Liz Smith, who we knew as Nana Royle from the Royle Family and Letitia Cropley from the Vicar of Dibley, Aunt Belle and Bette in 2Point4 Children and as a host of eccentric old ladies, has died at the grand age of 95.
Born in 1925 in Scunthorpe, Liz was called Betty Gleadle and was brought up by her widowed grandmother after her own mother died in childbirth and her young father left. Liz sad of her absent father: “He was a weak man and did as he was told, so he just disowned me.”
Liz served in the Women’s Royal Navel Service during the second world war and in 1945 married sailor Jack Thomas whom she met while serving in India. They returned to London when Liz contracted hepatitis, they had two children, Sarah and Robert. Jack and Liz divorced in 1959.
The character actor discovered acting aged nine when she attended drama classes, but it wasn’t until a series of false starts with repertory theatre and improvisation groups that Liz met film maker Mike Leigh at the age of 49 and began a successful acting career that spanned over thirty years. Liz brought us fabulous old ladies who weren’t going to be ignored.
Liz Smith died on Christmas Eve, her Royle Family co-star Ralf Little tweeted: “Devastating to lose two members of my second family in one awful year. RIP Liz Smith. Goodbye Nana. Xxx”
On 22nd December the Royle Family episode Queen of Sheba, in which Nana Royle dies was rerun in tribute to creator Caroline Aherne, who sadly died earlier this year. Of the episode Liz commented: “I felt it was an ending of a whole thing. It was not just one lift, it was the whole concert of the story. They each say goodbye in a way that it’s almost, ‘Goodbye, it’s being lovely knowing you’.”
Goodbye Liz, it was lovely knowing you.
