956) with Tyrone Power, and The Yellow Rolls-Royce (1965) with

Rex

> Harrison.
>
> In 1956 she was part of the splendid company formed by John

Gielgud for

> a season at the Palace Theatre in London that included King Lear

(in

> which she was a memorably forceful Regan) and Much Ado About

Nothing (as

> Margaret). She compiled the first of several one-woman shows,

People in

> Love, in 1958, touring Australia and South Africa, then starred in
> London in the hit black comedy The Gazebo (1960), which showcased

her

> superb comic timing and flair for madcap farce (Debbie Reynolds

played

> her role in the film version).
>
> Other comedies in which she excelled included Any Wednesday

(1965),

> Getting Married (1967) and notably the hilarious production of Ray
> Cooney's farce Move Over, Mrs Markham (1971), for which she won

the

> Variety Club of Great Britain's Silver Heart Award as Best Stage

Actress

> of 1971.
>
> Her distinctive, husky voice made Lister a radio stalwart in such

series

> as Simon and Laura and A Life of Bliss, and in South Africa her

radio

> roles included the leading parts in Rain, The Deep Blue Sea (she

had

> earlier played a supporting role in the film version) and The
> Millionairess. On television, she was a sparkling critic of record
> releases in Juke Box Jury, and she was a guest on such shows as

Danger

> Man, Call My Bluff and The Avengers.
>
> For three years, 1967-69, she starred in her own series, A Very

Merry

> Widow. In 1971 she was the subject of This Is Your Life, and her
> autobiography, A Very Merry Moira, was published in 1969. She

married

> the Vicomte d'Orthez, a French officer, in 1951 and the marriage,
> described by their daughter Chantal as a devoted relationship,

lasted

> until his death in 1989. They had two daughters, Chantal and

Christobel.

>
> Lister was performing until three years ago, touring with her

highly

> successful one-woman show about Noël Coward, and she was recently

given

> the Naledi Award, a lifetime achievement award for her services to

the

> theatre in South Africa.
>

 
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