Tiddles
04-15-2006, 10:19 PM
TV HEROES: #168: Mollie Sugden
Great sitcom characters tend to take on a life of their own, to the point where they become almost independent of their creators. Like a good parent, the writer can only wish them well and offer any help where necessary.
Mollie Sugden's Mrs Slocombe, in Jeremy Lloyd and David Croft's Are You Being Served?, was a recognisable working type - the shop- worn spinster, defying the years with ever more lurid rinses, and returning home alone each night to her pussy. Mrs Slocombe was Miss Brahms 30 years down the line (come to think of it, Pauline Fowler is also Miss Brahms 30 years down the line, but you know what I mean).
Mrs Slocombe had an arch, Orton'esque way with the unfortunate phrase (one can see her as the landlady in Entertaining Mr Sloane), and proved a ready stooge for John Inman's Mr Humphries. Yes, she had her pussy but no children - which must have been a personal relief to Sugden, who found herself endlessly cast in the role of interfering mother. She was Jimmy Clitheroe's mum in Just Jimmy, Nerys Hughes's snooty mama in The Liver Birds, Robin Nedwell's mater in Doctor in Charge, Terry Scott's in Son of the Bride, and John Alderton's in My Wife Next Door (in real- life she had twins, with her husband, the actor William Moore). Playing Mrs Slocombe must have been liberating indeed.
Great sitcom characters tend to take on a life of their own, to the point where they become almost independent of their creators. Like a good parent, the writer can only wish them well and offer any help where necessary.
Mollie Sugden's Mrs Slocombe, in Jeremy Lloyd and David Croft's Are You Being Served?, was a recognisable working type - the shop- worn spinster, defying the years with ever more lurid rinses, and returning home alone each night to her pussy. Mrs Slocombe was Miss Brahms 30 years down the line (come to think of it, Pauline Fowler is also Miss Brahms 30 years down the line, but you know what I mean).
Mrs Slocombe had an arch, Orton'esque way with the unfortunate phrase (one can see her as the landlady in Entertaining Mr Sloane), and proved a ready stooge for John Inman's Mr Humphries. Yes, she had her pussy but no children - which must have been a personal relief to Sugden, who found herself endlessly cast in the role of interfering mother. She was Jimmy Clitheroe's mum in Just Jimmy, Nerys Hughes's snooty mama in The Liver Birds, Robin Nedwell's mater in Doctor in Charge, Terry Scott's in Son of the Bride, and John Alderton's in My Wife Next Door (in real- life she had twins, with her husband, the actor William Moore). Playing Mrs Slocombe must have been liberating indeed.