Barbara Windsor

***Dame Barbara Windsor***, DBE (born Barbara Ann Deeks; August 6 1937, Shoreditch, London, England - December 10, 2020, London, England), was an English actress, known for her appearances in the Carry On films and for playing Peggy Mitchell in the BBC One soap opera EastEnders. She joined the cast of EastEnders in 1994 and won the 1999 British Soap Award for Best Actress. She left the show in 2010, before returning for three episodes between 2013 and 2015. Her character's final appearances were broadcast in May 2016.

Windsor began her career on stage in 1950 at the age of 13 and made her film debut in The Belles of St Trinian's (1954). She received a BAFTA Award nomination for the film Sparrows Can't Sing (1963), and a Tony Award nomination for the 1964 Broadway production of Oh, What A Lovely War!. In 1972, she starred opposite Vanessa Redgrave in the West End production of The Threepenny Opera. Between 1964 and 1974, she appeared in nine Carry On films, including Carry On Spying (1964), Carry On Doctor (1967), Carry On Camping (1969), Carry On Henry (1971) and Carry On Abroad (1972). She also co-presented the 1977 Carry On compilation That's Carry On!. Other film roles include A Study in Terror (1965), Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968), and as the voice of the Dormouse in Alice in Wonderland (2010) and Alice Through the Looking Glass (2016).

Windsor was made a Dame (DBE) in the 2016 New Year Honours for services to charity and entertainment. She was awarded Freedom of the City of London in 2010.

Windsor was born in Shoreditch, London, in 1937 (her birth was registered in Stepney), the only child of John Deeks, a costermonger, and his wife, Rose (née Ellis), a dressmaker. The family lived in Angela Street. One of her maternal great-grandmothers, Mary, was the daughter of Irish immigrants who fled Ireland to Great Britain between 1846 and 1851 to escape the Great Famine of Ireland. In 1939 at the start of WWII, Windsor's father was called up for the war and she and her mother went to live with her mother's relatives in Yoakley Road, Stoke Newington, where Windsor attended St Mary's Infants' School in nearby Lordship Road. Windsor's mother initially refused to let her be evacuated, but conceded after one of Windsor's school friends was killed by a bomb. She was evacuated to Blackpool to live with a married couple, although they sexually abused her. One of Windsor's friends, Mary, who lived a couple of houses away heard Windsor's screams and alerted her own parents who called the authorities. The couple were arrested and it was revealed that they were not married but brother and sister. Windsor moved in with Mary and her parents although they struggled to cope with her loud behaviour. They sent Windsor and Mary to dancing school which sparked her interest in performing, although one night after a class, Mary's mother walked Windsor and Mary home, when Windsor found Mary's father kissing another woman in a bus shelter. Humiliated by this, Mary's mother sent her back to London in 1944 along with a note from Windsor's dance teacher which read: “Barbara is a born show-off who loves to perform.”

Impressed by this, Windsor's mother sent her to Madame Behenna's Juvenile Jollities, a drama school at which she appeared in several charity concerts and pantomimes. After the war, she passed her 11-plus exams, gaining the top mark in North London, and earned a scholarship for a place at Our Lady's Convent in Stamford Hill although she was expelled because she argued with the Reverend Mother after she refused to let her have time off to appear in a pantomime. Instead, Windsor moved to the Aida Foster School, Golders Green, and took elocution lessons. When Windsor's father came to watch a performance, she was ridiculed by the others as her father had begun working as a trolley bus conductor and had come in his uniform. Enraged, Windsor covered the girls in theatrical face powder, throwing more over the chaperone who tried to stop her. Despite this, Windsor was chosen to appear in the chorus of the musical Love From Judy in the West End in 1952 which ran for a successful two years. Her stage name of "Windsor" was inspired by the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953. By the time Windsor was sixteen, Windsor's parents' divorced and Windsor was unwillingly made to testify against her father in court. Awarded to her mother, after the divorce Windsor ran up to her father but he just carried on walking, ignoring her. Every time he saw her, whether he walked past her house or his bus drove past, he blanked Windsor.

Shortly after, Windsor made her film debut as an uncredited extra in 1954 playing a schoolgirl in The Belles of St. Trinians. She followed this with several other uncredited roles until she appeared in Too Hot to Handle with Jayne Mansfield. Mansfield demanded Windsor to appear at the back of the scene they shared as she was worried Windsor's blonde hair and large chest would overshadow her own. After this, Windsor made her television debut when Johnny Brandon, whom Windsor had starred with in Love from Judy, asked her to appear in his television series Dreamer's Highway. Windsor later appearing in musical shows Variety Parade, The Jack Jackson Show and Six-Five Special, regularly singing with bands. She then became a regular cabaret act at Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club in Soho, and went on to do the same at the Winston's club alongside Danny La Rue and Amanda Barrie.

After joining Joan Littlewood's Theatre Workshop at the Theatre Royal, Stratford East, she came to prominence in their stage production Fings Ain't Wot They Used T'Be and Littlewood's film Sparrows Can't Sing (1963), achieving a BAFTA nomination for Best British Film Actress. She also appeared in the comedy film Crooks in Cloisters (1964), the fantasy film Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968) and Ken Russell's musical film The Boy Friend (1971), as well as the TV sitcoms The Rag Trade and Wild, Wild Women.

Windsor came to prominence with her portrayals of a "good-time girl" in nine Carry On films. Her first was Carry On Spying in 1964 and her final one was Carry On Dick in 1974. She also appeared in several Carry On... television and compilation specials between 1964 and 1977.

One of her best known scenes was in Carry On Camping (1969), where her bikini top flew off during outdoor aerobic exercises. In typical Carry On style, exposure is implied but little is in fact seen. From 1973 to 1975, she appeared with several of the Carry On team in the West End revue Carry On London!. She was strongly identified with the Carry On films for many years, which restricted the roles she was chosen to play later in her career.

Windsor starred on Broadway in the Theatre Workshop's Oh, What a Lovely War! and received a 1965 Tony Award nomination for Best Featured Actress in a Musical. She also appeared in several stage productions including Lionel Bart's musical flop Twang!! (1965) (directed by Joan Littlewood), The Beggar's Opera (1967), Come Spy with Me (1966–67) with Danny La Rue and in thirty pantomimes between 1950 and 2011.

In 1970, she landed the role of music hall legend Marie Lloyd in the musical-biopic Sing A Rude Song. In 1972 she appeared in the West End in Tony Richardson's The Threepenny Opera with Vanessa Redgrave. In 1975, she toured the UK, New Zealand and South Africa in her own show, Carry On Barbara!, and followed this with the role of Maria in Twelfth Night at the Chichester Festival Theatre.

Windsor hosted two series of the BBC documentary Disaster Masters in 2005. Windsor provided the voice of the Dormouse in Walt Disney's live action adaptation of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland (2010), directed by Tim Burton. Windsor appeared in the pantomime Dick Whittington at the Bristol Hippodrome over the Christmas/New Year period of 2010/2011. In September 2010, it was announced that Windsor would be fronting a TV campaign for online bingo site Jackpotjoy as the Queen of Bingo. She appeared as herself in one episode of Come Fly with Me in January 2011.