British actress Kate Saunders just died. I'm not going to pretend I know anything about her other than she had a major role in the Season 2 opener The Long Legs of the Law (the title character, actually), but a statement she made about a decade ago is interesting:
It was the pinnacle of my acting career, and will probably be the only thing I'm remembered for when I die – if you want immortality, all you need is one appearance in a classic sitcom. Thirty years later, I still get recognised; the series has built up a huge fan base of list-making nerds who occasionally send me hideous photos of myself to sign. It was the golden age of actors' contracts, and that means my single week's work has brought in some very useful repeat fees down the years. One pinnacle of my subsequent career as a journalist happened about a decade after my episode of OFAH, when I dropped into rehearsals of the umpteenth series to interview David Jason, and found the cast and crew beautifully unchanged. It hit me then just how lucky I was to have been part of it. Whatever I did before, or have done since – once, I supped with the immortals. David Beckham, this is where your real fame begins.
I don't know why I say "remarkable", OFAH is littered with tiny, one-scene characters who've spent the ensuing decades popping up anywhere they can to cash in, which seems like a pretty viable & easy thing to do, especially for a show that has its own yearly convention. It's kinda crazy that pretty much a few days work on a show you'll never be seen on again can be the first line your obituary 40+ years later, but it also goes to show how much people loved the show. I'm glad she - and all the others like her - was able to use this as an opportunity whenever she could.
PS - in the article, she's playfully warning David Beckham about how much his star will turn after guest-starring in an OFAH sketch for Red Nose Day for Comic Relief, it's a brilliant bit and you can watch it here.
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