Josie Lawrence

The next year she starred in Enchanted April a British remake of the 1935 film based on Elizabeth von Arnim's novel.

Her parents were Bert Lawrence and Kathleen Lawrence, née Griffin, who were married in 1948.

She has twin siblings, John and Janet, who are ten years her senior (1949).

They were brought up in nearby Cradley Heath, where their father worked for British Leyland and their mother as a dinner lady.

Lawrence wanted to be an actress at the early age of 5 and at 16 joined the Barlow Players in Oldbury.

Josie Lawrence (born Wendy Lawrence; 6 June 1959) is an English actress and comedian.

She is best known for her work with the Comedy Store Players improvisational troupe, the television series Whose Line Is It Anyway? and as Manda Best in EastEnders.

Lawrence was born Wendy Lawrence on 6 June 1959 in Old Hill, Staffordshire.

She studied at Dartington College of Arts from 1978 to 1981, receiving a Bachelor of Arts honours degree.

During the 1980s, she was also involved in a play called Passionaria at the Newcastle Playhouse, starring Denise Black and Kate McKenzie, and they later formed the jazz group Denise Black and the Kray Sisters.

Her work in comedy began as a result of starring in a Donmar Warehouse play called Songs For Stray Cats and hearing the audience invited to supply lines and ideas for improvisers appearing in after-show cabaret.

"I played a manic depressive Glaswegian in the play and I'd seen Jim Sweeney on the circuit when I was a singer with Denise Black and The Kray Sisters. So I stayed behind and watched one night and then, because I knew Jim, I said could I try it because it looked brilliant and it was one of those things I found I could do. You suddenly find your little baby. After that I joined The Comedy Store Players and then this TV show called Whose Line Is It Anyway came along."

Lawrence came to public attention as a regular guest on the Channel 4 improvisational comedy series Whose Line Is It Anyway? at its launch in 1988.

Lawrence's speciality on the show was her ability to improvise songs on the spot.

She was the first female performer to appear on the show, featuring in both the original pilot episode and the first broadcast episode.

In 1991, she had her own short-lived comedy series Josie, also on Channel 4.

She starred as the title character in the 1993 Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith production of the musical Moll Flanders.

Her other television work includes the comedy series Not with a Bang and Downwardly Mobile, and she is remembered for her performances as Maggie Costello in the cricketing comedy drama Outside Edge alongside Timothy Spall and Brenda Blethyn, for which she was awarded the Spectacle Wearer of the Year award in 1993.

From 1994–96, Lawrence played Katharine in the Royal Shakespeare Company production of The Taming of the Shrew in both Stratford-upon-Avon and London, for which she received a Dame Peggy Ashcroft award for Best Actress.

She also appeared in Faust and The Cherry Orchard and starred as Benedick in an all-female production of Much Ado About Nothing at Shakespeare's Globe, having played Beatrice previously at Manchester's Royal Exchange.

She went on to perform in Sealed with a Loving Kiss and Lunch in the Park as part of the Paul Merton in Galton and Simpson's... series on 16 February 1996 and 21 October 1997.

Lawrence was featured on Whose Line until its 9th series in 1997-1998, which was the last of the UK series to actually be filmed in the UK.

She also performed in two episodes of the American edition of the show in 1999.

She appeared in the 1999 made-for-television film The Flint Street Nativity as both Debbie Bennett and Debbie's mother.

Between 1999 and 2001, she was the voice of "Duck" in the children's television show Dog and Duck.

In 2000, she played Camilla in A Many Splintered Thing.

She made her West End theatre debut in 2001 taking over the lead role of Anna in the stage musical The King and I, replacing Elaine Paige.

In 2005, she appeared with Victoria Wood, Julie Walters and Celia Imrie in the cult West End production of Wood's Acorn Antiques: The Musical.

In 2006, she starred alongside Peter Davison in The Complete Guide to Parenting as Phoebe Huntley.

She has also appeared in the BBC 1 drama series Robin Hood and as Mrs Jiniwin in the 2007 ITV adaptation of The Old Curiosity Shop.

She appeared in an episode of the 2007 E4 teen comedy/drama Skins, playing Liz Jenkins, estranged mother of Sid Jenkins, a role which she reprised in the second series.

In 2008, Lawrence took the lead role in Tom Stoppard's Hapgood at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre and later at the West Yorkshire Playhouse in which she was a secret spymaster given the task of exposing a traitor who is leaking vital information to the Russians.

In the same year, she co-directed The Time Step, a comedy about fantasies and talent contests, with Linda Marlowe at the Edinburgh Festival.

Lawrence was in EastEnders from March 2009 to February 2010.

She played Manda Best, an old flame of Minty Peterson.

She was featured with Meera Syal in a celebrity special of Who Wants to be a Millionaire? that aired on 31 January 2009.

She has appeared as a guest on the panel show games QI and Never Mind the Buzzcocks.

Lawrence appeared as Madame Ranevskaya in a new version of Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard, translated by Tom Stoppard, at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre in autumn 2010.

In 2010, Lawrence appeared in series 25, episode 3 of Casualty named "The Chaos Theory".

Her first acting role was as a young boy in a production of The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists at the Half Moon Theatre (in 2016 she became a patron of the theatre).