Haydn Gwynne (; 21 March 1957 – 20 October 2023) was an English actress. She was nominated for the 1992 BAFTA TV Award for Best Light Entertainment Performance for the comedy series Drop the Dead Donkey (1990–1991), and won the 2009 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Featured Actress in a Musical for her role in the Broadway production of Billy Elliot the Musical. She was also a five-time Laurence Olivier Award nominee, winning posthumously in 2024. Her other television roles included Peak Practice (1999–2000), Merseybeat (2001–2002), and playing Camilla in The Windsors from 2016 until her death in 2023.
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Early life and education
Haydn Gwynne was born on 21 March 1957 in Hurstpierpoint, West Sussex, to Guy Thomas Haydn Gwynne (died 1994- also per some sources "Hayden-Gwynne"), who ran a printing business and was of Irish origin, and Rosamond Noelle, née Dobson. Her father was a "Barnardo's boy"; he and his twin brother were placed in a children's home as babies. She played county level tennis before studying sociology at the University of Nottingham, and was fluent in French and Italian. After university she took a five-year lectureship in Italy at the University of Rome La Sapienza, where she taught English as a foreign language.
Career
Gwynne became an actor in her mid-twenties. One of her first television roles was as Cosima in the Lovejoy two-part special "Death and Venice" (1986). She played feminist lecturer Dr Robyn Penrose in the BBC television mini-series dramatisation of David Lodge's Nice Work in 1989.
Her first high-profile comedy role was as Alex Pates in Drop the Dead Donkey in 1990. She then appeared in the 1991 Children's ITV science-fiction series Time Riders and later became a regular in Peak Practice, first appearing at the start of series 7 (episode 1) in 1999 as Dr Joanna Graham. The character of Dr Graham was written out of the show at the end of series 9 (episode 13) when she was fatally shot whilst intervening in a conflict between a man and his daughter. After Peak Practice, Gwynne went on to star in Merseybeat in 2001.
In 2002, she starred in the television drama for the BBC The Secret playing the character of Emma Faraday.
Her theatre work included regional and London-based appearances, from the Octagon, Bolton, in Hedda Gabler, to Richard Cheshire's Way of the World appearing in West End productions of Ziegfeld as Billie Burke (1988), City of Angels and Billy Elliot the Musical at the Victoria Palace Theatre, for which she was nominated for an Olivier Award. She reprised her role as Mrs Wilkinson in the Broadway production of Billy Elliot, which opened at the Imperial Theatre on 13 November 2008. Gwynne was awarded the Outer Critics Circle Award, Theatre World Award, and Drama Desk Award for her performance in Billy Elliot. She was also nominated for a 2009 Tony Award, Featured Actress in a Musical.
She also performed in numerous productions for the Royal Shakespeare Company. Her later television appearances were usually in shorter dramas, such as the role of Julius Caesar's wife, Calpurnia, in the TV series Rome. She also appeared in the first Christmas special episode of Midsomer Murders "Ghosts of Christmas Past" (2004) as Jennifer Carter.
Gwynne guest-starred in an episode of Lewis in the first of a new series (2008). She appeared in the first episode of series 2, "And the Moonbeams Kiss the Sea", playing the character of Sandra Walters. She guest starred in the BBC TV series Sherlock in the episode "The Great Game" (2010), as a museum curator, Miss Wenceslas. She appeared in the 2011 film Hunky Dory.
Personal life, illness and death
Gwynne lived in London with her two sons.
She died on 20 October 2023, aged 66, following a cancer diagnosis one month earlier.
Politics
In August 2014, she was one of 200 public figures who were signatories to a letter to The Guardian opposing Scottish independence in the run-up to September's referendum on that issue.
