As an aspiring young actress Anna Quayle was distraught when she tumbled from a ladder while earning some pin money as a model. The accident left her nose broken in three places.
She was a student at Rada at the time and, fearing that the disfiguration might end her career before it had even started, she asked her actor father what she should do. “Daddy told me, ‘It’s a great prop,’ ” she recalled. “So I never had it straightened.”
It was sound advice and her distinctive looks became an integral part of her marketability as a character actress whose credits ranged from a famous scene with John Lennon in the Beatles’ film A Hard Day’s Night to playing the form teacher Mrs Monroe in