Wanda Ventham is an English actress, known primarily for her role as Colonel Virginia Lake in the 1970s science-fiction television series UFO, and for her recurring role as Cassandra Trotter's mother Pamela Parry in the sitcom Only Fools and Horses between 1989 and 1992. She also appeared in two episodes of The Saint and two Carry On films. In April 2014, People magazine featured her in its "Most Beautiful People in the World" edition.
Ventham's first film role was in My Teenage Daughter, with Anna Neagle and Sylvia Syms. She also appeared in Carry On Cleo and Carry On Up the Khyber. She starred alongside Mark Burns in the mystery filmDeath is a Woman. Her best-known role was on television as Col. Virginia Lake, second-in-command to Cmdr. Ed Straker, in the cult seriesUFO. Ventham's numerous other TV credits include regular roles in Heartbeat as Fiona Weston, Hetty Wainthropp Investigates as Margaret Balshaw, and The Rag Trade as Shirley. She also played a love interest for Arthur Daley in Minder, Susan's mother in Coupling, and Deborah's mother in Men Behaving Badly. She starred opposite Ian Hendry in the 15-part BBC series The Lotus Eaters, and made a guest appearance on the BBC Twosketch showRutland Weekend Television. She was in an episode of Danger Man, and the series Patrick McGoohan completed immediately afterwards – the allegorical spy series The Prisoner – as well as the sitcoms Executive Stress and Next of Kin, and the sketch show The Two Ronnies. She has appeared in Doctor Who on three occasions over three decades: as Jean Rock in The Faceless Ones, as Thea Ransome in Image of the Fendahl and as Faroon in Time and the Rani. Her appearance in Image of the Fendahl was opposite Denis Lill. Ventham and Lill would later play Pamela and Alan Parry in the sitcom Only Fools and Horses. In 2014, she and her husband Timothy Carlton appeared in the BBC adaptation of Sherlock as the parents of Sherlock Holmes, who is played by their son Benedict Cumberbatch. Ventham appeared in Holby City as Sheilagh Chiltern, the grandmother of Lofty Chiltern.
Personal life
Ventham married her first husband James Tabernacle in 1957 and they had one daughter, Tracy. They were divorced on 12 November 1974. She met actor Timothy Carlton in 1970 while filming sequences for the drama series A Family at War and they have been married since April 1976. The couple appeared together in the second series of BBC drama The Lotus Eaters in 1973, and in the third and fourth series of BBC's Sherlock in 2014 and 2017, where they played the title character's parents. with their son, actor Benedict Cumberbatch starring in the titular role of Holmes.
