Glenda Jackson, Oscar-winning actress and former Labour MP, dies aged 87

Glenda Jackson, the Oscar-winning actress and former Labour MP, has died on the age of 87.

In a press release, her agent Lionel Larner mentioned: “Glenda Jackson, two-time Academy Award-winning actress and politician, died peacefully at her house in Blackheath, London, this morning after a quick sickness together with her household at her aspect.

“She recently completed filming The Great Escaper in which she co-starred with Michael Caine.”

Jackson received the Oscar for finest actress in 1970 for Women In Love and once more three years later for A Touch Of Class – though selected to not attend the Hollywood ceremony on both event.

Despite her profitable profession in leisure – she additionally received two Emmy Awards and a Tony – she mentioned she by no means had any curiosity within the social and glamorous points of the business, and devoted herself to politics within the Nineties.

Jackson was elected because the Labour MP for Hampstead and Highgate in 1992 and served as a junior transport minister from 1997 to 1999 when Sir Tony Blair was prime minister.

However, a return to performing – and awards – got here after she stood down as an MP on the 2015 common election. In 2019 she starred as a lady affected by dementia in Elizabeth Is Missing, and received a TV BAFTA for finest actress the next yr.

Tulip Siddiq, Labour MP for what’s now the Hampstead and Kilburn constituency, is amongst these paying tribute following Jackson’s demise.

“Devastated to hear that my predecessor Glenda Jackson has died,” she wrote on Twitter. “A formidable politician, an amazing actress and a very supportive mentor to me. Hampstead and Kilburn will miss you Glenda.”

Downing Street described Jackson’s demise as “extremely sad news” and mentioned Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s “thoughts will be with her friends and family at this time”.

Before her demise, Jackson had been reunited with fellow double Oscar-winner Sir Michael Caine, who she final acted with in The Romantic Englishwoman in 1975.

Their upcoming movie The Great Escaper is impressed by true occasions, telling the story of a Second World War veteran who escaped his care house in Hove, East Sussex, to attend a commemoration of the seventieth anniversary of the D-Day landings in France.

Born in Birkenhead in 1936, Jackson mentioned she solely began performing after she failed her college certificates, leaving her with no possibility however to start out working on the age of 16.

She beforehand instructed the Times journal of her childhood on the Wirral: “Listen, I come from a family where if you didn’t work, you didn’t eat. That was the class structure.”

After becoming a member of a pal on the YMCA beginner dramatics society whereas she was working at her native Boots retailer, she went on to check on the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (Rada).

She additionally performed Egyptian queen Cleopatra in 1971 for an episode of The Morecambe & Wise Show with comedy duo Eric Morecambe and Ernie Wise.

Speaking to the Radio Times about working with the late duo, whose widespread present consisted of a combination of sketches and stand-up comedy, Jackson mentioned: “Oh, I loved working with them.

“I discovered it extraordinarily tough to restrain my laughter after we had been doing Cleopatra.”

Jackson also remembered her experience of working with the late theatre director Peter Brook, who she worked with on a 1967 production of Marat/Sade and described as a “genius”.

Jackson also once said she would “most likely” turn down a damehood if she were to be offered one, because “what does it truly imply?”.