Remembering Welsh entertainer Doris Hare MBE, born March 1st, 1905.
She was born into a travelling theatrical family and made her stage debut in a speaking role aged three, then worked for decades in music hall, variety and musical theatre, and in the 1960s for the Royal Shakespeare Company and National Theatre.
During World War Two she hosted a radio programme especially for merchant mariners, Shipmates Ashore, and became 'the Sweetheart of the Merchant Navy', for which she was awarded the MBE.
She found later fame as 'Mum' in On the Buses, on television and in the cinema adaptations (1969-73), and in three 'Confessions' sex comedies, which were some of the most profitable British films of the 1970s.
Her film career spanned 60 years, from Night Mail in 1935 to her final credit, Second Best, directed by Chris Menges and starring William Hurt and Keith Allen, in 1994.
According to a tribute in the Borehamwood and Elstree Times:
"...At the grand age of 87, Doris Hare was to take to the West End stage one last time. Doris appeared at the Playhouse Theatre in the Ray Cooney farce, It Runs in the Family. The role saw her reunited opposite former Benny Hill straight man, Henry McGee..."
She passed away at Denville Hall, the residential care home for artistes, on May 30th, 2000.
