TV Times Awards Favourite Actress Nominees
Amanda Redman
With 10 new episodes of New Tricks out this year, it feels as though Amanda Redman has spent most of 2011 in our living rooms as cop Sandra Pullman. Which is no bad thing, because she's an assured actress at the top of her game. Amanda's a feisty character, too. A vocal critic of TV's tendency to employ people with no acting experience, she was prepared to back up her criticism by setting up a theatre school for young actors. She teaches there every weekend.
Sue Johnston
Not a great year for forensic fans, because we saw the end of Waking the Dead and Sue's popular psychological profiler, Grace Foley. Sue felt the end had come too soon, and told TV Times as much in March. "I feel robbed - I'm very sad about it." Fortunately we were able to enjoy her in another role this year - Margery in new BBC1 show Sugartown, where she reminded us just how good she is with comedy, as well as grisly cadavers.
Suranne Jones
Hats off to Suranne Jones. She didn't just star in excellent new ITV cop show Scott and Bailey as DC Rachel Bailey, she actually co-created it with fellow ex-Corrie star Sally Lindsay. Suranne also found time for a cameo appearance in Doctor Who episode The Doctor's Wife. In the process she achieved what many an enemy (and smitten fan) would have liked to have done: biting Matt Smith on the neck.
Lesley Sharp
And in the blue corner... Suranne's co-star in Scott and Bailey, Lesley Sharp. If Bailey put the feistiness into ITV's dynamic new cop pairing, Lesley injected a shot of much needed calm. As DC Janet Scott, she often had to reign in her more volatile colleague. Earlier in the year, she was equally convincing in an utterly different role - playing The Shadow Line's tragic Julie Bede, a wife who was losing her mind to early onset Alzheimer's.
Julia McKenzie
Where would Miss Marple be without her trademark twinkle? Employing just the right balance of sweet wit and savage, crime-solving insight, Julia has rapidly developed into one of our favourite ever Marples - always the best thing about the popular detective strand, even when she's surrounded by big name cameos (which is every episode). If she's not careful, she may end up turning herself into a National Treasure.
Dame Maggie Smith
Talking of National Treasures... If anyone had forgotten that Maggie Smith is one of the finest British actresses of her generation, their memories were firmly jolted by her stellar performance in the hit ITV drama of the year, Downton Abbey. One foot firmly in the past ("What is a 'weekend'?" she memorably asked in the first series) and at times slightly terrifying, her Dowager Countess is one of the best things about this brilliant show.
