Diana Rigg
Template:Short description Template:Use British English Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox person Dame Enid Diana Elizabeth Rigg (20 July 1938 – 10 September 2020) was an English actress of stage and screen. Her roles include Emma Peel in the TV series The Avengers (1965–1968); Countess Teresa di Vicenzo, wife of James Bond, in On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969); Olenna Tyrell in Game of Thrones (2013–2017); and the title role in Medea in the West End in 1993 followed by Broadway a year later.
Rigg made her professional stage debut in 1957 in The Caucasian Chalk Circle and joined the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1959. She made her Broadway debut in Abelard & Heloise in 1971. Her role as Emma Peel made her a sex symbol. For her role in Medea, both in London and New York, she won the 1994 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play and became a four-time Laurence Olivier Award nominee. She was appointed CBE in 1988 and a Dame in 1994 for services to drama.
Rigg appeared in numerous TV series and films, playing Helena in A Midsummer Night's Dream (1968); Lady Holiday in The Great Muppet Caper (1981); and Arlena Marshall in Evil Under the Sun (1982). She won the BAFTA TV Award for Best Actress for the BBC miniseries Mother Love (1989) and an Emmy Award for her role as Mrs Danvers in Rebecca (1997). Her other television credits include You, Me and the Apocalypse (2015), Detectorists (2015), the Doctor Who episode "The Crimson Horror" (2013) with her daughter, Rachael Stirling, and playing Mrs Pumphrey in All Creatures Great and Small (2020). Her final role was in Edgar Wright's 2021 psychological horror film Last Night in Soho, completed just before her death.
Early life and education
Enid Diana Elizabeth Rigg was born on 20 July 1938 in Doncaster, in the West Riding of Yorkshire (now in South Yorkshire),<ref name="bbc">Template:Cite news</ref> to Louis and Beryl Hilda Rigg (née Helliwell). She had a brother four years her senior.Template:Cn Her father was born in Yorkshire, worked in engineering, and moved to India to work for the railway to take advantage of the career opportunities there.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite book</ref> Her mother moved back to England for Rigg's birth. Between the ages of two months and eight years Rigg lived in Bikaner, Rajasthan, India,<ref name="bbc"/> where her father worked his way up to become a railway executive in the Bikaner State Railway.<ref name=":0" /> She spoke Hindi as her second language in those years.<ref name="BBC obit">Template:Cite news</ref>
She was later sent back to England to attend a boarding school, Fulneck Girls School, in a Moravian settlement near Pudsey.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Rigg hated her boarding school, where she felt like a fish out of water, but believed that Yorkshire played a greater part in shaping her character than India did.<ref name="icon" /> She trained as an actress at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art<ref name="farndale">Template:Cite news</ref> from 1955 to 1957, where her classmates included Glenda Jackson and Siân Phillips.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Theatre career
Rigg's career in film, television and the theatre was wide-ranging, including roles in the Royal Shakespeare Company between 1959 and 1967, including Gwendolen in Jean Anouilh's Becket, Cordelia in King Lear and Adriana in The Comedy of Errors.(<ref> Theatre World Annuals, 1963/1964 </ref>).<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Her professional debut was as Natasha Abashwilli in the RADA production of The Caucasian Chalk Circle at the York Festival in 1957.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
She returned to the stage in the Ronald Millar play Abelard and Heloïse in London in 1970 and made her Broadway debut with the play in 1971, in which she appeared nude with Keith Michell. She earned the first of three Tony Award nominations for Best Actress in a Play. She received her second nomination in 1975, for The Misanthrope. A member of the National Theatre Company at The Old Vic from 1972 to 1975, Rigg took leading roles in premiere productions of two Tom Stoppard plays, Dorothy Moore in Jumpers (National Theatre, 1972) and Ruth Carson in Night and Day (Phoenix Theatre, 1978).<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
In 1982 she appeared in the musical Colette, based on the life of the French writer and created by Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt, but it closed during an American tour en route to Broadway.Template:Cn In 1987 she took a leading role in the West End production of Stephen Sondheim's musical Follies.Template:Cn In the 1990s she had triumphs with roles at the Almeida Theatre in Islington, including Medea in 1992 (which transferred to the Wyndham's Theatre in 1993 and then Broadway in 1994, for which she received the Tony Award for Best Actress),Template:Cn Mother Courage at the National Theatre in 1995Template:Cn and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at the Almeida Theatre in 1996 (which transferred to the Aldwych Theatre in October 1996).<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
In 2004 she appeared as Violet Venable in Sheffield Theatre's production of Tennessee Williams's play Suddenly Last Summer, which transferred to the Albery Theatre. In 2006 she appeared at the Wyndham's Theatre in London's West End in a drama entitled Honour, which had a limited but successful run. In 2007 she appeared as Huma Rojo in The Old Vic's production of All About My Mother, adapted by Samuel Adamson and based on the film of the same title directed by Pedro Almodóvar.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
She appeared in 2008 in The Cherry Orchard at the Chichester Festival Theatre, returning there in 2009 to star in Noël Coward's Hay Fever. In 2011, she played Mrs Higgins in Pygmalion at the Garrick Theatre, opposite Rupert Everett and Kara Tointon, having played Eliza Doolittle 37 years earlier at the Albery Theatre.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
In February 2018, she returned to Broadway in the non-singing role of Mrs Higgins in My Fair Lady. She commented, "I think it's so special. When I was offered Mrs Higgins, I thought it was just such a lovely idea."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> She received her fourth Tony nomination for the role.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Film and television career
From 1965 to 1968 Rigg appeared in the British 1960s television series The Avengers (1961–1969) opposite Patrick Macnee as John Steed, playing the secret agent Emma Peel in 51 episodes. She replaced Elizabeth Shepherd at very short notice when Shepherd was dropped from the role after filming two episodes. Rigg auditioned for the role on a whim, without ever having seen the programme. Although she was hugely successful in the series, she disliked the lack of privacy that it brought and was not comfortable in her position as a sex symbol.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In an interview with The Guardian in 2019, Rigg stated that "becoming a sex symbol overnight had shocked (her)".<ref name="icon">Template:Cite web</ref> Neither did she like the way that she was treated by production company ABC Weekend TV. For her second series she held out for a pay rise from £150 a week to £450;<ref>Dave Rogers The Complete Avengers, London: Boxtree, 1989; New York: St Martin's Press, 1989, p.169.</ref> she said in 2019 – when gender pay inequality was very much in the news – that "not one woman in the industry supported me... Neither did Patrick [Macnee, her co-star]... I was painted as this mercenary creature by the press when all I wanted was equality. It's so depressing that we are still talking about the gender pay gap."<ref name="icon" /> She did not stay for a third year. Patrick Macnee noted that Rigg had later told him that she considered Macnee and her driver to be her only friends on the set.<ref>J. G. Lane, Template:Usurped. Retrieved 3 December 2010.</ref>
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On the big screen she became a Bond girl in On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969), playing Tracy Bond, James Bond's only wife, opposite George Lazenby. She said she took the role with the hope that she would become better known in the United States.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In 1973–74, she starred in a short-lived US sitcom called Diana.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Her other films from this period include The Assassination Bureau (1969), Julius Caesar (1970), The Hospital (1971), Theatre of Blood (1973), In This House of Brede (1975), based on the book by Rumer Godden, and A Little Night Music (1977). She appeared as the title character in The Marquise (1980), a television adaptation of a play by Noël Coward. She appeared in the Yorkshire Television production of Ibsen's Hedda Gabler (1981) as Hedda, and as Lady Holiday in the film The Great Muppet Caper (also 1981). The following year she received acclaim for her performance as Arlena Marshall in the film adaptation of Agatha Christie's Evil Under the Sun, sharing barbs with her character's old rival, played by Maggie Smith.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
She appeared as Regan, the king's treacherous second daughter, in a Granada Television production of King Lear (1983), which starred Laurence Olivier in the title role. As Lady Dedlock she costarred with Denholm Elliott in a television version of Dickens's Bleak House (BBC, 1985). In 1986 she played Miss Hardbroom in a Central Television adaptation of The Worst Witch, starring opposite Tim Curry. The following year, she played the Evil Queen, Snow White's evil stepmother, in the Cannon Movie Tales film adaptation of Snow White (1987). In 1989, she played Helena Vesey in Mother Love for the BBC; her portrayal of an obsessive mother who was prepared to do anything, even murder, to keep control of her son won Rigg the 1990 BAFTA for Best Television Actress.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In 1995, she appeared in a film adaptation for television based on Danielle Steel's Zoya as Evgenia, the main character's grandmother.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> She appeared on television as Mrs Danvers in Rebecca (1997), winning an Emmy, as well as the PBS production Moll Flanders, and as the amateur detective Mrs Bradley in The Mrs Bradley Mysteries. In this BBC series, first aired in 2000, she played Gladys Mitchell's detective, Dame Beatrice Adela Le Strange Bradley, an eccentric old woman who worked for Scotland Yard as a pathologist. The series was not a critical success and did not return for a second season.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
From 1989 until 2003 she hosted the PBS television series Mystery!, shown in the United States by PBS broadcaster WGBH, taking over from Vincent Price,<ref>Mystery! Hosts Template:Webarchive at pbs.org (Retrieved 1 July 2016)</ref> her co-star in Theatre of Blood.
She also appeared in the second series of Ricky Gervais's comedy Extras, alongside Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe and in the 2006 film The Painted Veil, in which she played a nun.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
In 2013 she appeared in an episode of Doctor Who in a Victorian era–based story The Crimson Horror alongside her daughter, Rachael Stirling, Matt Smith and Jenna-Louise Coleman. The episode had been specially written for her and her daughter by Mark Gatiss and aired as part of series 7.<ref>Doctor Who, "Dame Diana Rigg and Rachael Stirling to Star in New Series! ". Retrieved 3 July 2012.</ref> It was not the first time mother and daughter had appeared in the same production – that was in the 2000 NBC film In the Beginning – but the first time she had worked direct with her daughter and the first time in her career her roots were accessed to find a Doncaster, Yorkshire, accent.<ref name="BBC obit"/>
That same year Rigg was cast in a recurring role in the third season of the HBO series Game of Thrones, portraying Lady Olenna Tyrell, a witty and sarcastic political mastermind popularly known as the Queen of Thorns, the paternal grandmother of regular character Margaery Tyrell.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Her performance was well received by critics and audiences alike, and earned her an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series for the 65th Primetime Emmy Awards in 2013.<ref name="huffpost 2013–07">Template:Cite web</ref> She reprised her role in season four of Game of Thrones, and in July 2014 received another Guest Actress Emmy nomination.<ref name="huffpost 2014–07">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="latimes 2014–07">Template:Cite web</ref> In 2015 and 2016, she again reprised the role in seasons five and six in an expanded role from the books. In 2015 and 2018, she received two additional Guest Actress Emmy nominations. The character was killed off in the seventh season, with Rigg's final performance receiving wide critical acclaim.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In April 2019 Rigg said she had never watched Game of Thrones, before or after her time on the show.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
From 2015 to 2017, she appeared in the BBC Four comedy series Detectorists in the role of Veronica, the mother of protagonist Andy Stone's wife Becky, played by her own daughter Rachael Stirling.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
During autumn 2019 Rigg was filming the role of Mrs Pumphrey at Broughton Hall, near Skipton, for All Creatures Great and Small.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Rigg died after the filming of the first season had been completed. Her final performance was in the British psychological horror film Last Night in Soho, in which she had a major supporting role. The film was in post-production at the time of her death and is dedicated to her memory.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Personal life
In the 1960s, Rigg lived for eight years with director Philip Saville, gaining attention in the tabloid press when she disclaimed interest in marrying the older and already-married Saville, saying that she had no desire "to be respectable".<ref name="kahtleen tracy">Template:Cite book</ref> She was married to Menachem Gueffen, an Israeli painter, from 1973 until their divorce in 1976.<ref name=Hauptfuhrer>Template:Cite web</ref>
Rigg had a daughter, actress Rachael Stirling (born 1977),<ref>Template:Citation</ref> with Archie Stirling, a theatrical producer and former officer in the Scots Guards, and son of Bill Stirling. They married five years later in 25 March 1982,<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> but divorced in 1990 after Archie's affair with the actress Joely Richardson.<ref name="farndale" />
Rigg was a patron of International Care & Relief and was for many years the public face of the charity's child-sponsorship scheme. She was also chancellor of the University of Stirling, a ceremonial rather than executive role,<ref name="farndale" /> and was succeeded by James Naughtie when her 10-year term of office ended on 31 July 2008.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Michael Parkinson, who first interviewed Rigg in 1972, described her as the most desirable woman he had ever met and who "radiated a lustrous beauty".<ref name="Parkinson2010">Template:Cite book</ref> A smoker from the age of 18, Rigg was still smoking 20 cigarettes (one pack)<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> a day in 2009.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> By December 2017 she had stopped smoking after serious illness led to heart surgery, a cardiac ablation, two months earlier. She joked later, "My heart had stopped ticking during the procedure, so I was up there and the good Lord must have said, 'Send the old bag down again, I'm not having her yet!'"<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
In a June 2015 interview with the website The A.V. Club, Rigg talked about her chemistry with Patrick Macnee on The Avengers despite their 16-year age difference: "I sort of vaguely knew Patrick Macnee, and he looked kindly on me and sort of husbanded me through the first couple of episodes. After that, we became equal, and loved each other professionally and sparked off each other. And we'd then improvise, write our own lines. They trusted us. Particularly our scenes when we were finding a dead body—I mean, another dead body. How do you get round that one? They allowed us to do it." Asked if she had stayed in touch with Macnee (the interview was published two days before Macnee's death and decades after they were reunited on her short-lived American series Diana): "You'll always be close to somebody that you worked with very intimately for so long, and you become really fond of each other. But we haven't seen each other for a very, very long time."<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Rigg was a Christian.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Death
Rigg died at her daughter Rachael Stirling's home in London on 10 September 2020, at the age of 82.<ref name="BBC death">Template:Cite news</ref> Rigg's cause of death was lung cancer, with which she had been diagnosed in March that year.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In her final weeks, she recorded tapes imploring MPs to legalise assisted dying.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
Honours
In 1999, Rigg was appointed as the Cameron Mackintosh Visiting professor of Contemporary Theatre at St Catherine's College, Oxford; she held the post for one year.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
In 2014, Rigg received the Will Award, presented by the Shakespeare Theatre Company, along with Stacy Keach and John Hurt.<ref>Bennettawards Template:Webarchive Retrieved 15 October 2015.</ref>
On 25 October 2015, to mark 50 years of Emma Peel, the British Film Institute screened an episode of The Avengers; this was followed by an onstage interview with Rigg about her time in the television series.<ref>BFI Interview with Dame Diana Rigg Template:Webarchive Retrieved 18 February 2016.</ref>
Commonwealth honours
| Country | Date | Appointment | Post-nominal letters | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Template:Flagu | 1988 | Commander of the Order of the British Empire | CBE | <ref name=":1">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:London Gazette</ref> |
| 1994 | Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire | DBE | <ref name=":1" /><ref>Template:London Gazette</ref> |
Scholastic
- Chancellor, visitor, governor, rector and fellowships
| Location | Dates | School | Position | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Template:Flagu | 1998–2008 | University of Stirling | Chancellor | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| Template:Flagu | 1999–2000 | University of Oxford | Cameron Mackintosh Visiting professor of Contemporary Theatre | <ref>Template:Cite news</ref> |
| 1999–2020 | St Catherine's College, Oxford | Fellow | <ref>Template:Cite webTemplate:Dead link</ref> |
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Honorary degrees
| Location | Date | School | Degree | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Template:Flagu | 4 November 1988 | University of Stirling | Doctor of the University (D.Univ) | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| Template:Flagu | 1992 | University of Leeds | Doctor of Literature (D.Litt.) | <ref>Download. Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1995 | University of Nottingham | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> | ||
| 1996 | London South Bank University | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
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Credits
Sources:<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Theatre
Selected.
| Year | Title | Role | Notes | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1957 | The Caucasian Chalk Circle | Natella Abashwili | Theatre Royal, York Festival | <ref>Template:Cite news</ref> |
| 1964 | King Lear | Cordelia | Royal Shakespeare Company (European/US Tour) | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1966 | Twelfth Night | Viola | Royal Shakespeare Company | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1970 | Abelard and Heloise | Heloise | Wyndham's Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1971 | Brooks Atkinson Theatre, New York | <ref>Template:Cite news</ref> | ||
| 1972 | Macbeth | Lady Macbeth | The Old Vic Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| Jumpers | Dorothy Moore | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> | ||
| 1973 | Template:Sortname | Célimène | <ref name=":3" /> | |
| 1974 | Pygmalion | Eliza Doolittle | Albery Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1975 | Template:Sortname | Célimène | St. James Theatre, New York | <ref>Template:Cite news</ref> |
| 1978 | Night and Day | Ruth Carson | Phoenix Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1982 | Colette | Colette | US national tour | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1983 | Heartbreak House | Lady Ariadne Utterword | Theatre Royal Haymarket, London | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1985 | Little Eyolf | Rita Allmers | Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, London | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| Antony and Cleopatra | Cleopatra | Chichester Festival Theatre, UK | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> | |
| 1986 | Wildfire | Bess | Theatre Royal Bath & Phoenix Theatre, London | <ref name=":2">Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1987 | Follies | Phyllis Rogers Stone | Shaftesbury Theatre, London | <ref name=":3" /> |
| 1990 | Love Letters | Melissa | Stage Door Theatre, San Francisco | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1992 | Putting It Together | Old Fire Station Theatre, Oxford | <ref>Template:Cite news</ref> | |
| Berlin Bertie | Rosa | Royal Court Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> | |
| Medea | Medea | Almeida Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite news</ref> | |
| 1993 | Wyndham's Theatre, London | <ref name=":3" /> | ||
| 1994 | Longacre Theatre, New York | <ref>Template:Cite news</ref> | ||
| 1995 | Mother Courage and Her Children | Mother Courage | Royal National Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite webTemplate:Cbignore</ref> |
| 1996 | Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? | Martha | Almeida Theatre & Aldwych Theatre, London | <ref name=":3" /><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1997 | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> | |||
| 1998 | Phaedra | Phaedra | Almeida at the Albery Theatre, London & BAM in Brooklyn | <ref name=":2"/> |
| Britannicus | Agrippina | <ref name=":2" /> | ||
| 2001 | Humble Boy | Flora Humble | Royal National Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 2002 | The Hollow Crown | International Tour: New Zealand, Australia, Stratford-upon-Avon, UK | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> | |
| 2004 | Suddenly, Last Summer | Violet Venable | Albery Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 2006 | Honour | Honour | Wyndham's Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 2007 | All About My Mother | Huma Rojo | The Old Vic Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite news</ref> |
| 2008 | Template:Sortname | Ranyevskaya | Chichester Festival Theatre, UK | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 2009 | Hay Fever | Judith Bliss | <ref>Template:Cite webTemplate:Dead linkTemplate:Cbignore</ref> | |
| 2011 | Pygmalion | Mrs. Higgins | Garrick Theatre, London | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 2018 | My Fair Lady | Mrs. Higgins | Vivian Beaumont Theatre, New York | <ref>Template:Cite news</ref> |
Film
| Year | Title | Role | Notes | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1968 | Diadem aka Der Goldene Schlussel | short film shot in Germany | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> | |
| Template:Sortname | Helena | <ref name="BFI" /> | ||
| 1969 | Minikillers | short film shot in Spain | <ref>Template:Cite book</ref> | |
| The Assassination Bureau | Sonya Winter | <ref name="BFI" /> | ||
| On Her Majesty's Secret Service | Teresa "Tracy" di Vicenzo | <ref name="BFI" /> | ||
| 1970 | Julius Caesar | Portia | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1971 | Template:Sortname | Barbara Drummond | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1973 | Theatre of Blood | Edwina Lionheart | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1975 | In This House of Brede | Sister Philippa | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1977 | Template:Sortname | Countess Charlotte Mittelheim | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1981 | Template:Sortname | Lady Holiday | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1982 | Evil Under the Sun | Arlena Stuart Marshall | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1987 | Snow White | The Evil Queen | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1993 | Genghis Cohn | Frieda von Stangel | ||
| 1994 | Template:Sortname | Chloe Fanshawe | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1999 | Parting Shots | Lisa | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 2005 | Heidi | Grandmamma | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 2006 | Template:Sortname | Mother Superior | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 2015 | The Honourable Rebel | Narrator | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 2017 | Breathe | Lady Neville | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 2021 | Last Night in Soho | Ms. Alexandra Collins | Posthumous release | <ref>Template:Cite news</ref> |
Television
| Year | Title | Role | Notes | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1961 | Ondine | Bit part | Televised stage performance, Aldwych theatre | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1963 | Template:Sortname | Francy Wilde | episode: "A Very Desirable Plot" | <ref name=":3">Template:Cite news</ref> |
| 1964 | Festival | Adriana | episode: "The Comedy of Errors" | <ref name="BFI"/> |
| Armchair Theatre | Anita Fender | episode: "The Hothouse" | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1965 | ITV Play of the Week | Bianca | episode: "Women Beware Women" | <ref name="BFI"/> |
| 1965–68 | Template:Sortname | Emma Peel | 51 episodes | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 1970 | ITV Saturday Night Theatre | Liz Jardine | episode: "Married Alive" | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 1973 | The Diana Rigg Show | Diana Smythe | unaired pilot | <ref name=":4">Template:Cite book</ref> |
| 1973–74 | Diana | 15 episodes | <ref name=":4" /> | |
| 1974 | Affairs of the Heart | Grace Gracedew | episode: "Grace" | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 1975 | In This House of Brede | Philippa | TV film | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| The Morecambe & Wise Show | Nell Gwynne | sketch in Christmas show | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1977 | Three Piece Suite | Various | 6 episodes | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 1979 | Oresteia | Clytemnestra | mini-series | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 1980 | Template:Sortname | Eloise | TV film | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 1981 | Hedda Gabler | Hedda Gabler | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1982 | Play of the Month | Rita Allmers | episode: Little Eyolf | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| Witness for the Prosecution | Christine Vole | TV film | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1983 | King Lear | Regan | <ref name=":3" /> | |
| 1985 | Bleak House | Lady Honoria Dedlock | mini-series | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 1986 | Template:Sortname | Miss Constance Hardbroom | TV film | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 1987 | Template:Sortname | Lady Harriet Vulcan | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1989 | Template:Sortname | Lydia | episode: "Unexplained Laughter" | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| Mother Love | Helena Vesey | mini-series British Academy Television Award for Best Actress Broadcast Press Guild Award for Best Actress |
<ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 1992 | Mrs 'Arris Goes to Paris | Mme Colbert | TV film | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 1993 | Road to Avonlea | Lady Blackwell | episode: "The Disappearance" | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| Running Delilah | Judith | TV film | <ref name="BFI"/> | |
| Screen Two | Baroness Frieda von Stangel | episode: "Genghis Cohn" Nominated – CableACE Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or Movie |
<ref name="BFI">Template:Cite web</ref> | |
| 1995 | Zoya | Evgenia | TV film | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| Template:Sortname | Mrs Grose | <ref name="BFI" /> | ||
| 1996 | Template:Sortname | Mrs Golightly | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| Samson and Delilah | Mara | <ref name="BFI" /> | ||
| 1997 | Rebecca | Mrs Danvers | mini-series Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie |
<ref name="BFI" /> |
| 1998 | Template:Sortname | Madame de Bellegarde | TV film | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 1998–2000 | Template:Sortname | Adela Bradley | 5 episodes | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 2000 | In the Beginning | Mature Rebeccah | TV film | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 2001 | Victoria & Albert | Baroness Lehzen | mini-series Nominated – Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie |
<ref name="BFI" /> |
| 2003 | Murder in Mind | Jill Craig | episode: "Suicide" | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| Charles II: The Power and the Passion | Queen Henrietta Maria | mini-series | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 2006 | Extras | Herself | episode: "Daniel Radcliffe" | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 2013–17 | Game of Thrones | Olenna Tyrell | 18 episodes Nominated – Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series (2013, 2014, 2015, 2018) Nominated – Critics' Choice Television Award for Best Guest Performer in a Drama Series (2013, 2014) |
<ref name="Emmys" /> |
| 2013 | Doctor Who | Mrs Winifred Gillyflower | episode: "The Crimson Horror" | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| 2015; 2017 | Penn Zero: Part-Time Hero | Mayor Pink Panda | Voice, 3 episodes | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| Detectorists | Veronica | 6 episodes | <ref name="BFI" /> | |
| 2015 | You, Me and the Apocalypse | Sutton | 5 episodes | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| Professor Branestawm Returns | Lady Pagwell | TV film | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> | |
| 2017 | Victoria | Duchess of Buccleuch | 9 episodes | <ref name="BFI" /> |
| A Christmas Carol Goes Wrong | Herself/narrator | Christmas special | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> | |
| 2019 | The Snail and the Whale | Narrator | short TV film | <ref>Template:Cite web</ref> |
| 2020 | All Creatures Great and Small | Mrs Pumphrey | 2 episodes | <ref name=":5">Template:Cite web</ref> |
| Black Narcissus | Mother Dorothea | Posthumous release | <ref name=":5" /> |
Awards and nominations
See also
- No Turn Unstoned, a collection of scathing theatrical reviews collected by Rigg, first published in 1982.
References
External links
- Pages with broken file links
- 1938 births
- 2020 deaths
- 20th-century English actresses
- 21st-century English actresses
- Actresses from Doncaster
- Actresses awarded damehoods
- Alumni of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art
- Audiobook narrators
- Best Actress BAFTA Award (television) winners
- Dames Commander of the Order of the British Empire
- Deaths from cancer in England
- English Christians
- English Shakespearean actresses
- English film actresses
- English stage actresses
- English television actresses
- English voice actresses
- Fellows of St Catherine's College, Oxford
- Outstanding Performance by a Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or Movie Primetime Emmy Award winners
- Female critics of feminism
- People associated with the University of Stirling
- People educated at Fulneck School
- Royal Shakespeare Company members
- Tony Award winners