ANITA Dobson’s Angie in Eastenders was dynamite. Iconic.
Dobson was in the soap only three and a half years but such was her potency it seems much longer.
But she had to leave. Acting was about playing other roles. However, who to play?
The critics were ready to feed her to the wolves. If she remained Cockney, as she did playing alongside Adam Faith in the theatre version of cult TV show Budgie, the critics said it was ‘too Angie.’
If she played posh, worked for the RSC, she was accused of being snooty, ignoring the role, her eastend background which gave her the building bricks of fame.
“I was in no-win situation,” she admits in soft voice. “But I had a lovely time doing Budgie. And I had a lovely time working with Adam Faith.
She certainly doesn’t look back on the Angie years with regret. She giggles; “When you become an established actress people actually send scripts to you. And I wouldn’t have met my husband otherwise.”
Her husband is of course Queen guitarist Brian May whom she married in 2000.
Has marriage been especially difficult given the demands of work?
“Of course,” she says in clipped voice. “We both want to do the job. But then every marriage is difficult.”
She pauses and smiles; “People ask me the secret of a good marriage. Well, the only secret of a good marriage is wanting to stay in the marriage. And working at it. If it’s not good - get out.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here