Late Queen loved Grange Hill and did ‘flawless’ impressions of the characters
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Elizabeth II was known to be a great mimic and was particularly good at accents.
But few would have guessed that the late monarch was a fan of the classic children’s television drama Grange Hill – and once performed a flawless 10-minute routine as the various characters.
The long-running show, set in a gritty London comprehensive, was broadcast on the BBC from 1978 until 2008.
Gyles Brandreth, the broadcaster and writer, revealed this week that “not many years before her death” the late Queen entertained dinner guests at Windsor Castle with an impromptu performance “with the accents, as a complete set piece”.
The author revealed on his podcast, Rosebud, that he had discovered the late monarch’s unlikely love of Grange Hill while researching his 2022 biography Elizabeth: An Intimate Portrait.
Chatting to Rob Brydon, the comedian and impressionist, who admitted that he used to watch the drama, Brandreth said: “It wasn’t just you who was enjoying Grange Hill.
“While you were watching, Elizabeth II was watching, too.”
He added: “One of the people who was an admirer of yours was the late Elizabeth II. I wrote a biography recently of the Queen and she was very much into impressionists, and she loved impressions.
“And I was told only recently by proper friends of the Queen that they were – not many years before her death – at a dinner at Windsor Castle with the Queen, Prince Edward and his wife Sophie, and just two other people.
“And Grange Hill came up. And the Queen did a routine – a routine – lasting 10 minutes on Grange Hill.
“She played all the characters, with the accents, as a complete set piece. Isn’t that extraordinary?”
Speaking in 2012, Rowan Williams, then the Archbishop of Canterbury, said: “I found, in the Queen, someone who can be friendly, who can be informal, who can be extremely funny in private.
“Not everybody appreciates just how funny she can be. Who is quite prepared to tease and to be teased.”
Karen Dolby, the royal author, shared an anecdote in her book The Wicked Wit of the Royal Family, in which she revealed the late Queen had once surprised the then Prince Charles by perfectly mimicking a south London twang.
“Once, when Prince Charles and the Queen were driving to the Ascot races in an open carriage, there was a loud shout from the crowd,” she wrote.
“Charles did not hear what was said and asked his mother.
“‘Gizza wave Liz!’ the Queen replied in her best south London accent, waving obligingly at the spectators.”
Ms Dolby revealed that the late monarch’s repertoire was said to include politicians such as Tony Benn and Tony Blair, familiar TV characters and a “very convincing Russian president Boris Yeltsin, along with several US presidents”.
Angela Kelly, the Queen’s loyal confidante and dressmaker, has also spoken of her boss’s talent for mimicking accents, including her own Scouse twang.
The Liverpudlian said in a 2007 interview: “The Queen has a wicked sense of humour and is a great mimic. She can do all accents – including mine.”
‘Brilliant’ impressionist
It is a skill that appears to have been inherited by her elder son, who is said to be a “brilliant” impressionist.
Queen Camilla was asked in the first episode of her Reading Room podcast earlier this month which books she most enjoyed reading to her grandchildren.
She replied: “I think the one I enjoyed reading more than anything else was Harry Potter… all the stories.
“I can’t mimic voices for love or money. I’m completely hopeless at it. I was a really bad actor at school and I’ve never been able to master the art of mimicry.
“But my husband, he does it brilliantly, he can do all the voices.”
