Shoes

Personal Info

Known For

Acting

Gender

Female

Birthday

1938-06-16

Place of Birth

Liverpool, England, UK

Helen Ryan

Biography

Helen Ryan (born June 16, 1938, in Liverpool, Lancashire) is a British actress, who is notable for playing several royal roles. The Liverpool native played Princess and then Queen Alexandra in the British television series Edward the Seventh, for which she received a BAFTA nomination in 1975. She also played Princess Alexandra in the 1980 movie The Elephant Man and the Sherlock Holmes story "The Mazarin Stone". She played another royal, Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands, in the 2002 television drama Bertie and Elizabeth. Her other credits include Madame Balzac in the TV series Prometheus: The Life of Balzac (1975), Mrs. McFarlane in the Sherlock Holmes story "The Norwood Builder", and films such as Clash of Loyalties (1983), Misunderstood (1984) and The Hawk (1993). More recently, Ryan has appeared as Peggy Roath, a personal aide to Queen Elizabeth II, in the fifth season of The Crown in 2022. In 2023, she appeared in the BBC soap opera Doctors as Thelma Scott. She was formerly married to the theatre director Guy Slater, with whom she had a daughter, Rebecca, and a son, Daniel.

Known for

The Crown

The Crown

The gripping, decades-spanning inside story of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and the Prime Ministers who shaped Britain's post-war destiny. The Crown tells the inside story of two of the most famous addresses in the world – Buckingham Palace and 10 Downing Street – and the intrigues, love lives and machinations behind the great events that shaped the second half of the 20th century. Two houses, two courts, one Crown.

Midsomer Murders

Midsomer Murders

The peacefulness of the Midsomer community is shattered by violent crimes, suspects are placed under suspicion, and it is up to a veteran DCI and his young sergeant to calmly and diligently eliminate the innocent and ruthlessly pursue the guilty.

Heartbeat

Heartbeat

Set during the 1960s in the fictional North Yorkshire village of Aidensfield, this enduringly popular series interweaves crime and medical storylines.

Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes, along with his friend Dr. Watson, uses his abilities to take on cases by private clients and those that the Scotland Yard are unable to solve.

Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes, along with his friend Dr. Watson, uses his abilities to take on cases by private clients and those that the Scotland Yard are unable to solve.

Van der Valk

Van der Valk

Van der Valk is a British television series that was produced by Thames Television for the ITV network. It starred Barry Foster in the title role as Dutch detective Commissaris "Piet" van der Valk. Based on the characters and atmosphere of the novels of Nicolas Freeling, the first series was shown in 1972.

Bella Block

Bella Block

Bella Block is a long-running German detective television series starring Hannelore Hoger, first broadcast in 1994 on ZDF. In 2010 the 30th series was produced.

The Duchess of Duke Street

The Duchess of Duke Street

In Victorian London, Louisa Leyton works her way up from servant to renowned cook to proprietress of the upper-class Bentinck Hotel in Duke Street, St James's.

The Elephant Man

The Elephant Man

A Victorian surgeon rescues a heavily disfigured man being mistreated by his "owner" as a side-show freak. Behind his monstrous façade, there is revealed a person of great intelligence and sensitivity.

The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes

The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes

In this thrilling final series starring Jeremy Brett as the famous 'consulting detective' Sherlock Holmes, six of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's short stories are adapted: The Three Gables, The Dying Detective, The Golden Pince-Nez, The Red Circle, The Mazarin Stone, and The Cardboard Box.

Edward the Seventh

Edward the Seventh

Edward the Seventh is a 1975 television drama miniseries produced by ATV. Based on the biography of Edward VII by Philip Magnus, the series features depictions of a vast number of historical figures including, but not limited to, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Arthur Balfour, Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, Edward VII, George V, Napoleon III, Nicholas II of Russia, Queen Victoria, Wilhelm I, Wilhelm II, Winston Churchill, Henry John Temple, and Otto von Bismarck.

Edward the Seventh

Edward the Seventh

Edward the Seventh is a 1975 television drama miniseries produced by ATV. Based on the biography of Edward VII by Philip Magnus, the series features depictions of a vast number of historical figures including, but not limited to, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Arthur Balfour, Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, Edward VII, George V, Napoleon III, Nicholas II of Russia, Queen Victoria, Wilhelm I, Wilhelm II, Winston Churchill, Henry John Temple, and Otto von Bismarck.

Harry

Harry

Harry is a television drama series produced by Union Pictures for the BBC, and shown on BBC1 between 18 September 1993 and 12 April 1995. The programme follows a journalist called Harry Salter, who ran a news agency in the English town of Darlington.

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

In Victorian London, consulting detective Sherlock Holmes wields not only powers of observation and deduction but also vast knowledge on anything relevant to solve mysteries, including crimes. Cases that would stump most detectives are merely short work for Holmes, who is ably assisted by his friend and colleague Dr John H. Watson.

Old Guy

Old Guy

Stuck at a dead end but vying for the love of spunky club manager Anata, aging contract killer Danny Dolinski is thrilled when The Company pulls him back in the field, but only to train Gen Z newcomer Wihlborg, a prodigy assassin with an attitude.