Looking Forward, Looking Back

Often, and happiest, acting with her adored husband of 50 years, Michael Denison, Dulcie Gray has been seen in roles as varied as Candida and Miss Marple, Mrs Candour and the White Queen in "Alice Through the Looking Glass". Her childhood, divided between the Malaya of Maugham's short stories and a succession of English boarding schools, equipped her to be adaptable and, after running away from home to be a school teacher in the jungle, she came to England on a visit which became permanent. Her acting career, which began almost by accident on the outbreak of World War II has embraced the West End stage as well as many provincial and overseas tours, filming with James Mason and Jack Hawkins, and innumerable radio and television appearances. She was in the BBC's first radio soap opera, "Front Line Family", designed to boost wartime morale, and most recently features as Kate Harvey in six series of "Howards Way" on television. Dulcie Gray writes of the friendships she and Michael Denison have shared with Noel Coward, J.B.Priestley, Rebecca West and Laurence Olivier, of being directed by John Gielgud and Peter Hall, of the sheer fun of acting with Margaret Lockwood and Hermione Baddeley, or sharing a provincial dressing room with Evelyn Laye.