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MARY MILLAR
Fondly remembered, Mary Millar worked in musical theatre
for the best part of half a century. In the later phase of her
career, her very English qualities even found their place in
some genuine blockbusters
Mary Millar was born Mary Wetton in Doncaster on 26 July 1936
and educated at Shirecliffe in Sheffield. Her first professional
engagement was on the variety stage at the Empire Theatre, Sheffield
in August 1950, when she entertained with operatic items. She
embarked on a learning process through pantomime, more variety
and summer seasons, and in February 1957 she embarked on a tour
of The Desert Song as its leading lady, Margot Bonvalet, a role
that clearly displayed her excellent singing voice (and she toured
in the same part two years later). Between these productions
she appeared in December 1958 in a tour of Old Chelsea, playing
the leading role of Mary Fenton. A real break came in December
1960 when she went to New York to understudy Julie Andrews in
Camelot.
 Her
first London musical was rather more hybrid, but Lock Up Your
Daughters had some sort of stranglehold on British audiences,
and in May 1962 she played Cloris in a revival, transferring
with it to Her Majesty's Theatre in August. There was a fling
in revue at the Duchess Theatre in March 1963, but it was brief.
See You Inside was perhaps an unfortunate invitation attached
to a show for which patrons seemed to prefer to stay on the outside.
It had a terrific cast (Millar, Jon Pertwee, Moyra Fraser, Hugh
Paddick, Amanda Barrie and John Dane), but shut up shop after
21 showings. The Theatre World critic thought that the cast 'had
everything to discourage them in the material at their disposal.
Indeed it is hard to recall one consistently good item; several
commenced on a promising note, but petered out with regularity,
finally falling to pieces at the most crucial point.' Millar
then joined the ranks of highly capable leading ladies who found
themselves adrift in a spate of flops.
About to get in a bloody mess with John
Gower in Dearest Dracula
The first to fall was All In Love, an American adaptation
of Sheridan's The Rivals, at the Mayfair Theatre in March 1964.
Once again she was in good company and on good form as the leading
lady Lydia Languish, but the critical reaction to the show was
damp, and the production faded away quickly. The following autumn
she was seen in Dublin playing Lucy opposite John Gower's fanged
hero in Dearest Dracula. It was a splendid idea for a musical,
but it too vanished, perhaps robbing London audiences of a good
deal of blood-soaked but innocent fun. At Richmond in March 1968
she was a natural choice for the lead in a revival of the darling
old Bless the Bride, but there was no West End transfer for a
piece that seemed dated. The previous year she had recorded the
role on a budget assembled studio version for Music for Pleasure.
She might have hoped for another leading role in London, but
instead accepted the quite minor role of Hetty Widgett in Ann
Veronica, an attempt to exploit H G Wells' novel about female
emancipation for the musical stage. It opened with Dorothy Tutin
in the title role at the Belgrade Theatre, Coventry in February
1969, but pretty soon Tutin (or the management) decided it wasn't
for her. Millar was upgraded to the title role, and the show
sailed hopefully into the Cambridge Theatre two months later.
It was condemned by the critics and the paying customers didn't
want to pay to see it. Ann Veronica was done and dusted in 44
performances, but we still have the original cast recording with
Millar delivering a madly exciting version of one of the show's
most hair-raising numbers, 'Sweep Me Off My Feet'. In her other
numbers she tried to give the show its gravitas, but it wasn't
her fault that the stuff didn't work well.
In October 1971 she was back at Richmond giving her Lucy in
another shot at Bless the Bride, followed by a tour. The following
year, she was cast as Poppy Dickie in Popkiss, the musical of
Ben Travers' old farce Rookery Nook. Millar got fine notices,
but the show itself seemed out of tune in a climate that didn't
welcome such hybrid efforts, and Popkiss was written off. Its
reputation might have endured better had it been recorded. In
April 1975 she was in the revue Small and Brassy at the King's
Head, Islington, subsequently staged late at night at Wyndham's
Theatre.
Substantial success came late. At the National Theatre in
1978 she was in the company of Lark Rise, a play with music from
the bucolic trilogy by Flora Thompson. She had the supporting
role of Madame Giry in the original London cast of The Phantom
of the Opera at Her Majesty's Theatre in 1986, and stayed with
it for four years. Finding favour with Andrew Lloyd Webber, she
was in the workshop production of Aspects of Love at the Sydmonton
Festival. Her name was also associated with Stephen Sondheim
when she played the leading part of Sally in Follies for its
European premiere at the Library Theatre, Manchester. She did
a try-out of a Sondheim-inspired musical, Maddie, and in another
tryout was cast as Lady Carnarvon in Tutankhamun the Musical.
She excelled in repertory productions, too, being much praised
for her Anna in The King and I at the Wolsey Theatre, Ipswich,
and her Jenny Lind in Hans Christian Andersen at the Yvonne Arnaud
Theatre, Guildford.
On television, she found wider fame as the sex-starved Rose
in the BBC TV comedy series Keeping Up Appearances, a take-over
(from Shirley Stelfox) that paid off more dividends than her
take-over in Ann Veronica. But her stage work always seemed to
be her priority, and she scored another hit as Mrs Potts in the
British production of the blockbusting Beauty and the Beast.
Sadly, it was to be her final role. Illness forced her to leave
the company early in 1998. Mary Millar died on 10 November 1998.
Selected discography
Original cast recordings of
Ann Veronica
The Phantom of the Opera
Beauty and the Beast
Bless the Bride [studio recording]
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