I could report on some scurrilous scandal in the Sunday papers but this is a much more rewarding news article. Deanna Delamotta writes for the Manchester Evening News and the first half of her recent column is nowt but praise for the overlooked and under appreciated Eileen Derbyshire who has played Emily Bishop for nearly 49 years. What spurred Ms. Delamotta to write about Eileen was her performance this week in the aftermath of discovering that her newly found love, Ramsay Clegg, had died suddenly. She calls Eileen's performance "achingly poignant" with "a startlingly realistic range of emotions". Eileen played Emily's grief entirely spot on in character. She puts it so succinctly that I can't rephrase it better, "More tellingly, Monday night's master class demonstrated that actors don't have to shout and bawl to convey despair. Eileen's restrained initial reaction to the news of Ramsay's death which erupted in an outpouring of invective at Norris demonstrated that less is more in acting terms." She thinks, and I agree, that more of the younger actors could do worse than take a few pointers from Eileen's experience and performance. When she is allowed to shine, she's blinding!
