Street star still seen on screen AFTER leaving Coronation Street, Jean Alexander won the plum role of Auntie Wainwright, the antique shopkeeper in Last of the Summer Wine. She loves the gentle humour of the series which began in 1973, but finds only glimpses of the old charm on the Street. "I keep an eye on my friends who are still in it like Bill Roache (Ken Barlow), Eileen Derbyshire (Emily Bishop), Sue Nicholls (Audrey Potter), Helen Worth (Gail Potter), Betty Turpin (Betty Driver) and Anne Kirkbride (Deidre Barlow). "John Betjeman came to see us at a party after we had finished work one evening, and his little face lit up when he came into the room. "I was with Bernard and he said, 'ooh, ooh', like a little mouse, 'I love it. It is my half hour of joy. It is so like Dickens. Ooh, it's Stan and Hilda, my favourite people'. He was a nice, nice man." But there have been changes. "All the permutions they have had of couples in that street. "It is getting ridiculous. It has lost its identity somewhere," she says "I don't like the Street so much now. It hasn't got really good stories now. They're all the same, just different people doing them. "But I do watch it for the sake of my old friends. "They are brilliant at comedy. Barbara Knox (Rita Sullivan) and Malcolm Hebden (Norris Cole) play off each other so well. Brilliant. "Unfortunately, they don't get enough to do." After leaving school, Jean worked for five years as a librarian in Liverpool. During this time, she had joined the Playgoers, an amateur group. Then came repertory work in Macclesfield, Southport and York. Her TV career began in Z Cars in the early 1960s. She was cast as a landlady in two episodes of the Street in 1962 and that led to her being chosen as Hilda. Next month, she will complete filming another 11 episodes of Last of the Summer Wine. "It's witty, it's funny," she says.. "A lot of the supposed comedy these days is not really funny. "Everybody is trying too hard, comedians are throwing themselves about and I am sitting here, thinking, 'is that supposed to be funny?'." | 
