Hyacinth Bucket

Patrica Routledge’s visit to Dear Fay in Newlyn

We sat around our kitchen table sharing a Cup of tea and chatting for the best part of an hour as they exchanged their reminices on their acting careers.

What roles they most enjoyed playing. What roles they found most challenging. The emotional torrents of performing. The BBC had just discontinued the ‘Hattie Wainthrop Investergates’ series in which Patrica was playing the leading role and Fay was ‘outraged’ as there were few crime series where women were the lead players. They chatted at ease like old familiar friends and would have ‘gone on’ for hours had not ‘the minders’ interrupted “We have to open the shop Fay” ” Patrica, you have a function to attend in Ballarat and we are already late…”

She parted with an invitation to visit her in her home, if ever we came to England.

Fay and Patrica exchanged greeting cards and letters for a number of years.

It remained a highlight in Dear Fay’s life that “Patrica Routlidge – Hyacinth Bucket – had come to visit her and  enjoyed a cup of the in ker kitchen…”

Happy Birthday Patrica, may it be full of love and Joy. With love from John (& Dear Fay from the Spirit World).  Routlidge’s  95th birthday. She is best known for her performance in the BBC series ‘Keeping Up Appearences’ as Hyacinth Bucket. It seems such a long time ago now, but she was able to give Dear Fay one of the greatest honours of her life as an actor and singer during a visit to Australia in the late 1990s.

She made a special visit to our Newlyn Home to meet and chat with Fay.

We sat around our kitchen table sharing a Cup of tea and chatting for the best part of an hour as they exchanged their reminices on their acting careers.

What roles they most enjoyed playing. What roles they found most challenging. The emotional torrents of performing. The BBC had just discontinued the ‘Hattie Wainthrop Investergates’ series in which Patrica was playing the leading role and Fay was ‘outraged’ as there were few crime series where women were the lead players. They chatted at ease like old familiar friends and would have ‘gone on’ for hours had not ‘the minders’ interrupted “We have to open the shop Fay.” ” Patrica, you have a function to attend in Ballarat and we are already late…”

She parted with an invitation to visit her in her home, if ever we came to England.

Fay and Patrica exchanged greeting cards and letters for a number of years.

It remained a highlight in Dear Fay’s life that “Patrica Routlidge – Hyacinth Bucket – had come to visit her and  enjoyed a cup of the in ker kitchen…”

John (Jack) WB Hungerford