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Margaret Maud Tyzack (9 September 193125 June 2011) was an English actress. Her television roles included The Forsyte Saga (1967) I, Claudius (1976), and George Lucas's Young Indiana Jones (1992–1993). She won the 1970 BAFTA TV Award for Best Actress for the BBC serial The First Churchills, and the 1990 Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for Lettice and Lovage, opposite Maggie Smith. She also won two Olivier Awards—in 1981 as Actress of the Year in a Revival and in 2009 as Best Actress in a Play. Her film appearances included Stanley Kubrick's (1968) and A Clockwork Orange (1971). As well as Prick Up Your Ears (1987) and Match Point (2005).
She received her first Olivier award as Actress of the Year in a Revival in 1981 for the National Theatre revival of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? in which she played Martha, replacing Joan Plowright who was ill. In 1990, she won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for her role as Lotte Schoen in the play Lettice and Lovage, in which she appeared in both the London and Broadway theatre productions opposite Dame Maggie Smith. The American Actors' Equity initially refused permission for Tyzack to join the New York production, but Smith refused to appear without Tyzack because of the "onstage chemistry" she believed the two women had created in their roles.Bruce Weber "Margaret Tyzack, Award-Winning Actress, Dies at 79", New York Times, 27 June 2011 In 1994, she played Sybil Birling in the Royal National Theatre production of An Inspector Calls. In 2008, she was acclaimed for her portrayal of Mrs St Maugham in a revival of Enid Bagnold's The Chalk Garden at the Donmar Warehouse, London, for which she won the Best Actress award in the Critics' Circle Theatre Awards and the Olivier award for Best Actress in a Play in 2009. In 2009, she also appeared alongside Helen Mirren in Phedre at the Royal National Theatre.
She appeared in two films directed by Stanley Kubrick, (1968) and A Clockwork Orange (1971). Tyzack also appeared in Ring of Spies (1964), The Whisperers (1967), A Touch of Love (1969), The Legacy (1978), The Quatermass Conclusion (1979), Mr. Love (1985), Prick Up Your Ears (1987), The King's Whore (1990), Mrs Dalloway (1997), Bright Young Things (2003), and the Woody Allen films Match Point (2005) and Scoop (2006).
It was as a television actress that Tyzack became a household name. She is remembered for her leading roles in BBC television productions. She came to notice as Winifred, Soames's sister, in the well received BBC adaptation of John Galsworthy's The Forsyte Saga in 1967, a series shown internationally. She portrayed the character of Gladys King in Dennis Potter's The Bone Grinder (1968), a metaphor for the decline of the British Empire and rise of American power in the post-war world. BFI Player"Playbill" by James Greenfield, TV Times page 10, 11-17 May 1968 Tyzack played Queen Anne in The First Churchills; Bette in Cousin Bette; and Antonia Minor, mother of the Emperor Claudius, in I, Claudius. She also played Clotilde Bradbury-Scott in the BBC adaptation of the Agatha Christie story Nemesis in 1987 in Miss Marple.
In the 1990s, she played a major role in George Lucas's Young Indiana Jones television series as the young Indiana Jones' strict Oxford-educated tutor, Miss Helen Seymour. In the 2000s, she made two appearances in Midsomer Murders. In 2011, she joined the cast of soap opera EastEnders, playing Lydia Simmonds. On 13 April 2011, it was announced that for personal reasons she had departed EastEnders and that her role had been recast to Heather Chasen as a result of the nature of the large storyline needing to continue.
| 1987 | |
| Uncredited | |
| (final film role) |
| + !Year !Title !Role !Notes | |||
| 1957 | Kenilworth | Janet | 4 episodes |
| 1957–1958 | Angel Pavement | Miss Matfield | |
| 1958 | Armchair Theatre | Elizabeth Farrow | Episode: "The Owl Who Came Back" |
| 1958–1959 | Saturday Playhouse | Nadine Arne/Clare Cousins | 2 episodes |
| 1958–1965 | ITV Play of the Week | Various | 3 episodes |
| 1959 | The Infamous John Friend | Mrs. Friend | 5 episodes |
| 1960 | The Four Just Men | Wife | Episode: "The Miracle of St. Philipe" |
| 1960–1963 | BBC Sunday-Night Play | Various | 3 episodes |
| ITV Television Playhouse | Elizabeth/Lily | ||
| 1961 | Theatre 70 | Valerie Marsden/The Woman | 2 episodes |
| 1961–1962 | Drama 61-67 | Various | 3 episodes |
| 1963 | Maigret | Mademoisselle/Anna | 2 episodes |
| 1965 | Thursday Theatre | Isobel Cherry | Episode: "The Floweing Cherry" |
| 1967 | The Forsyte Saga | Winifred Dartie | 23 episodes |
| 1968 | ITV Playhouse | Gladys King | Episode: "The Bonegrinder" |
| 1969 | NET Playhouse | Isobel Cherry | Episode: "Flowering Cherry" |
| The First Churchills | Queen Anne | 9 episodes | |
| 1969–1978 | Jackanory | Storyteller | 17 episodes |
| 1974 | BBC Play of the Month | Mrs. Linden | Episode: "The Linden Tree" |
| 1976 | I, Claudius | Antonia Minor | |
| 1979 | Quatermass | Annie Morgan | 2 episodes |
| 1981–1982 | BBC2 Playhouse | Madam Fyolka/Daphne | |
| 1982 | BBC Television Shakespeare | Paulina | Episode: The Winter's Tale |
| An Inspector Calls | Sybil Birling | Miniseries | |
| Queen Elizabeth II | TV movie | ||
| 1985 | The Corsican Brothers | Madame de Guidice | |
| 1987 | Miss Marple | Clothilde Bradbury-Scott | Episode: "Nemesis" |
| 1992–2000 | The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles | Miss Seymour | 14 episodes |
| 1994 | Alleyn Mysteries | Emily Pride | Episode: "Dead Water" |
| 1998 | Dalziel and Pascoe | Ella Keech | Episode: "Child's Play" |
| Our Mutual Friend | Lady Tippins | 4 episodes | |
| 2000, 2009 | Midsomer Murders | Naomi Inkpen/Harriet Compton | 2 episodes |
| 2003 | Heartbeat | Edna Barton | Episode: "Caped Crusaders" |
| 2005 | Doc Martin | Muriel Steel | Episode: "Old Dogs" |
| 2006 | Rosemary & Thyme | Audrey Pargeter | Episode: "Seeds of Time" |
| 2009 | Midsomer Murders | Harriet Compton | Episode: "Small Mercies" |
| 2011 | EastEnders | Lydia Simmonds | 3 episodes |
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