Gretchen Franklin
| Gretchen Franklin | |
|---|---|
|
|
| Born |
7 July 1911 Covent Garden, London, England |
| Died | 11 July 2005 (aged 94) Barnes, London, England |
| Occupation | Actress Dancer |
| Years active | 1929–2000 |
| Spouse(s) | John Caswell Garth (m. 1934–1953, his death) |
| Relatives | Clive Dunn (cousin) |
Gretchen Franklin (7 July 1911 – 11 July 2005) was an English actress and dancer with a career in show business spanning over eighty years. She was born in Covent Garden, west London. She played Ethel Skinner in the long-running BBC 1 soap opera EastEnders on a regular basis from 1985 until 1988. After this she returned to the show intermittently. These appearances became briefer and more widely spaced as time went on. Her final appearance was in 2000, when her character was killed off.
Gretchen Franklin was born into a theatrical family. Her father had a song-and-dance act, while her grandfather was a well-known music hall entertainer at the turn of the century.
She entered show business as a teenager, making her début as a pantomime chorus girl in Bournemouth. In 1929, she took dancing lessons at the Theatre Girls Club in Soho in London's West End and she later became a tap dancer and founder member of a quartet known as Four Brilliant Blondes. Franklin was a Tiller Girl, known for their high kicks, at the London Palladium.
She toured in variety with the comedians Syd and Max Harrison and on the Gracie Fields Show, and performed with another dance group, The Three Girlies, before making a gradual switch to straight dramatic roles.
Her break came during the Second World War when she was cast in Sweet and Low, the first of a series of highly successful West End revues. Staged at the New Ambassadors Theatre, the revues starred Hermione Gingold. Franklin and Gingold became close friends and were reunited in another revue, Slings and Arrows (Comedy Theatre, 1948).
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