Wendy Richard

Wendy Richard, was born in Middlesborough to Henry and Beatrice Emmerton who moved to London when she was five, operating The Shepherds Tavern in Mayfair. Her father comitted suicide due to depression when she was eleven. She was educated at St. Georges School in Mount Street, Mayfair, London, and at a boarding school. While still in her teens, she became a shop assistant at Fortum and Masons, but was fired on her second day for not selling anything. She then joined the Italia Conti stage school at sixteen, but refused elocution lessons as she didn't want to do voice exercises. Her first big break came when she did voice on the Mike Sarne record 'Come Outside', which went to number one in the 1962 charts. All she got out of it was £ 15. David Croft then cast her in the comedy series Hugh and I and nurtured her career, resulting in appearances in such series as The Likely Lads, Newcomers, Up Pompeii, Dads Army and Eastenders. She had a part in the Beatles film Help, but her scene was cut, but survived in the comedy Bless This House. The day after her mother's funeral, she married music publisher Leonard Black in May 1972. The union only lasted five months. Afraid of being on her own, she then married advertising executive Will Thorpe, but their relationship became turbulent and developed into violent abuse, resulting in a divorce in 1984. Her 3rd marriage was to Paul Glorney, a carpet fitter, but they divorced in 1994. In February 1996, she met John Burns, a painter and decorator. They lived together before marrying in October 2008. In 1996, she had discovered a lump on her breast which turned out to be cancerous, but she was given the all clear after an operation. There was a recurrence of it in 2002 and after further treatment she was again given a clean bill of health, until, in 2008, when a check up revealed that she had cancerous cells in her breast which had spread through her body. She made a half hour television Programme 'Wendy Richard: To Tell You the Truth', documenting the last few months of her life, which was broadcast in March 2009.