Diana Rigg

Dame Diana Rigg
DBE

Rigg in the 1973 TV series Diana
Born Enid Diana Elizabeth Rigg
(1938-07-20) 20 July 1938
Doncaster, South Yorkshire, UK
Residence Hammersmith, London, UK
Occupation Actress
Years active 1959–present
Spouse(s) Menachem Gueffen
(m. 1973; div. 1976)

Archie Stirling
(m. 1982; div. 1990)
Children Rachael Stirling

Dame Enid Diana Elizabeth Rigg, DBE (born 20 July 1938) is an English actress. She played Emma Peel in the 60's TV series The Avengers, and plays Olenna Tyrell in Game of Thrones, Sutton in You, Me and the Apocalypse, and opposite her daughter, Rachel Stirling, in Detectorists. She has had an extensive career in film and theatre, including playing the title role in Medea, both in London and New York, for which she won the 1994 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play. She was made CBE in 1988 and a Dame in 1994.

Rigg made her professional stage debut in 1957 in The Caucasian Chalk Circle, and joined the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1959. She made her Broadway debut in the 1971 production of Abelard & Heloise. Her film roles include Helena in A Midsummer Night's Dream (1968); Countess Teresa di Vicenzo, wife of James Bond in On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969); Lady Holiday in The Great Muppet Caper (1981); and Arlene Marshall in Evil Under the Sun (1982). She won the BAFTA TV Award for Best Actress for the 1989 BBC miniseries Mother Love, and an Emmy Award for her role as Mrs. Danvers in the 1997 adaptation of Rebecca.

Biography

Early life and education

Rigg was born in Doncaster, then in the West Riding of Yorkshire, now in South Yorkshire[1] to Louis Rigg (1903–1968) and Beryl Hilda (née Helliwell; 1908–1981); her father was a railway engineer who had been born in Yorkshire. Between the ages of two months and eight years Rigg lived in Bikaner, India, where her father was employed as a railway executive.[1]

Hindi was her second language in those young years (and she still today enjoys using a smattering of words and phrases when ordering Indian food). She was then sent to a boarding school, the Moravian School in Fulneck, near Pudsey. She disliked her boarding school, where she felt like a fish out of water, but she believes that Yorkshire played a greater part in shaping her character than India did. She trained as an actress at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art from 1955-57, where her classmates included Glenda Jackson and Siân Phillips.[2]

Theatre career

Rigg's career in film, television and the theatre has been wide-ranging, including roles in the Royal Shakespeare Company between 1959 and 1964. Her professional debut was in the RADA production of The Caucasian Chalk Circle at the York Festival in 1957. Her role was Natasha Abashwilli.[3]

She returned to the stage in the Ronald Millar play Abelard and Heloïse in London in 1970, and made her Broadway debut with the play in 1971, earning the first of three Tony Award nominations for Best Actress in a Play. She received her second nomination in 1975, for The Misanthrope. A member of the National Theatre Company at the Old Vic from 1972 to 1975, Rigg took leading roles in premiere productions of two Tom Stoppard plays, Dorothy Moore in Jumpers (National Theatre, 1972) and Ruth Carson in Night and Day (Phoenix Theatre, 1978).

In 1982, she appeared in a musical called Colette, based on the life of the French writer and created by Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt, but it closed during an American tour en route to Broadway. In 1987 she took a leading role in the West End production of Stephen Sondheim's musical Follies. In the 1990s, she had triumphs with roles at the Almeida Theatre in Islington, including Medea in 1992 (which transferred to the Wyndham's Theatre in 1993 and then Broadway in 1994, for which she received the Tony Award for Best Actress), Mother Courage at the National Theatre in 1995 and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at the Almeida Theatre in 1996 (which transferred to the Aldwych Theatre in 1997).

In 2004, she appeared as Violet Venable in Sheffield Theatres' production of Tennessee Williams's play Suddenly Last Summer, which transferred to the Albery Theatre. In 2006, she appeared at the Wyndham's Theatre in London's West End in a drama entitled Honour which had a limited but successful run. In 2007, she appeared as Huma Rojo in the Old Vic's production of All About My Mother, adapted by Samuel Adamson and based on the film of the same title directed by Pedro Almodóvar.

She appeared in 2008 in The Cherry Orchard at the Chichester Festival Theatre, returning there in 2009 to star in Noël Coward's Hay Fever. In 2011 she played Mrs Higgins in Pygmalion at the Garrick Theatre, opposite Rupert Everett and Kara Tointon, having played Eliza Doolittle 37 years earlier at the Albery Theatre.

Film and television career

Rigg appeared in the cult British 1960s television series The Avengers (1965–67) playing the secret agent Mrs Emma Peel in 51 episodes, replacing Elizabeth Shepherd at very short notice when Shepherd was dropped from the role after filming two episodes. Rigg auditioned for the role of Emma Peel on a whim, without ever having seen the programme. Although she was hugely successful in the series, she disliked the lack of privacy that it brought. She also did not like the way that she was treated by the Associated British Corporation (ABC). After a dozen episodes she discovered that she was being paid less than a cameraman. For her second season she held out for a pay rise from £150 a week to £450,[4] but there was still no question of her staying for a third year. Patrick Macnee, her co-star in the series, noted that Rigg had later told him that she considered Macnee and her driver to be her only friends on the set.[5]

On the big screen she became a Bond girl in On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969), playing Tracy Bond, James Bond's only wife, opposite George Lazenby. She said she took the role with the hope that she would become well known in America.[6]

Her other films from this period include The Assassination Bureau (1969), Julius Caesar (1970), The Hospital (1971), Theatre of Blood (1973), In This House of Brede (1975) (based on the book by Rumer Godden) and A Little Night Music (1977). She appeared as the title character in The Marquise (1980), a television adaptation of play by Noël Coward. In 1981 she appeared in a Yorkshire Television production of Hedda Gabler in the title role, and as Lady Holiday in the film The Great Muppet Caper (1981). The following year she received acclaim for her performance as Arlena Marshall in the film adaptation of Agatha Christie's Evil Under the Sun, sharing barbs with her character's old rival, played by Maggie Smith.

She appeared as Regan, the king's treacherous second daughter, in a Granada Television production of King Lear (1983), which starred Laurence Olivier in the title role. She costarred with Denholm Elliot in a television version of Dickens' Bleak House (BBC, 1985), and played the Evil Queen, Snow White's evil stepmother, in the Cannon Movie Tales's film adaptation of Snow White (1987). In 1989 she played Helena Vesey in Mother Love for the BBC; her portrayal of an obsessive mother who was prepared to do anything, even murder, to keep control of her son won Rigg the 1989 BAFTA for Best Television Actress.

In the 1990s she appeared on television as Mrs. Danvers in Rebecca (winning an Emmy Award in the process), as well as the PBS production Moll Flanders, and as the amateur detective Mrs. Bradley in The Mrs Bradley Mysteries. In this BBC series, first aired in 2000, she played Gladys Mitchell's detective, Dame Beatrice Adela Le Strange Bradley, an eccentric old woman who worked for Scotland Yard as a pathologist. The series was not a critical success and did not return for a second season.

From 1989 until 2003, she hosted the PBS television series Mystery!, shown in the United States by PBS broadcaster WGBH,taking over from Vincent Price,[7] her co-star from Theatre of Blood. Her TV career in America has been varied. She starred in her own sitcom Diana in 1973, but it was not successful.

She also appeared in the second series of Ricky Gervais's hit comedy Extras, alongside Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe, and in the 2006 film The Painted Veil.

In 2013 she appeared in an episode of Doctor Who in a Victorian-era based story called The Crimson Horror alongside her daughter Rachael Stirling, Matt Smith and Jenna-Louise Coleman. The episode had been specially written for her and her daughter by Mark Gatiss and aired as part of series 7.[8] It was not the first time mother and daughter had appeared in the same production – that was in the 2000 NBC film In the Beginning — but the first time she had worked with her daughter and also the first time in her career her roots were accessed to find a Doncaster, Yorkshire, accent.

The same year, Rigg secured a recurring role in the third season of the HBO series Game of Thrones, portraying Lady Olenna Tyrell, a witty and sarcastic political mastermind popularly known as the Queen of Thorns, the grandmother of regular character Margaery Tyrell.[9] Her performance was well received by critics and audiences alike, and earned her an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series for the 65th Primetime Emmy Awards in 2013.[10] She reprised her role in season four of Game of Thrones, and in July 2014 received another Guest Actress Emmy nomination.[11][12] In 2015 and 2016, she again reprised the role in seasons five, and six in an expanded role from the books.

Personal life

In the 1960s, Rigg lived for eight years with actor/director Philip Saville,[13] causing some degree of scandal in the tabloids when she disclaimed interest in marrying the older, already-married Saville, saying she had no desire "to be respectable".[14] She was married to Menachem Gueffen, an Israeli painter, from 1973 until their divorce in 1976,[15] and to Archibald Stirling, a theatrical producer and former officer in the Scots Guards, from 25 March 1982,[16] until their divorce in 1990.[2] With Stirling, Rigg has a daughter, actress Rachael Stirling, who was born in 1977.[17]

Rigg has long been an outspoken critic of feminism,[18] saying in 1969, "Women are in a much stronger position than men."[19]

Rigg is a Patron of International Care & Relief and was for many years the public face of the charity's child sponsorship scheme. She was also Chancellor of the University of Stirling,[2] being succeeded by James Naughtie when her ten-year term of office ended on 31 July 2008.[20]

Michael Parkinson, who first interviewed Rigg in 1972, described her as the most desirable woman he ever met, who "radiated a lustrous beauty".[21] A smoker from the age of 18, Rigg was still smoking 20 cigarettes a day in 2009,[22] but in 2011 said she had given up smoking because she "had to".[23]

Honours

Rigg received honorary degrees from the University of Stirling in 1988 and the University of Leeds in 1992.[24]

Rigg was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1988 and a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in 1994.

In 2014, Rigg received the Will Award, presented by the Shakespeare Theatre Company, along with Stacey Keach and John Hurt.[25]

On 25 October 2015, to mark 50 years of Emma Peel, the BFI (British Film Institute) screened an episode of The Avengers followed by an onstage interview with Rigg about her time on the cult 1960s TV show.[26]

Filmography

Film

Year Title Role Notes
1968 Midsummer Night's Dream, AA Midsummer Night's Dream Helena
1969 Mini-Killers Short film
1969 Assassination Bureau, TheThe Assassination Bureau Sonya Winter
1969 On Her Majesty's Secret Service Contessa Teresa "Tracy" Draco di Vicenzo/Bond
1970 Julius Caesar Portia
1971 Hospital, TheThe Hospital Barbara Drummond
1973 Theatre of Blood Edwina Lionheart
1977 Little Night Music, AA Little Night Music Countess Charlotte Mittelheim
1981 Great Muppet Caper, TheThe Great Muppet Caper Lady Holiday
1982 Evil Under the Sun Arlena Marshall
1987 Snow White The Evil Queen, Snow White's evil stepmother
1994 Good Man in Africa, AA Good Man in Africa Chloe Fanshawe
1999 Parting Shots Lisa
2005 Heidi Grandmamma
2006 Painted Veil, TheThe Painted Veil Mother Superior
2015 The Honourable Rebel Narrator

Television

Year Title Role Notes
1959 Midsummer Night's Dream, AA Midsummer Night's Dream Bit part TV film
1963 Sentimental Agent, TheThe Sentimental Agent Francy Wilde Episode: "A Very Desirable Plot"
1964 Festival Adriana Episode: "The Comedy of Errors"
1964 Armchair Theatre Anita Fender Episode: "The Hothouse"
1965 ITV Play of the Week Bianca Episode: "Women Beware Women"
1965–68 Avengers, TheThe Avengers Emma Peel Main role (51 episodes)
1970 ITV Saturday Night Theatre Liz Jardine Episode: "Married Alive"
1973–74 Diana Diana Smythe Main role (15 episodes)
1974 Affairs of the Heart Grace Gracedew Episode: "Grace"
1975 In This House of Brede Philippa TV film
1975 The Morecambe & Wise Show Nell Gwynne Sketch in Christmas Show
1977 Three Piece Suite Various Regular role (6 episodes)
1979 Oresteia Clytemnestra TV miniseries
1980 Marquise, TheThe Marquise Eloise TV film
1981 Hedda Gabler Hedda Gabler TV film
1982 Play of the Month (BBC) Rita Allmers Episode: Little Eyolf
1982 Witness for the Prosecution Christine Vole TV film
1983 King Lear Regan TV film
1985 Bleak House Lady Honoria Dedlock TV miniseries
1986 Worst Witch, TheThe Worst Witch Miss Constance Hardbroom TV film
1987 Hazard of Hearts, AA Hazard of Hearts Lady Harriet Vulcan TV film
1989 Play on One, TheThe Play on One Lydia Episode: "Unexplained Laughter"
1989 Mother Love Helena Vesey TV miniseries
British Academy Television Award for Best Actress
Broadcast Press Guild Award for Best Actress
1992 Mrs. 'Arris Goes to Paris Mme. Colbert TV film
1993 Road to Avonlea Lady Blackwell Episode: "The Disappearance"
1993 Running Delilah Judith TV film
1993 Screen Two Baroness Frieda von Stangel Episode: "Genghis Cohn"
Nominated – CableACE Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or Movie
1995 Zoya Evgenia TV film
1995 Haunting of Helen Walker, TheThe Haunting of Helen Walker Mrs. Grose TV film
1996 Fortunes and Misfortunes of Moll Flanders, TheThe Fortunes and Misfortunes of Moll Flanders Mrs. Golightly TV film
1996 Samson and Delilah Mara TV film
1997 Rebecca Mrs. Danvers TV miniseries
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie
1998 American, TheThe American Madame de Bellegarde TV film
1998–2000 Mrs Bradley Mysteries, TheThe Mrs Bradley Mysteries Mrs. Adela Bradley Main role
2000 In the Beginning Mature Rebeccah TV film
2001 Victoria & Albert Baroness Lehzen TV miniseries
Nominated – Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie
2003 Murder in Mind Jill Craig Episode: "Suicide"
2003 Charles II: The Power and The Passion Queen Henrietta Maria TV miniseries
2006 Extras Herself Episode: "Daniel Radcliffe"
2013–present Game of Thrones Olenna Tyrell Seasons 3, 4, 5, 6
Online Film & Television Association Award for Best Guest Actress in a Drama Series (2013, 2014)
Nominated – Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series (2013, 2014, 2015)
Nominated – Critics' Choice Television Award for Best Guest Performer in a Drama Series (2013, 2014)
Nominated – Online Film & Television Association Award for Best Guest Actress in a Drama Series (2015)
2013 Doctor Who Mrs. Winifred Gillyflower Episode: "The Crimson Horror"
2015 Penn Zero: Part-Time Hero Mayor Pink Panda (voice) Episode: "Babypocalypse"
2015 You, Me and the Apocalypse Sutton TV series
2015 Professor Branestawm Returns Lady Pagwell TV film
2015 Detectorists Veronica TV series

Theatre

List of selected theatre credits

Year Title Role Notes
1957 The Caucasian Chalk Circle Natella Abashwili Theatre Royal, York Festival
1964 King Lear Cordelia Royal Shakespeare Company (European/US Tour)
1966 Twelfth Night Viola Royal Shakespeare Company
1970 Abelard and Heloise Heloise Wyndham's Theatre, London
1971 Abelard and Heloise Heloise Brooks Atkinson Theatre, New York City
1972 Macbeth Lady Macbeth Old Vic Theatre, London
1972 Jumpers Dorothy Moore National Theatre, London
1974 Pygmalion Eliza Doolittle Albery Theatre, London
1978 Night and Day Ruth Carson Phoenix Theatre, London
1975 Misanthrope, TheThe Misanthrope Célimène National Theatre, London
1975 Misanthrope, TheThe Misanthrope Célimène St. James Theatre, New York City
1982 Colette Colette US national tour
1983 Heartbreak House Lady Ariadne Utter word Theatre Royal Haymarket, London
1985 Little Eyolf Rita Allmers Lyric Theatre, London
1985 Antony and Cleopatra Cleopatra Chichester Festival Theatre, UK
1986 Wildfire Bess Theatre Royal, Bath & Phoenix Theatre, London
1987 Follies Phyllis Rogers Stone Shaftesbury Theatre, London
1990 Love Letters Melissa Stage Door Theatre, San Francisco
1992 Putting It Together Old Fire Station Theatre, Oxford
1992 Berlin Bertie Rosa Royal Court Theatre, London
1992 Medea Medea Almeida Theatre, London
1993 Medea Medea Wyndham's Theatre, London
1994 Medea Medea Longacre Theatre, New York City
1995 Mother Courage Mother Courage National Theatre, London
1996 Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf Martha Almeida Theatre, London
1997 Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf Martha Aldwych Theatre, London
1998 Phaedra Phaedra Almeida at the Albery Theatre, London & BAM in Brooklyn, NY
1998 Britannicus Agrippina Almeida at the Albery Theatre, London & BAM in Brooklyn, NY
2001 Humble Boy Flora Humble National Theatre, London & Chichester Festival Theatre, UK
2002 The Hollow Crown International Tour: New Zealand, Australia, Stratford-upon-Avon, UK
2004 Suddenly, Last Summer Violet Venable Albery Theatre, London
2006 Honour Honour Wyndham's Theatre, London
2007 All About My Mother Huma Rojo Old Vic Theatre, London
2008 Cherry Orchard, TheThe Cherry Orchard Ranyevskaya Chichester Festival Theatre, UK
2009 Hay Fever Judith Bliss Chichester Festival Theatre, UK
2011 Pygmalion Mrs. Higgins Garrick Theatre, London

Awards and nominations

Year Award Category Work Result
1967 Emmy Award Best Actress in a Drama Series The Avengers Nominated
1968 Emmy Award Best Actress in a Drama Series The Avengers Nominated
1970 Laurel Award Female New Face The Assassination Bureau Nominated
1971 Tony Award Best Actress in a Play Abelard and Heloise Nominated
1972 Golden Globe Best Supporting Actress (motion picture) The Hospital Nominated
1975 Tony Award Best Actress in a Play The Misanthrope Nominated
1975 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Actress in a Play The Misanthrope Nominated
1975 Emmy Award Best Actress in a TV Movie In This House of Brede Nominated
1990 BAFTA TV Award Best Actress Mother Love Won
1990 Broadcasting Press Guild Award Best Actress Mother Love Won
1992 Evening Standard Award Best Actress Medea Won
1994 Olivier Award Best Actress Medea Nominated
1994 Tony Award Best Actress in a Play Medea Won
1996 CableACE Award Supporting Actress in a Movie or Miniseries Screen Two (1985) - episode "Genghis Cohn" Nominated
1996 Olivier Award Best Actress Mother Courage Nominated
1996 Evening Standard Award Best Actress Mother Courage and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf Won
1997 Olivier Award Best Actress Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf Nominated
1997 Emmy Award Best Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or TV Movie Rebecca Won
1999 Olivier Award Best Actress Britannicus and Phedre Nominated
2000 Special BAFTA Award[27] non-competitive John Steed's partners shared with Honor Blackman, Linda Thorson and Joanna Lumley. The Avengers (and
The New Avengers
)
Awarded
2002 Emmy Award Best Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or TV Movie Victoria & Albert Nominated
2013 Critics' Choice Television Award Best Guest Performer in a Drama Series Game of Thrones Nominated
Emmy Award Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series Game of Thrones Nominated
Online Film & Television Association Award Best Guest Actress in a Drama Series Game of Thrones Won
2014 Critics' Choice Television Award Best Guest Performer in a Drama Series Game of Thrones Nominated
Emmy Award Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series Game of Thrones Nominated
Online Film & Television Association Award Best Guest Actress in a Drama Series Game of Thrones Won
2015 Emmy Award Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series Game of Thrones Nominated
Online Film & Television Association Award Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series Game of Thrones Nominated

References

  1. 1 2 Meet... Dame Diana Rigg, BBC South Yorkshire. Retrieved 14 July 2006.
  2. 1 2 3 Nigel Farndale (17 August 2008). "Diana Rigg: her story". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 20 August 2011.
  3. "dianarigg.net career: theatre". dianarigg.net.
  4. Dave Rogers The Complete Avengers, London: Boxtree, 1989; New York: St. Martin's Press, 1989, p.169
  5. J.G. Lane, "Diana Rigg Biography". Retrieved 3 December 2010
  6. "Bond's Beauties". people.com.
  7. Mystery! Hosts at pbs.org (Retrieved 1 July 2016)
  8. Doctor Who, "Dame Diana Rigg and Rachael Stirling to Star in New Series!". Retrieved 3 July 2012
  9. "Dame Diana Rigg Joins Season 3 of HBO's 'Game of Thrones' | The Playlist". Blogs.indiewire.com. Retrieved 28 April 2013.
  10. "Emmy Nominees Full List: Breaking Bad, Homeland, Downton Abbey Dominate 2013 Awards". The Huffington Post. 18 July 2013. Retrieved 10 July 2014.
  11. Jacobs, Matthew (10 July 2014). "Emmy Nominations 2014: Breaking Bad, Orange Is The New Black Among Top Nominees". The Huffington Post. Retrieved 10 July 2014.
  12. Brown, Tracy (10 July 2014). "Emmys 2014: Complete list of nominees". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 10 July 2014.
  13. Miss Peelpants (7 February 2011). "Diana Rigg and Philip Saville". Vintage-a-Peel. Retrieved 10 January 2014.
  14. Tracy, Kathleen (2004). Diana Rigg: The Biography. Dallas: BenBella Books. p. 38. ISBN 978-1932100273.
  15. Hauptfuhrer, Fred (15 July 1974). "Being Mr. Diana Rigg Was Too Much for Gueffen". People. Retrieved 19 September 2013.
  16. Rainho, Manny (March 2015). "This Month in Movie History". Classic Images (477): 28.
  17. Groskop, Viv (17 February 2010), "Rachael Stirling is a rising stage star – and she's in love with her ass", London Evening Standard, retrieved 12 June 2011
  18. Langley, William (5 May 2013). "Dame Diana Rigg is still fanning the flames of feminist derision". The Telegraph. London.
  19. Hunter-Symon, Penny (17 March 1969). "Those vulnerable feminists". The Times. London.
  20. "Diana Rigg gets new star role as Stirling's chancellor".
  21. Parkinson, Michael (14 October 2010). Parky's People. Hodder & Stoughton. p. 316. ISBN 978-1-84894-696-5. Retrieved 12 April 2012.
  22. Laura Potter. "My body & soul". the Guardian.
  23. "Ciaran Brown meets Avengers actress Dame Diana Rigg". Ciaranbrown.com. Retrieved 28 April 2013.
  24. Biography for Diana Rigg at the Internet Movie Database
  25. Bennettawards Retrieved 2015-10-15.
  26. BFI Interview with Dame Diana Rigg Retrieved 2016-02-18.
  27. The Special BAFTA Award

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