Reception
Hilary Kingsley has suggested that despite Sue's flaws, due to the skill of Sandy Ratcliff, "you can't help feeling sorry for her". She has added that "A lot of hearts were touched by Sandy Ratcliff when she played the tragic Sue Osman". Further, it has been suggested that "the tempestuous relationship between Sue and Ali Osman kept many an EastEnders viewer on the edge of their seat." They couple were described as a diet coke version of the popular EastEnders couple, Den and Angie "running the café rather than the Queen Vic".
In 1988, Journalist for USA Today, Matt Roush, described Sue and Ali as two of the serial's more colourful residents. Discussing the cotdeath storyline, which aired in 1985 in the UK, Roush said, "When tragedy strikes, as in the case of Ali (Nejdet Salih) and jealous wife (Sandy Ratcliff), EastEnders becomes achingly believable. Try to remember the last time you saw soap stars deal with the bureaucracy of registering death certificates and canceling welfare benefits."
Ratcliff has been critical of her character. In a 1987 interview she commented, "Sue really annoys me sometimes because she's got no guts. I'd love to liven her up a bit, dress her in some of Angie's clothes, get her out of that cafe, set her up in a business of her own and allow her to make something of her life." Ratcliff was also critical that Sue was not more of a feminist: "I was under the impression she'd become more assertive. I had visions of a bunch of feminists walking into the cafe one day right in the middle of a typical Sue and Ali fight, and them asking her why she puts up with him. No doubt Sue would screw up her nose and ask: 'What do you mean?' But she'd think about it, want to hear more and gradually begin to change her ways to become stronger, more independent! I get cheesed off with Sue. She isn't me at all."
In 2011, an EastEnders' storyline aired featuring the character Ronnie Branning's baby dying of a cot death and the mother subsequently swapping her dead baby with another character's child. This plot has been compared unfavourably to the Osman cot death of 1985.
Read more about this topic: Sue Osman
Famous quotes containing the word reception:
“He’s leaving Germany by special request of the Nazi government. First he sends a dispatch about Danzig and how 10,000 German tourists are pouring into the city every day with butterfly nets in their hands and submachine guns in their knapsacks. They warn him right then. What does he do next? Goes to a reception at von Ribbentropf’s and keeps yelling for gefilte fish!”
—Billy Wilder (b. 1906)
“I gave a speech in Omaha. After the speech I went to a reception elsewhere in town. A sweet old lady came up to me, put her gloved hand in mine, and said, “I hear you spoke here tonight.” “Oh, it was nothing,” I replied modestly. “Yes,” the little old lady nodded, “that’s what I heard.””
—Gerald R. Ford (b. 1913)
“But in the reception of metaphysical formula, all depends, as regards their actual and ulterior result, on the pre-existent qualities of that soil of human nature into which they fall—the company they find already present there, on their admission into the house of thought.”
—Walter Pater (1839–1894)