Biography
Born on 8 June 1934 in Romford, Essex, England, Millicent Mary Lillian Martin entered the profession as a child actor with ambitions centered on the stage. In her early twenties she secured recognition through simultaneous appearances in the West End and Broadway versions of The Boy Friend during 1954, after which she entered an extended stretch of supporting parts in theatre, cinema, and television. London stage credits from those years comprised Expresso Bongo in 1958 and The Crooked Mile the year after, while screen work included the 1959 feature Libel and the 1961 television film The Horsemasters.
Her first notable television exposure arrived with a 1961 slot on The Morecambe And Wise Show; late-night viewers soon grew familiar with her through singing and acting segments on That Was The Week That Was, which ran from 1962 to 1963. Subsequent British television projects encompassed ABC Of Britain and Mainly Millicent, both broadcast in 1964, together with the 1966 one-hour special Millicent And Roy, in which she shared the spotlight with Roy Castle.
Film roles followed in Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines (1965), Alfie (1966), and the screen adaptation of Anthony Newley and Leslie Bricusse’s Stop The World - I Want To Get Off (1966). On stage she appeared opposite Jim Dale in The Card (1975) and joined Julia McKenzie and David Kiernan for the West End revue Side By Side By Sondheim in 1976 before repeating the engagement in its New York production. Her stage work alternated between musical and straight plays, encompassing the part of Dorothy Brock in the New York mounting of 42nd Street and the role of Phyllis in the 1987 West End production of Stephen Sondheim’s Follies; she also performed in Hey, Mr. Producer! The Musical World Of Cameron Mackintosh in 1998.
Between the late 1980s and the early 2000s Martin maintained regular appearances in series and situation comedies on both sides of the Atlantic, among them Downtown (1986), Moon And Son (1992), Days Of Our Lives in the late 1990s, a recurring portrayal of Carol on That’s Life (2000), and the long-running Frasier, where she played Gertrude Moon in another recurring capacity from 2000 to 2003. She was also seen in the 2005 film Mrs. Palfrey At The Claremont.
Her first notable television exposure arrived with a 1961 slot on The Morecambe And Wise Show; late-night viewers soon grew familiar with her through singing and acting segments on That Was The Week That Was, which ran from 1962 to 1963. Subsequent British television projects encompassed ABC Of Britain and Mainly Millicent, both broadcast in 1964, together with the 1966 one-hour special Millicent And Roy, in which she shared the spotlight with Roy Castle.
Film roles followed in Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines (1965), Alfie (1966), and the screen adaptation of Anthony Newley and Leslie Bricusse’s Stop The World - I Want To Get Off (1966). On stage she appeared opposite Jim Dale in The Card (1975) and joined Julia McKenzie and David Kiernan for the West End revue Side By Side By Sondheim in 1976 before repeating the engagement in its New York production. Her stage work alternated between musical and straight plays, encompassing the part of Dorothy Brock in the New York mounting of 42nd Street and the role of Phyllis in the 1987 West End production of Stephen Sondheim’s Follies; she also performed in Hey, Mr. Producer! The Musical World Of Cameron Mackintosh in 1998.
Between the late 1980s and the early 2000s Martin maintained regular appearances in series and situation comedies on both sides of the Atlantic, among them Downtown (1986), Moon And Son (1992), Days Of Our Lives in the late 1990s, a recurring portrayal of Carol on That’s Life (2000), and the long-running Frasier, where she played Gertrude Moon in another recurring capacity from 2000 to 2003. She was also seen in the 2005 film Mrs. Palfrey At The Claremont.