Sue Johnston - Acting Royle-ty

It might appear a tad perverse to select as a Treasure someone who has made her name in three major dramas I’ve never been inclined to watch, but Sue Johnston is so much more than the product of Corrie, Brookside or Downton Abbey. Like her Royle Family co-star Liz Smith, she was a late starter to television, not making her debut ‘til the age of 38. She appeared in the very first episode of Brookside on Channel 4’s opening night back in ’82 but it wasn’t until the next decade that I saw her on the box.

It was probably in Medics, an ITV series which ran for five years, but which didn’t keep me hooked for long. To be honest the most memorable character was played by Tom Baker who, like Brian Blessed, is never known for understated performances. Alternatively it could have been the same year as a casino owner in A Touch of Frost or in Inspector Morse, although this was only a minor part alongside the likes of Diana Quick and a very youthful Sean Bean.

Sue was on the right side of the law five years later, this time in the Beeb’s Crime Traveller. Like Medics, I don’t recall this being a long-standing regular of mine but I was prepared to give it a go. It was obviously a vehicle for Michel French, straight after his stint on Eastenders and based on the unlikely premise that he and co-star Chloe Annett could secretly use her late dad’s time machine for solving crimes. Hmm. Johnston played French’s boss who disliked his methods but presumably not his results. Despite being written by Anthony Horowitz (Poirot, Foyle’s War and novels featuring Sherlock Holmes and James Bond, though sadly not in the same story) it wasn’t recommissioned but they were fairly entertaining cop capers.

Waking The Dead lasted much longer; eleven years, in fact. Sue Johnston played Grace Foley, an experienced psychological profiler who was the calm, rational, ‘people person’ partner of more headstrong Trevor Eve’s DCI Boyd in his Cold Case team. Besides a healthy dollop of mutual respect, there was much witty banter between the two, a key factor in the show’s enduring popularity throughout the Noughties.

Whilst born in nearby Warrington, Sue Johnston was brought up on Merseyside. Her Liverpool credentials were advanced from her time on Brookside but apparently her allegiance to Liverpool FC is life-long. This informed football support earned her a few spots on Fantasy Football League in the Nineties. It may have been a comedy showpiece for Frank Skinner and David Baddiel but the guests also had the opportunity to demonstrate some genuine sporting knowledge. Back in ’94, Sue was by no means fazed by the lads or fellow guest Eddie Large, but I can’t recall, come the end of the season, how successful she was as a manager.

In 2004, I became riveted by the first series of the celebrity family history series, Who Do You Think You Are? To some extent, it has suffered through familiarity leading if not to contempt but at least to repetition. After a few years, I started to tire of the samey tales from the trenches or Caribbean slavery. Some of the best have been rooted in very ordinary social realism of nineteenth-century Britain, and Sue Johnston’s personal genealogical journey to life on the railways and slums of Carlisle was both gripping and emotional. Sadly I can’t find it on YouTube but the actress was mesmerising merely playing herself.

More recently Sue has been lured by some meaty dramatic roles. In 2018 she was in Kiri, playing star Sarah Lancashire’s elderly mum and last year was again in granny mode in Channel 4’s hard-hitting reminder of the Stafford Hospital scandal, The Cure. She portrayed Bella, whose unnecessary death sparked the campaign which resulted in the eventual expose of incompetence and shocking outcomes of spending cuts in the NHS. The mini-series also introduced me to the worrying notion of Sue Johnston as someone who was actually quite old in real life.

However, it is in comedy that she has become best known in recent decades. There was her role in Jennifer Saunders’ not terribly funny Jam and Jerusalem and with another excellent ensemble cast in the feelgood TV movie family holiday to Lapland. Co-star and fellow-Scouser Stephen Graham has said: “For me to work with Sue Johnston is like playing football with Steven Gerrard” although since then he himself  has become the Mo Salah of TV actors.

But of course I will never forget her as Barbara in The Royle Family. She didn’t always get the funniest lines but she’s utterly brilliant as the downtrodden mum being whisked along by the crazily commonplace conversations in the living room or even in the car. The scripts may have become increasingly formulaic but the characters remained true. From her spot at the end of the sofa, Sue Johnston showed time and again why she is one of the finest character actors of our time.