Melissa Stribling (7 November 1926 – 22 March 1992) was a Scottish film and television actress, who began her acting career as part of a professional group who presented a different stage play each week at the Croydon 'Grand' theatre. She is best known for playing the role of Mina Holmwood in the horror film ''

Dracula ''Dracula'' is a novel by Bram Stoker, published in 1897. As an epistolary novel, the narrative is related through letters, diary entries, and newspaper articles. It has no single protagonist, but opens with solicitor Jonathan Harker taking ...

'' (1958).

Career

Born in

Gourock Gourock ( ; gd, Guireag ) is a town in the Inverclyde council area and formerly a burgh of the County of Renfrew in the west of Scotland. It was a seaside resort on the East shore of the upper Firth of Clyde. Its main function today is as a r ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

as Melissa Stribling Smith, her career began with a small role in the film ''

The First Gentleman ''The First Gentleman'' is a 1948 British historical drama film directed by Alberto Cavalcanti, and starring Jean-Pierre Aumont, Joan Hopkins, and Cecil Parker. It portrays the relationships and marriage of George, Prince Regent and his tense ...

'' (1948). Stribling is known for playing the role of Mina Holmwood in the horror film ''

'' (1958) starring

Christopher Lee Sir Christopher Frank Carandini Lee (27 May 1922 – 7 June 2015) was an English actor and singer. In a long career spanning more than 60 years, Lee often portrayed villains, and appeared as Count Dracula in seven Hammer Horror films, ultimat ...

in the title role. In the 1960s and 1970s, she guest-starred in the TV series ''

Benny Hill Alfred Hawthorne "Benny" Hill (21 January 1924 – 20 April 1992) was an English comedian, actor, singer and writer. He is remembered for his television programme ''The Benny Hill Show'', an amalgam of slapstick, burlesque and double ente ...

'' (1963), ''

ITV Play of the Week ''Play of the Week'' is a 90-minute British television anthology series produced by a variety of companies including Granada Television, Associated-Rediffusion, ATV and Anglia Television. Synopsis From 1955 to 1967 approximately 500 episodes a ...

'', '' The Avengers'', ''

The Persuaders! ''The Persuaders!'' is an action-comedy series starring Tony Curtis and Roger Moore, produced by ITC Entertainment, and initially broadcast on ITV and ABC in 1971. The show has been called 'the last major entry in the cycle of adventure serie ...

'', ''

The Dick Emery Show ''The Dick Emery Show'' is a British sketch comedy show starring Dick Emery. It was broadcast on the BBC from 1963 to 1981. It was directed and produced by Harold Snoad. The show was broadcast over 19 series with 166 episodes. The show experienced ...

'', and '' The New Avengers''. Her last appearance was in the film '' Paris by Night'' (1988) with

Charlotte Rampling Tessa Charlotte Rampling (born 5 February 1946) is an English actress, known for her work in European arthouse films in English, French, and Italian. An icon of the Swinging Sixties, she began her career as a model. She was cast in the role ...

. In the film ''Dracula'', her character was the victim of a vampire in what can be seen as an erotically charged performance. Dracula and Mina showing sexual pleasure in this way was a first in British cinema.

Terence Fisher Terence Fisher (23 February 1904 – 18 June 1980) was a British film director best known for his work for Hammer Films. He was the first to bring gothic horror alive in full colour, and the sexual overtones and explicit horror in his films, ...

remembers her asking him how to play the scene. Terence replied, saying that she should imagine that she had one whale of a sexual night and that it should be shown on her face. The author Mark Clark detailed the first encounter between Dracula and Mina in his book ''Smirk, sneer, and scream: great acting in horror cinema'' which he described as an implied erotic scene.

Jonathan Rigby Jonathan Rigby is an English actor and film historian who has written several books. ''Video Watchdog'' magazine described him as occupying "a proud place in the advance guard of film researchers, writers and critics," and in 2020 he was inducted ...

complimented her performance in his book ''English gothic: a century of horror cinema'', saying that she is a terrific female lead throughout the film. Terence Fisher said that he told her that she produced a satisfied little

facial expression A facial expression is one or more motions or positions of the muscles beneath the skin of the face. According to one set of controversial theories, these movements convey the emotional state of an individual to observers. Facial expressions are a ...

that speaks volumes.

Family

She was married to Basil Dearden; their son is

James Dearden James Dearden (born 14 September 1949) is an English film director and screenwriter, the son of Scottish actress Melissa Stribling and English film director Basil Dearden. He directed nine films between 1977 and 2018. His film '' Pascali's Isl ...

, also a film director. Their younger son is Torquil Dearden, a London-based editor at a company specialising in commercials and corporate videos.

Filmography

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Stribling, Melissa 1926 births 1992 deaths Scottish film actresses Scottish television actresses People from Gourock 20th-century Scottish actresses