
Mary Tamm
Acting
Biography
Mary Tamm (22 March 1950 – 26 July 2012) was a British actress who appeared in many British TV drama series and serials. She is best known for her role as Romana I in the BBC's science fiction television series Doctor Who, appearing opposite Tom Baker in the 1978–1979 story arc The Key to Time. Tamm was born in Bradford, West Riding of Yorkshire, to an Estonian father and a half-Russian mother, who was an opera singer. Her parents had fled Estonia after four of her father's brothers had died in Stalin's gulag labour camps. Tamm spoke only Estonian at home and attended Estonian-language school on Saturdays. She did not begin learning English until she was enrolled in primary school. At age 11, she won a scholarship to attend Bradford Girls' Grammar School and joined the city's Civic Theatre. She was a graduate and an associate member of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, where she studied from 1969 to 1971.
Known For

From England to Egypt, accompanied by his elegant and trustworthy sidekicks, the intelligent yet eccentrically-refined Belgian detective Hercule Poirot pits his wits against a collection of first class deceptions.
Agatha Christie's Poirot

The adventures of The Doctor, a time-traveling humanoid alien known as a Time Lord. He explores the universe in his TARDIS, a sentient time-traveling spaceship. Its exterior appears as a blue British police box, which was a common sight in Britain in 1963 when the series first aired. Along with a succession of companions, The Doctor faces a variety of foes while working to save civilizations, help ordinary people, and right many wrongs.
Doctor Who

Drama series about the staff and patients at Holby City Hospital's emergency department, charting the ups and downs in their personal and professional lives.
Casualty

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

Set in the fictional Midlands town of Letherbridge, defined as being close to the city of Birmingham, this soap opera follows the staff and families of a doctor's surgery.
Doctors

Jim Bergerac is a detective sergeant in The Foreigners Office who likes to do things his own way. While dealing with his own personal demons Bergerac has a knack of finding trouble, and sometimes causing it.
Bergerac

The ground-breaking soap set in a housing estate on the outskirts of Liverpool.
Brookside

Public Eye is a British television drama broadcast from 1965 to 1975 on ITV1. Produced by ABC Television for three series, and Thames Television for a further four, the programme follows the investigations and cases handled by the unglamourous enquiry agent Frank Marker.
Public Eye

Follow the swashbuckling exploits of Simon Templar, a modern-day Robin Hood of sorts.
Return of the Saint

Clinical psychologist Dr Tony Hill's uncanny ability to see into the minds of murderers means he finds it difficult to distance himself from disturbing cases.
Wire in the Blood

Written and filmed to reflect the reality of life in the Royal Navy and the Royal Marines in the 1970s, most stories focus on the Captain and his fellow officers, with subplots dealing with life on the lower decks. Episodes typically featured a variety of events at sea (the Cold War, smuggling, the evacuation of civilians from crisis-hit places, etc.), as well as the personal lives of officers and ratings and the impact their personal lives had on their professional lives and duties.
Warship

Anthology series of black comedies, which sets out to deliver excellent stories with a darkly comic twist.
Spine Chillers

After a bleak childhood, Jane Eyre goes out into the world to become a governess. As she lives happily in her new position at Thornfield Hall, she meets the dark, cold, and abrupt master of the house, Edward Rochester. Jane and her employer grow close in friendship and she soon finds herself falling in love with him. Happiness seems to have found Jane at last, but could Rochester's terrible secret be about to destroy it forever?
Jane Eyre

Twisted Tales is a dark and stylish comedy drama series. With intense scripts written by a mix of established writers and upcoming talent, each story is a self-contained episode with a mysterious twist. The tales set out to spook the brain and tickle the funny bone, so be prepared to expect the unexpected. The series is very closely related to Spine Chillers, an earlier BBC Three series. In effect, Twisted Tales is a rebranded second series of the earlier successful production.
Twisted Tales

Perfect Scoundrels first broadcast in 1990 on British television. A comedy-drama following two con-men doing their best to separate various people from their money
Perfect Scoundrels

Worlds Beyond is a British television anthology broadcast on ITV from 1986 to 1988, based on real-life supernatural experiences described in archival documents from the Society for Psychical Research. A book was also released to accompany the series.
Worlds Beyond

In this 1998 re-imagining of the original The Professionals TV show, CI5 now has an international remit, being jointly funded by the governments of the UK, U.S.A., Japan, Germany and France, and called upon to deal with terrorism and espionage on an international scale. An all-new cast features the original dynamic of two gung ho field agents (these a former U.S. Navy Seal and a British secret service man) and a cantankerous boss, but adds the dynamic of a female agent, a computer and martial arts expert who came to CI5 by way of the Canadian Secret Service. Expectations were high, but the new show failed to capture the imagination of viewers and only one season was made.
CI5: The New Professionals

Only When I Laugh is an ITV1 sitcom broadcast from 29 October 1979 to 16 December 1982 for four series with seven episodes each, and a Christmas special in 1981. The title is the answer to the question, "Does it hurt?" A naïve middle-class man is admitted to an NHS hospital ward, shared with a working-class layabout and an upper-class hypochondriac. The trio never fail to cause a nuisance for the poor, unsuspecting staff.
Only When I Laugh

Detective Jeff Slade teams up with scientist Holly Turner, whose late father has created a time machine that can travel back several hours. Together they solve mysteries using the device. In the beginning of episodes (before they travel back in time), things happen because they DID travel back in time, and they are constantly working to avoid paradoxes. This approach to time-travel is unusual in sci-fi movies, and keeps the plot twisted.
Crime Traveller

A group of men, heading to a remote village to help one of their friends get over his divorce, soon discover that all the women have been infected with a virus that makes them man-hating cannibals.