My friend Janet Whiteside, who has died aged 83, played a rich variety of parts during a long acting career, principally in the theatre. What’s more, she graced every production on which she worked with an infectious joie de vivre and was always immensely popular with her directors and fellow actors.
Born in Birmingham to Ernest Whiteside, an encyclopedia salesman, and his wife, Ada (nee Hartley), Janet trained at the Birmingham repertory theatre and began her career in regional theatre. In 1967 she appeared in London at the New theatre (now the Noël Coward) in Spring and Port Wine and in 1968 joined the RSC for eight years – her parts there included Mistress Page in The Merry Wives of Windsor and Pert in London Assurance.
In 1977 she appeared at the National Theatre in William Gaskill’s production of The Madras House, and stayed on with the NT company throughout the 1980s, playing the leading role of Beatrice Grimble in Neaptide and working for all the leading theatre directors. The playwright and director Peter Gill, for whom she appeared in Antigone and Tales from Hollywood, once wrote that Janet was “one of a generation of talented actresses whose commitment, and it must be said, forbearance, made the subsidised theatre work at a crucial time in its development”. She was, he added, “completely without malice and the most rewarding colleague you could imagine”.
Later in her career Janet worked in London at the Donmar, the Almeida and the Old Vic, and she also appeared at the Northampton Royal, which was a favourite theatre of hers, in the title role in Driving Miss Daisy. As well as theatre, she featured in more than a dozen films, including as Mrs Hill in Pride and Prejudice (2005) and as Pamela’s mother in Johnny English Reborn (2011). She was also frequently seen on television, including, over the past few years, in three medical soap operas, Casualty, Holby City and Doctors.
Janet was a delightful and loyal friend. She shared a flat in Chelsea with a fellow thespian, Barbara Atkinson, and helped to care for Barbara after she had a stroke, until her death earlier this year.
Janet is survived by her brother, Terence.
