9:11pm Wednesday 1st July 2009
Actress Mollie Sugden died in hospital today after a long illness, aged 86.
The Keighley-born star of popular sitcom Are You Being Served? died in the Royal Surrey County Hospital in Guildford.
Her twin sons, Robin and Simon Moore, were at her bedside, according to her agent Joan Reddin.
Ms Reddin began representing Sugden in the 1960s before she became famous with her role as Mrs Slocombe in Are You Being Served?.
She said: “I represented her for more than 30 years and I was a very close friend as well.
“She had had a long illness and various problems but it was very quick in the end.
“She was a lovely, lovely person and I never had any trouble with her. She was a great professional.”
Sugden, who lived in Surrey, was married to fellow actor William Moore.
She never fully recovered from his death nine years ago, Ms Reddin said.
Best known for her comedy roles often playing battleaxes, Sugden also appeared as the fearsome Mrs Hutch-inson in The Liver Birds.
But Ms Reddin said that although Are You Being Served? was her most famous show, Sugden was “too good” an actress not to do drama as well and her career spanned a variety of roles.
Born in Keighley in July 1922, she attended school locally before going to train at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London.
Her early career was spent in repertory theatre, where in Swansea in 1956, she met Moore.
They married two years later, when she was 35 and he was 39. Their sons were born six years later.
In later life, re-runs of Are You Being Served? transformed both Sugden and co-star John Inman into cult figures in the US in the early 1990s. Such was her popularity in America that at the age of 71 she was asked to appear in Donizetti’s opera La Fille Du Regiment in a non-singing role.
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