Pretty much unknown outside of the French speaking world, this great comic actress was a lady who knew how to wear a turban and wield a cigarette-holder. Battleaxe of the first order, she was a throwback to the 1920s and enormously popular in French comedy both on screen and in the theatre, where strangely enough, to my knowledge, she never played Lady Bracknell in any French production of "The Importance of Being Ernest", a role which could have been written for her. Her gravelly voice and strong bone structure elicited mischievous suggestions that she was a transvestite, but she was in fact a great beauty in her youth. Although she was inseparable from her partner Guillaume Hanoteau for 25 years, she never married and in her old age surrounded herself with young gay men, because, as she explained: "They are single. And they have cars. I always go out with two of them, one to drive the car, and the other to open the door for me." Of Turkish ancestry and educated in Brussels, she shares these two things with another great eccentric, Boris Johnson. She is probably best remembered for is her series of TV ads for cleaning products in the 1980s.
What a belter. She was loud, she was brash, and she had great hats. And, the mark of a true diva, she is frequently imitated by drag acts. Here she is giving her all in the famous 1954 film of the same name, I can't help miming along to this when I'm doing the ironing. 
The imcomparable Dorothy Rothschild Parker, critic, poet, short-story writer, screenwriter and civil rights campaigner. Star of the Algonquin Round Table 1919-1929. I am not worthy. But the woman who said "You can lead a whore to culture but you can't make her think" deserves a prominent place in my pantheon. She took bitchiness to an art form, as the following quotes will attest:
Penelope Keith as either Margo Ledbetter in "The Good Life" or Audrey Fforbes-Hamilton in "To the Manor Born", or indeed just as herself, conveys the essence of Daphne. Or rather, what Daphne would like to be. She empathized enormously with the impoverished Audrey, a photo of whose eventual marriage to millionnaire businessman Richard De Vere she keeps in her wallet as a reminder that her ship may come in one day. She secretly practices announcing herself with "Daphne, Graefin von Fuchs-Langezeit zu Neanderthal, Guten Tag".
The Queen of the Iceni was a feisty dame, and much admired by Daphne's mother who named her daughter Daphne Boadicea Harridan in hommage to the rampaging monarch. It has been said (I will not say by whom) that Daphne lives up to the name when she is behind the wheel of a car.
The truly immortal Joyce Grenfell epitomizes the class, the elegance, the grace, and the humour that is Daphne. She also knew how to wear a flowery dress, which is even more impressive since she did most of her work on the radio.
Mrs Slocombe of "Are you being served" is rather evocative of Daphne's short stint working on the dress jewellery counter in a department store. Daphne however does not have a pussy.
The Australian housewife and superstar could be Daphne's antipodean twin - apart from the purple hair, the grating Aussie accent and the OTT specs. Edna and Daphne share exquisite dress sense, and an innate down to earth quality for which they are loved by millions. They are both, of course, widows, Edna's Norm and Daphne's Harold both much missed, although apparently useless when they were alive. But like the old troupers they are, they hitched up their support stockings and went on with the show.
