British actress and former Labor politician Glenda Jackson has died at the age of 87 at her home in Blackheath, south London, according to her agent, Lioner Larner. The interpreter, awarded two Oscars for best actress -in 1970 for Women in Love and in 1973 for A Touch of Distinction- died after a “brief illness” surrounded by her family.
His artistic recognitions also include two Emmy Awards, a Bafta for his performance as a divorced businesswoman who had a relationship with a bisexual artist in Sunday, Damn Sunday (1971), by John Schlesinger; In 1978 she was awarded the Order of the British Empire and in 2018 she managed to win a Tony, becoming the twenty-fourth person awarded the Triple Crown of acting flame.
Born on May 9, 1936 in Birkenhead, into a working family, Jackson dropped out of school at the age of 16 to work in a pharmacy until in 1954 she won a scholarship to study at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. She made her stage debut with Terence Rattigan’s Separate Tables in 1957, which was well received by critics and audiences, and later became part of the Royal Shakespeare Company.
In the cinema he had his first opportunity in the film This sporting life in 1963 but fame and his first Oscar would come with Women in Love, a romantic drama based on the novel by D.H. Lawrence where she starred in a full nude and worked under the orders of the controversial Ken Russell, of whom she was the muse, and with the actors Oliver Reed and Alan Bates. In A Touch of Class, which earned her her second gold statuette, she played an English divorcee who is having an affair with a married American businessman.
Jackson was a woman of challenges and dared to get into the shoes of Queen Elizabeth I of England in the British BBC television series broadcast in 1971. Her incredible performance earned her two Emmys. With Trevor Nunn’s Hedda, based on Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler, she earned her third Oscar nomination. Subsequently, she starred in The Incredible Sarah as Sarah Bernhardt directed by Richard Fleischer.
A great defender of human rights, particularly those of women, Glenda Jackson was very sensitive to the social problems of the United Kingdom, which led her to join the Labor Party in 1992 to form part of the Government of Tony Blair. Following the 1997 general election she took over London Transport, a position she resigned as she wanted to try to be elected Labor’s candidate for Mayor of London in 2000. The choice ultimately fell to Frank Dobson. Ten years later she retired from politics.
In addition to Russell, with whom she would also collaborate on La pasión de vivir (1970), Salomé (1988) and El arcoiris (1989), the actress worked with directors such as Robert Altman, Michael Apted and Joseph Losey. In 1984 she was nominated for a Golden Globe for the Sakharov miniseries as Yelena Bonner and in 1991 she starred in Federico García Lorca’s La casa de Bernarda Alba for television. The last appearance of her on the big screen has been Spring at Beechwood (2021), where she was the protagonist of her in her mature age.
