Dame Maureen Diane Lipman was born on 10 May 1946 and is an English actress, columnist and comedian.
39 Facts About Maureen Lipman
1.
2.
Maureen Lipman trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art and her stage work has included appearances with the National Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company.
3.
Maureen Lipman was made a dame in the 2020 Queen's Birthday Honours for services to charity, entertainment and the arts.
4.
On television, Maureen Lipman had prominent roles in Agony, Smiley's People, Eskimo Day and Ladies of Letters.
5.
Maureen Lipman was born on 10 May 1946 in Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire, England, the daughter of Maurice Julius Maureen Lipman and Zelma Pearlman.
6.
Maureen Lipman's father was a tailor; he used to have a shop between the Ferens Art Gallery and Monument Bridge.
7.
Maureen Lipman grew up Jewish and found post-war Hull a welcoming place for the Jewish community.
8.
Maureen Lipman lived in Northfield Road, Hull and attended Wheeler Primary School.
9.
Maureen Lipman then attended Newland School for Girls in Hull, and in her youth became interested in performing.
10.
Maureen Lipman performed in school productions, attended an early Beatles concert, and watched Elizabeth Taylor's Butterfield 8 fifteen times.
11.
Maureen Lipman trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art.
12.
Maureen Lipman worked extensively in the theatre following her debut in a stage production of The Knack at the Watford Palace Theatre.
13.
Maureen Lipman was a member of Laurence Olivier's National Theatre Company at the Old Vic from 1971 to 1973 and of the Royal Shakespeare Company for its 1973 Stratford season.
14.
Maureen Lipman performed the Joyce Grenfell monologue The Committee for the first time on The Green Tie on the Little Yellow Dog, which was recorded 1982, and broadcast by Channel 4 in 1983.
15.
Maureen Lipman played the lead role in the television series All at No 20 and took on a range of diverse characters when starring in the series of comedy plays About Face.
16.
Maureen Lipman appeared as snooty landlady Lillian Spencer in Coronation Street for six episodes in 2002.
17.
Maureen Lipman re-joined the cast of Coronation Street in August 2018, this time playing Evelyn Plummer, the long-lost grandmother of Tyrone Dobbs.
18.
Maureen Lipman played Maggie Wych in the children's television show The Fugitives, broadcast in 2005.
19.
Maureen Lipman performed as a villain, The Wire, in the 2006 series of Doctor Who in the episode entitled "The Idiot's Lantern".
20.
Maureen Lipman has appeared on Just a Minute, The News Quiz, That Reminds Me, This Week and Have I Got News for You.
21.
In 2007, Maureen Lipman appeared as a celebrity contestant on Comic Relief Does The Apprentice to raise money for Comic Relief.
22.
Maureen Lipman played Irene Spencer in the ITV3 comedy Ladies of Letters, in which she starred alongside Anne Reid.
23.
Maureen Lipman made an early film appearance in Up the Junction.
24.
Maureen Lipman played the title character's mother in Roman Polanski's film The Pianist.
25.
Maureen Lipman's anthology, The Gibbon's In Decline But The Horse Is Stable, is a book of animal poems that is illustrated by established cartoonists, including Posy Simmonds and Gerald Scarfe, to raise money for Myeloma UK, to combat the cancer to which she lost her husband.
26.
Maureen Lipman has contributed a weekly column in The Guardian in the newspaper's G2 section.
27.
Maureen Lipman writes for The Oldie and is on the editorial advisory board of Jewish Renaissance magazine.
28.
Maureen Lipman was married to dramatist Jack Rosenthal from 1974 until his death in 2004, and has had a number of roles in his works.
29.
Maureen Lipman spoke on behalf of Prospect Burma in the BBC Radio 4 Appeal, broadcast in September 2009.
30.
Maureen Lipman responded to Alibhai-Brown's accusation of racism by arguing that the columnist had deliberately misrepresented Maureen Lipman's comments as generalisations about Muslims rather than specific comments about terrorists.
31.
In May 2015, Maureen Lipman joined pro-Israel groups including the Zionist Federation in a protest outside the London premiere of a Palestinian play, The Siege, at Battersea Arts Centre.
32.
Maureen Lipman intimated that she would not be prepared to work alongside some pro-Palestinian actors, citing Maxine Peake and Miriam Margolyes as examples.
33.
In 2024, Maureen Lipman said that protests against Israel are "close to fascism".
34.
In November 2023 Maureen Lipman joined a march against antisemitism in London alongside prominent celebrities including Vanessa Feltz, Robert Rinder, Tracy-Ann Oberman, Elliot Levey, Rachel Riley, Eddie Marsan, and David Baddiel.
35.
At the 2005 general election, Maureen Lipman supported the Labour Party, but declared in October 2014 that she could no longer do so due to leader Ed Miliband's support for a parliamentary motion in favour of recognising the State of Palestine.
36.
Maureen Lipman attended a protest outside Labour's head office and said she was there "as a disenfranchised socialist".
37.
Maureen Lipman identified with a placard reading "Corbyn made me a Tory".
38.
Maureen Lipman said she would have to be "stark raving mad to support Boris Johnson".
39.
Maureen Lipman was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1999 New Year Honours and Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 2020 Birthday Honours for services to charity, entertainment and the arts.