Amanda Barrie

Amanda Barrie  (born Shirley Anne Broadbent on 14 September, 1935 in Ashton-under-Lyne, Lancashire) is an English Actor.

Career
Barrie has acted in a number of British television and film roles in the 1960s and 1970s. She was also in two of the Carry On films, an extensive series of British comedy films. She had a supporting turn as a cab driver in Carry On Cabby (1963) and took the title role in Carry on Cleo (1964).

Barrie is probably best known for her role as a café proprietor's wife, Alma Sedgewick (later Baldwin), on the British soap opera Coronation Street. She was a bit player in the early to mid 1980s before she was offered a contract in 1988 where she became a very well-known character. She played the role until she decided to retire in 2001. In the story, Alma was diagnosed with terminal cervical cancer which later caused her death.

Since leaving Coronation Street, she has continued to act in the popular ITV1 prison series, Bad Girls, playing inmate Bev Tull from the fifth series to the last, along with Phyl Oswyn played by Stephanie Beacham. The characters together were known as "The Costa Cons". She also became one of the celebrities who took part in Hell's Kitchen; a popular ITV1 "reality TV" series which screened in 2004. While on the show, she became so frustrated with Gordon Ramsay, that she tried to slap him across the face. It can be seen here.

From November 2006 to January 2007, Amanda took a starring role in the pantomime adaption of Jack and the Beanstalk in Canterbury, Kent. From December 2007 to January 2008, she will appear as the Fairy Godmother in the pantomime adaption of Cinderella at the Gordon Craig Theatre in Stevenage, Hertfordshire.

Personal life
She was married to the theatre director Robin Hunter (1967-2004).

Amanda's autobiography It's Not a Rehearsal has become a best seller since it was published in 2003. Having kept her personal life very private, Amanda decided in her autobiography to be more open about being bisexual.

Selected filmography

 * Operation Bullshine (1959)
 * A Pair of Briefs (1962)
 * Carry on Cabby (1963)
 * Doctor in Distress (1963)
 * Carry on Cleo (1964)
 * I've Gotta Horse (1965)
 * The Reluctant Romeo (1967)
 * Thirty-Minute Theatre (1969)
 * One of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing (1975)
 * Are You Being Served? (1979)
 * Time of My Life (1980)
 * Coronation Street (1981 - 2001)
 * Dick Whittington (2002)
 * Hell's Kitchen (2004)
 * Doctors (2003 - 2004)
 * Bad Girls (2003 - 2006)