Born: 29th April 1949
Episodes Broadcast: 2023-2024

Born in Stepney, London, Anita Dobson worked a series of jobs, including as a model, before winning a scholarship to attend the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art. After graduating, she spent the Seventies focussing on the stage, before she moved to television with a role in the telefilm Leave Him To Heaven and work as a presenter on the children's series Play Away. The early Eighties saw Dobson appear in programmes like Nanny and Up The Elephant And Round The Castle. She then landed the role for which she would become best known, as landlady Angie Watts in the initial seasons of EastEnders. Dobson remained on the soap from 1985 to 1988, during which she began a relationship with Queen guitarist Brian May. A talented singer, she spun the EastEnders theme music into a successful 1986 single called Anyone Can Fall In Love, which May produced.

After leaving EastEnders, Dobson starred in the sitcom Split Ends. She made numerous television appearances during the Nineties, including episodes of Red Dwarf, Woof!, Highlander and Get Well Soon. Dobson also made occasional movies, such as The Revengers' Comedies (known in North America as Sweet Revenge) starring Sam Neill, Helena Bonham Carter and Kristin Scott Thomas. She and May were married in 2000. Amongst Dobson's credits following the turn of the century were NCS Manhunter, The Last Detective, New Tricks and Hotel Babylon. She was also cast in the Big Finish Productions audio play Blood Of The Daleks, a 2006 adventure for Paul McGann as the Eighth Doctor.

In 2011, Dobson was a contestant on the ballroom dancing competition Strictly Come Dancing. She remained prolific during throughout the decade, adding the likes of The Rebel, Call The Midwife and The Worst Witch to her resume, alongside such films as London Road with Olivia Colman. During the Twenties, Dobson took roles in The Long Call, Dodger and Inside No 9. In 2023, she joined the cast of Doctor Who in the recurring role of the enigmatic Mrs Flood, making her first appearance in that year's Christmas special, The Church On Ruby Road, which starred Ncuti Gatwa as the Fifteenth Doctor.