Short, middle-aged feisty eccentrics were the speciality of this Australian-born mockney lass, although she wasn’t limited to parts such as the doggedly defiant Flo in Carry On Cabby, being convincingly terrorised by Peggy Mount in Sailor Beware, and hauntingly mute as Lindy, the unwilling partner in crime of Margaret Lockwood’s Jassy. But usually, if there’s an Elsie, and Effie or a Flo in a Britcom of a certain vintage, and no-one telling *her* how to behave, you’ll often as not find Esma under the headscarf.
FINEST HOUR: The batty spinster playing table tennis with a flagging Kenneth Williams in Carry on Cruising.
