: she created the leading role in a repertory production and, though unknown to London audiences, was given the part when the play was presented in the West End.

Later in her career, Mount was cast more frequently in serious parts, including the title role of Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage on stage, and in several television dramas.

Her childhood was unhappy; her father was an invalid who struggled to support his family, and her mother displayed no sign of affection for their younger daughter.

[6] During the Worthing repertory season, Mount played the central role, the domestic tyrant Emma Hornett, in a new comedy, Sailor Beware!

[5] Failing to find anyone more suitable, they gave the part to Mount, who achieved overnight celebrity after the first night, at the Strand Theatre in February 1955.

She played the cameo role of the Charwoman in Diego Fabbri's religious drama Man on Trial at the Lyric Theatre, London in 1957.

Six series of the show were produced between 1958 and 1964, and the leading characters, the put-upon but wily Alf and the formidable Ada, appeared in a spin-off feature film, Inn for Trouble.

In a 1958 television version of Arsenic and Old Lace, Mount was cast against type as dotty serial poison-dispensing Abby Brewster.

[13] Kenneth Tynan commented in a review for The Observer: "We shall not soon see a Mrs. Hardcastle who scolds, capers, coquettes and bellows with anything like the majestic, intimidating authority of Peggy Mount.

"[14] In 1961–62, Mount appeared in another ITV sitcom called Winning Widows, co-starring with Avice Landone as two sisters who have each survived three husbands.

[2] On BBC radio, Mount appeared as Mistress Otter in Ben Jonson's The Silent Woman (1972), Opinionated Alice in Stargazy on Zummerdown (1978) and Madame Arcati in Noël Coward's Blithe Spirit (1983).

Her Donna Pasqua in Il Campiello by Carlo Goldoni (1976) gained good notices, as did her Mrs Hewlett in Ben Travers's Plunder (1978).

[5] The Daily Telegraph recorded, "Her acting admitted no trace of self-pity or of the laughter she had been accustomed to provoke, and it proved what a serious and emotional actress she could be when given the chance.

Mount to be a treat, and she is: sweeping on in a vast robe topped off with an Indian feather ... from her sepulchral invocations to her volcanically indignant exits, she is terrific.

In 1987, Mount appeared as Ursula in Ben Jonson's Bartholomew Fair at the Open Air Theatre, Regent's Park.

[2] Her obituarist in The Times wrote of Mount's later television appearances: "In dramas such as Punishment Without Crime (1985) and the harrowing Trial of Klaus Barbie (1988) she showed just what a fine actress she really was, and in an episode of Inspector Morse she was a most unnerving Sister of Mercy.

"[3] Mount's later appearances on television included Doctor Who (in "The Greatest Show in the Galaxy" in 1988–89, in the cameo role of the Stallslady),[22] Mrs. Weaver in Virtual Murder (1992),[3] and The Tomorrow People (as Mrs. Butterworth in the second episode of the 1994 story "The Monsoon Man").

[23] As the nanny in Chekhov's Uncle Vanya (1996, Chichester) with a cast that included Derek Jacobi, Imogen Stubbs, Trevor Eve and Frances Barber, Mount gave what her biographer Verena Wright calls "a great performance as the play's most sympathetic and sensible character".