Jacqueline Pearce
| Jacqueline Pearce | |
|---|---|
 Jacqueline Pearce at the Blake's 7 Series 2 DVD launch, 2005. | |
| Born |
20 December 1943 Woking, Surrey, England |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years active | 1964-2006 |
| Spouse(s) | Drewe Henley (divorced) |
Jacqueline Pearce (born 20 December 1943) is a British film and television actress. Her roles have included horror and comedy and she is perhaps best known as the villain Servalan in the British science fiction TV series Blake's 7.[1]
Career
Jacqueline Pearce was born in Woking, Surrey. She attended the Marist Convent School for Girls at West Byfleet.
She trained at the British stage school RADA and at Lee Strasberg's Actors Studio in Los Angeles.[2]
Despite having appeared in dozens of films and TV shows, she remains best known for her role as Servalan in the British science fiction TV series Blake's 7 (1978–1981).
Jacqueline Pearce was the subject of the 3rd volume of MJTV's "The Actor Speaks" interview/drama CDs, with a special piece written for her by Tanith Lee.
Filmography
Jacqueline Pearce starred in two Hammer horror films, The Plague of the Zombies and The Reptile, which were filmed simultaneously on the same location with largely the same cast and both released in 1966. Other film roles include Sky West and Crooked (1965), the Carry On film Don't Lose Your Head (1966), Don't Raise the Bridge, Lower the River (1968), White Mischief (1987), How to Get Ahead in Advertising (1989), and Princess Caraboo (1994).
TV appearances
As well as appearing in the BBC children's programmes Dark Season (alongside Kate Winslet) and Moondial, Jacqueline Pearce has appeared in the Doctor Who serial The Two Doctors as Chessene, a bloodthirsty alien. She has more recently been associated with Doctor Who through her appearance in The Fearmonger as Sherilyn Harper, an audio drama by Big Finish Productions, and as Admiral Mettna in the webcast story Death Comes to Time. Pearce returned once again to Doctor Who from 2015, this time opposite John Hurt, as a regular in the Big Finish audio series based on the adventures of the War Doctor. She made a memorable appearance playing the role of Rosa Dartle in the 1974 BBC series of Charles Dickens's David Copperfield. She also appeared as an associate of the assassin Carlos in the 1988 television movie, The Bourne Identity.
Pearce has also made frequent guest appearances in TV series such as: Danger Man, The Avengers, Man in a Suitcase, Public Eye, Callan, Dead of Night, Special Branch, The Zoo Gang, Spy Trap and The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles.
Personal life
In February 2012, Pearce was diagnosed with breast cancer for a second time. In May 2012, she began a course of chemotherapy and is now in remission. She resided in South Africa from 2006 until she returned to the UK in 2015 to further pursue her acting career.
References
- ↑ John Kenneth Muir, A History and Critical Analysis of Blake's 7, the 1978-1981 British Television Space Adventure.
- ↑ Garfield, David (1980). "Appendix: Life Members of The Actors Studio as of January 1980". A Player's Place: The Story of The Actors Studio. New York: MacMillan Publishing Co., Inc. p. 279. ISBN 0-02-542650-8.
External links
- From Byfleet to the Bush: The Autobiography of Jacqueline Pearce
- Jacqueline Pearce at the Internet Movie Database