Dinah Sheridan - Later Years

Later Years

Her second husband, businessman John Davis, whom she married in 1954, insisted that she quit acting and stay at home with her children. After their 1965 divorce, she resumed her career, at first "bringing wit and elegance to a succession of West End comedies, farces and thrillers", including Let’s All Go Down the Strand (1967), The Card (1973), The Pleasure of His Company (1976 revival), A Murder Is Announced (1977), Present Laughter (1981) and a several other stage roles. She also soon found more success as the mother in the film version of The Railway Children (1970), an affecting emotional eloquence that was crucial to the film’s appeal, and as Angela in the long-running 1980s British sitcom, Don't Wait Up (1983–90). She made only one more film after The Railway Children, Agatha Christie's The Mirror Crack'd (1980), starring Angela Lansbury as Miss Marple.

Sheridan was the subject of the UK TV show This Is Your Life in 1979. In 1983 she made a guest appearance in the BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who as the Time Lady Chancellor Flavia in the 20th anniversary special, "The Five Doctors". Among other television roles, she appeared several times in the mini-series The Winning Streak (1985) and the series Just Us (1992) and in the game show Countdown. She played Clare in the 1994 TV sitcom All Night Long. Her last role was in 1999 as Kathleen Gilmore in the Jonathan Creek television episode "Miracle in Crooked Lane". Sheridan died peacefully at her home in Northwood, London, on 25 November 2012. She was 92.