Claire Davenport

Claire Davenport
Birth date:	24 April 1933
Death date:	25 February 2002
Work in the DWU
Main roles:	Empress
Main jobs:	Actor
Stories:	Marco Polo
Main time period active:	1964
Career highlights
Notable non-DWU work:	The Rag Trade, The Baron, Crossplot, Z-Cars, Churchill's People, The Return of the Pink Panther, Fawlty Towers, The Bawdy Adventures of Tom Jones, The Dick Emery Show, The Tempest, The Elephant Man, Return of the Jedi, By the Sword Divided, Alice in Wonderland, War Requiem
IMDb profile

Claire Davenport (24 April 1933-25 February 2002) played the Empress in the Doctor Who television story Marco Polo. This was her first known television acting credit.

Career

Ms. Davenport became known for her "junoesque" form and was often cast in character roles which highlighted her large physique. Outside her early role on Doctor Who, she may perhaps be most recognised as the Swiss masseuse who grapples with Inspector Clouseau for control of a vacuum cleaner in The Return of the Pink Panther (1975), as the circus fat lady in The Elephant Man (1980), and especially as Yarna d'al' Gargan, the rotund dancer who shakes, shimmies, and kicks in the court of Jabba the Hutt's palace in Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (1983).

External links

• Claire Davenport at the Internet Movie Database