June Muriel Brown, MBE (born 16 February 1927) is an English actress and presenter best known for her role as Dot Cotton in the British soap opera EastEnders.
Brown served in the Wrens (Royal Navy), and was classically trained at the Old Vic Drama School.
Brown has had a long television career, with small roles in Coronation Street as Mrs Parsons (1970); in the Doctor Who story "The Time Warrior" as Lady Eleanor (1974); medical soap Angels; history-of-Britain Churchill's People; long-running comedy drama Minder; police soap The Bill; and cult sci-fi series Survivors. She also had a bigger part as Mrs Leyton in the very popular costume drama The Duchess of Duke Street (1976), and played Mrs Mann in Oliver Twist (1985).
She has also starred in the wartime big band comedy Ain't Misbehavin (1997), and played Nanny Slagg in the BBC's big-budget production of Gormenghast in 2000. She had a number of small roles in several famous movies, appearing as the grieving mother of an undead biker in British horror flick Psychomania (1971), as well as Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971), Straw Dogs (1971), Murder by Decree (1979), Nijinsky (1980), The Mambo Kings (1992), the hugely successful Mr. Bean and the movie adaption Bean (1997),.
In 2006, Brown appeared as Aunt Spiker at the Children's Party At The Palace, an all-star event to celebrate the Queen's 80th birthday.
Brown was recommended to producers for the role of Dot by another one of its original cast members, Leslie Grantham, who played the show's villain, Den Watts. Dot is one of the longest-running characters in EastEnders; Brown played the role from 1985 to 1993, and then again from 1997 onwards.
Initially a highly unsympathetic character in EastEnders - a sanctimonious, judgemental and two-faced busybody - Dot was originally brought on for a short-term story arc to complement the storyline of her screen son, Nick Cotton, being accused of murder. Dot became a popular character, and has matured into the best loved character in the programme, a 'mother earth' figure who anyone can go to in times of need.
On an interview on The Paul O'Grady Show in December 2007 Brown expressed embarrassment at watching herself on screen and she has a highly modest attitude towards her role as Dot.
On January 31st 2008 June made history by being the first and so far only actress to carry an entire episode single handed in the history of British soap, with a monologue looking back over her past life, dictated to a cassette machine for her husband Jim to listen to in hospital following a stroke. The fact that co-star John Bardon (who plays Jim) is recovering from a stroke in real life added extra pathos to the episode. In an interview on This Morning she claimed it was relatively easy as there were no co-actors fogetting their lines.
She is currently the second longest serving cast member at Eastenders behind Adam Woodyatt.
June's single-handed episode wept praise from critics and viewers alike.
Brown has also been active in British theatre, directing Pin Money (by Malcolm Needs) in London, and Double D in London and Edinburgh. She played Mrs Danvers in a production of Rebecca. Other plays include An Inspector Calls, The Lion in Winter, A View from the Bridge, and numerous pantomimes including The Witches, in which her sister also performed.
Brown received a Lifetime Achievement award at the 2005 British Soap Awards, presented by her close friends Anna Wing formerly EastEnders' Lou Beale and Barbara Windsor also known as Peggy Mitchell. She has also won 'Best Onscreen Partnership' at the same awards for her onscreen relationship with Jim Branning for two consecutive years. She also won 'Best Actress' at the Inside Soap Awards in 2001 and 2004 she also again won 'Best Onscreen Partnership' at the same awards.
She was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2008 Birthday Honours for her services to drama and charity.
Born in Suffolk in 1927 (nine years earlier than Dot), she attended Ipswich High School, an independent school for girls. Her father was wealthy, but he 'went bust'. Her baby brother died of pneumonia in 1932 aged 15 days and her elder sister Marise died in 1934 aged 8 from a meningitis-like illness. During the Second World War, she was evacuated to Pontyates, a small village in west Wales.
In 1950, she met and married the actor John Garley, but he suffered depression and gassed himself at home in 1957. In 1958, she married Robert Arnold, star of the well-known early BBC television programme Dixon of Dock Green. They had six children, though her second daughter, Chloe (b. 1960) born premature at 28 weeks, died after only 16 days. The surviving children are Louise (b. 1959), Sophie (b. 1961), (William/Billy b. 1962), Chloe (b. 1964) and Naomi (b. 1966). Chloe suffered paralysis, but June is reported as saying that it went away after she prayed for healing. Brown and Arnold were together for forty-five years, until he died in 2003, and since then she has lived alone in their house in Surrey.
Brown says she is pleased to have been able to restore Dot as a character of depth in her ground-breaking episode, especially after reports that she wanted to leave the series in 2007 because she had disagreed with a storyline in which Dot found a refugee baby abandoned in a church. She signed a £370,000 contract in April 2007 to play Dot Cotton for another year. She signed a £570,000 deal in April 2008 to play Dot for another year. June Brown said " I feel better with the writers now, as they are coming up with sustainable storylines for me to play. On top of that, the arrival of John Bardon has boosted my confidence.
Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971)
