Kay Adshead

Kay Adshead

Acting
1954-05-10
Cheetham Hill, Manchester, Lancashire, England, UK

Biography

Kay Adshead is a British actress best known for playing Cathy in the BBC's 1978 adaptation of Wuthering Heights. She is also a poet, playwright, theatremaker, and producer.

Known For & Full Filmography14 Titles

#1Family Affairs

Drama Series - 1997, 16 episodes Main Cast Role

3.7 / 10
DramaSoap

Focuses on the lives of residents in the fictional London suburb of Charnham.

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#2The Bill

Drama Series - 1984, 16 episodes Main Cast Role

6.8 / 10
CrimeDrama

The daily lives of the men and women at Sun Hill Police Station as they fight crime on the streets of London. From bomb threats to armed robbery and drug raids to the routine demands of policing this ground-breaking series focuses as much on crime as it does on the personal lives of its characters.

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#3Dick Turpin

Drama Series - 1979, 16 episodes as Julsca

7.4 / 10
DramaComedy

Richard O'Sullivan stars as Dick Turpin in this action-filled adventure series chronicling the exploits of England's most celebrated highwayman.

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#4One Foot in the Grave

Drama Series - 1990, 16 episodes as Keep Fit Instructress

7.7 / 10
Comedy

One Foot in the Grave is a BBC television sitcom series. The series features the exploits of Victor Meldrew and his long-suffering wife, Margaret. The programmes invariably deal with Meldrew's battle against the problems he creates for himself. Living in a typical household in an unnamed English suburb, Victor takes involuntary early retirement. His various efforts to keep himself busy, while encountering various misfortunes and misunderstandings are the themes of the sitcom. Despite its traditional production, the series supplants its domestic sitcom setting with elements of black humour and surrealism.

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#5dinnerladies

Drama Series - 1998, 16 episodes as Christine

7.5 / 10
Comedy

Dinnerladies is a BBC sitcom written by and starring Victoria Wood that chronicles the antics of a group of workers in a canteen in the north of England. Bren tries to maintain a semblance of order in amongst the chaos, while dealing with the canteen supervisor, slightly sex-obsessed cancer sufferer Tony. Dolly and Jean are the bickering menopausal older women, always at odds but best friends beneath it all. Then there's thick-as-two-short-planks Anita, and the terminally uninterested Twinkle, more concerned with having a good time than anything else. Making up the motley crew are military man handyman Stan, all rules and regulations, and ditzy Philippa, who never seems to get anything right.

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#6Victoria Wood

Drama Series - 1989, 16 episodes as Lorraine Spence

8.0 / 10
Comedy

Victoria Wood was a series of six one-off situation comedies written by and starring Victoria Wood in 1989, who took a break from sketches, two years after her very successful and award winning series Victoria Wood As Seen on TV. Wood appeared as "Victoria", a fictionalised version of herself, in all six episodes - in The Library it was said that she "worked in TV" and in Over To Pam characters appeared to recognise her celebrity and in the final episode, Staying In, she was taken to a party to perform as a comedienne and was expected to go through her stand-up 'routine'. Her character often broke the 'fourth wall' of TV and spoke directly to the camera, but not in every episode. Bored with the sketch format and with a yearning to recapture previous success as a playwright, Wood came up with six individual sitcoms as a compromise. She admitted to finding the writing difficult. Though Wood was written as the central character, other lead parts were written with specific actresses in mind, like Julie Walters and Una Stubbs. "I want people to like me and the people who play my friends, and not everybody else" she said. Screenonline says of the shows "Modest in ambition and scale but rich in wit and acuity, the six playlets showcase Wood's eye for human foibles and her distinctively eccentric characters.".

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#7Wuthering Heights

Drama Series - 1978, 16 episodes as Catherine 'Cathy' Earnshaw

6.3 / 10
Drama

Young orphan Heathcliff is adopted by the wealthy Earnshaw family and moves into their estate, Wuthering Heights. Soon, the new resident falls for his compassionate foster sister, Cathy. The two share a remarkable bond that seems unbreakable until Cathy, feeling the pressure of social convention, suppresses her feelings and marries Edgar Linton, a man of means who befits her stature. Heathcliff vows to win her back.

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#8Crime Traveller

Drama Series - 1997, 16 episodes Main Cast Role

7.3 / 10
Drama

Detective Jeff Slade teams up with scientist Holly Turner, whose late father has created a time machine that can travel back several hours. Together they solve mysteries using the device. In the beginning of episodes (before they travel back in time), things happen because they DID travel back in time, and they are constantly working to avoid paradoxes. This approach to time-travel is unusual in sci-fi movies, and keeps the plot twisted.

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#9Ghosts

Drama Series - 1995, 16 episodes as Teacher

6.0 / 10
Sci-Fi & FantasyMysteryDrama

British anthology series of ghost stories.

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#10The Hound of the Baskervilles

Drama Series - 1982, 16 episodes as Beryl Stapleton

6.3 / 10
Sci-Fi & FantasyDramaMystery

When a nobleman is threatened by a family curse on his newly inherited estate, detective Sherlock Holmes is hired to investigate. A British television serial based on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's novel.

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#11Soft Targets

Movie - 1982, 2h 15m as Hotel Waitress

10.0 / 10
ComedyThrillerDrama

Stephen Poliakoff's parody of the spy-thriller genre. A Russian diplomat becomes convinced that he is at the centre of a Foreign Office plot.

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#12Operation Julie

Movie - 1985, 2h 15m as 'Swan'

3.5 / 10
CrimeDramaTV Movie

A TV movie directed by Bob Mahoney. Based on the book by Dick Lee & Colin Pratt it tells the true story of a long running Police investigation which resulted in the arrests of 120 people and jail sentences of 170 years for the manufacture and distribution of £100M of LSD.

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#13Acceptable Levels

Movie - 1983, 2h 15m as Sue

7.0 / 10
Drama

A BBC film crew is interviewing a ‘typical Catholic family’ in the Divis Flats area of Belfast, when news comes in that a child, known to the family, has been hit by a stray plastic bullet fired by a British soldier – a version of events contested by the army. Back in London, editing the footage, the producer and researcher on the project wrestle with how to present the incident, and with their responsibility to the people in the film.

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#14The Kiss of Death

Movie - 1977, 2h 15m as Linda

6.5 / 10
DramaRomanceTV Movie

Trevor is an extremely shy undertaker's assistant. He always tags along with his good friend Ronnie, when he goes to the pub with his girlfriend Sandra. Sandra introduces Trevor to her more forward friend Linda. Linda has a difficult time getting Trevor to go out with her, but she finally gets him to go to a disco; he won't dance, so Linda dances with Ronnie.

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Kay Adshead - Movies & TV Shows | XFlix | XFlix