Connie Beauchamp
Connie Beauchamp | |
---|---|
Holby City and Casualty character | |
First appearance | "In at the Deep End" 1 June 2004 (Holby City) "Casualty@Holby City – Part One" 26 December 2004 (Casualty) |
Last appearance | Episode 1194 3 April 2021 |
Portrayed by | Amanda Mealing |
Spinoff(s) | Casualty@Holby City |
In-universe information | |
Occupation |
Consultant in emergency medicine.
Consultant in cardiothoracic surgery, medical director, director of surgery, deputy clinical lead. |
Family | William Chase (father) Lionel Jackson (great-uncle) |
Spouse | Grace Beauchamp |
Connie Beauchamp is a fictional character from the BBC medical dramas Holby City and Casualty, portrayed by actress Amanda Mealing. She first appeared in the series six, episode 35, "In at the Deep End", broadcast on 1 June 2004,[1] and appeared in Holby City's sister show Casualty multiple times, having already appeared in crossover Casualty@Holby City[2] episodes. Mealing continued her role as Connie until the thirteenth series of Holby City,[3] departing in the 28 December 2010 episode "Snow Queens".[4] Connie's role in Holby City was that of Clinical Lead of Cardiothoracic Surgery in Darwin, and Joint Director of Surgery.[5]
It was announced on 23 July 2013 that Mealing would be reprising her role as Connie, but in Casualty.[6] Connie Beauchamp was introduced as a consultant in emergency medicine and Deputy Clinical Lead, in March 2014, over three years since her last appearance in Holby City. Later, in June 2014, Connie's role within Casualty became Clinical Lead.[7] It was announced in early 2019 that Mealing had decided to take a break from the show for her health reasons with Connie departing on screen later on in the year. Connie departed in the last episode of series 33 broadcast on 10 August 2019. She returned on 4 January 2020. Mealing's exit from Casualty was announced on 1 March 2021. She departed in the episode broadcast on 3 April 2021.[8]
Development
Relationships
In the character's introductory episode, she ends her first day at
Connie's relationship with her husband Michael was explored in 2005, when
Connie later had an affair with John Grayson (Benedick Blythe), husband of hospital CEO Jayne Grayson (Stella Gonet). She ended their relationship when she discovered he was Jayne's husband, which Mealing has deemed "the ultimate sacrifice",[13] explaining Connie's motivations as being unwilling to hurt Jayne. She has assessed that: "Connie truly loved John and she thought he loved her, too."[13] When Connie discovers John has moved on and has another lover, "it breaks her heart. She realises what they had wasn’t love... It was sex."[13]
Crossovers
Connie has appeared in several
Casualty
Mealing was announced to be reprising her role in July 2013, but would appear in Holby City's sister show, Casualty.[15] Connie would return, having retrained as a consultant in emergency medicine, billed as "demanding but fair".[15] Mealing said she was "surprised" when she was asked to reprise her role in Casualty.[15] She said she was hoping that Connie's return would be "as exciting for fans as it is for [her]."[15] She added that she couldn't "wait to get those heels back on and get to work".[15] The show's executive producer Oliver Kent described Connie, following her return, as "a brilliant top-dog" and "demanding but fair".[16] He said he felt "very lucky" when Mealing accepted the chance to return.[16] Kent teased that Connie's arrival would "set the cat among the pigeons", especially with the emergency department's feisty clinical lead Zoe Hanna (Sunetra Sarker) and consultant Martin "Ash" Ashford (Patrick Robinson).[16] He added that Connie would "instantly upstage" Zoe and Ash.[16] Kent said that Connie and Zoe would develop a "fun rivalry" and that Connie's arrival would "put Ash in a very different place".[16] Connie returned to the show on 30 March 2014, in the series 28 episode, "Valves to Vagrants".[17]
Mealing appears as Connie in a crossover two-part episode between Casualty and Holby City, originally broadcast in March 2019.[18]
Storylines
Holby City
Connie arrives at
Connie makes an enemy of colleague
Following Will's death, Connie finds her position within the hospital increasingly challenged. An emergency Board meeting is called in episode "It's Kinda Rock and Roll" with the intention of forcing Connie's
During series nine, it emerges that, following a brief relationship with her registrar
In a visit to her home town of
In series ten of the show, Connie takes a
In episode "Only Believe", Connie applies for the new Director of Surgery position, alongside Ric Griffin and Michael Spence (Hari Dhillon). She agrees with Ric to support his application on the understanding he will step down in six months time, and recommend her to assume the role in his place. She also begins a new romance with a man she knows only as "John". Through a series of clandestine meetings, she falls in love with him, and is shocked to discover he is the husband of her colleague and Holby City CEO Jayne Grayson (Stella Gonet). When John and Jayne's son, Christian, is rescued from drowning and Connie is asked to operate on him, she realises she cannot break up the family and ends her affair with John.
Throughout the show's eleventh season, Connie battles Ric for the Director of Surgery position when he refuses to step down as agreed. When she discovers Michael's anaesthetist wife
Connie goes on to apply for Director of Surgery, to replace Ric, who is resigning. After the interview the board are seen deciding whom to allocate the job to, and Jayne, who is Holby's CEO, recommends an unofficial tie breaker. Michael Spence gets the job over Connie, due to the fact she allegedly ruined her marriage by having an affair with John. Connie later resigns but Spence blackmails Jayne into resigning, persuading Connie to stay at Holby.
Connie soon clashed with Jayne's replacement, Vanessa Lytton (Leslie Ash), an old friend of Michael's. Vanessa warned Michael that she believed Connie was after his job as Director of Surgery. When Faye Morton's (Patsy Kensit) son Archie died in suspicious circumstances, Joseph pleads with both Connie and Ric to lie to Vanessa, telling her that they had authorised Faye to inject Archie with saline despite the fact that she wasn't officially on duty. When no clear cause of death could be initially determined, Vanessa suspends the pair until the matter is resolved. Following Lauren Minster's confession that she had given Archie an incorrect dose of potassium, the suspension was lifted but it was revealed that Connie had had enough of Holby and taken up a new position at the Trafalgar Hospital in London.
In February 2010, both Michael and Elliot visited Connie and persuaded her to return - but the only way Connie would ever set foot in Holby again is if Vanessa would leave. Connie returned on 9 March 2010, when her old friend and colleague
Connie later becomes joint Director of Surgery with
In December 2010, Connie's father is rushed into Holby requiring an operation, and as a result she learns that he has
Connie reappeared in Holby City[20] briefly at the behest of the hospital's CEO, Guy Self (John Michie). She met Jac's former boyfriend, Jonny Maconie (Michael Thomson) and seemed to have heard about him before and was left shocked when he made his first impression. Connie then aided Jac in a complicated endarterectomy procedure and visited Elliot who was currently in recovery. Her comments help push Jac into taking Elliot's job as clinical lead of Darwin and the Herzig 5 project.
Connie reappeared in Holby City once more after the events of Too Old for this Shift when a helicopter crashes into the hospitals emergency department. She is seen talking to Fletch whilst on Intensive Care.
Casualty
In March 2014, Connie returned to Holby City Hospital after being recruited by new CEO Guy Self (John Michie) to work as a consultant in the Emergency Department.[21] She instantly clashes with clinical lead, Zoe Hanna (Sunetra Sarker) when she disobeys her instructions by going out to an accident with the paramedics. She forms an attachment with nurse Robyn Miller (Amanda Henderson), who goes with her to the accident. In June 2014, Zoe resigns from her Clinical Lead status after a helicopter crash, and offers the role to Connie, who immediately accepts.[22] Connie then begins to redeem the ED and bring it to its best. Registrar, Caleb Knight (Richard Winsor) is seen flirting with Connie a lot, despite her rejections.
By the beginning of 2015, after 6 months of managing the ED, Connie's leadership skills are put to the test when she gets a GMC hearing and her daughter Grace leaves to join her father Sam Strachan in New York, causing a breakdown from Connie. A disastrous inspection soon follows, and she blames Clinical Nurse Manager Rita Freeman for the loss of Grace, promising her that she will be out within 6 months, and Connie throws herself into work. Charlie Fairhead asks her why she is setting such "high standards" for her ED staff to follow; she reveals that it is because her father died in an overcrowded emergency department corridor, also explaining her change of department.[23] She later became close to Motor Neurone Disease sufferer and ex-cardiothoracic surgeon Alfred Maxwell (Michael Byrne). Rita accused Connie of carrying out euthanasia on Maxwell, and she was sent to court,[24] with Rita removing vital evidence from Connie's office.[25] Mealing revealed that Casualty bosses had lined up a season of storylines for the actress, as she said in an interview: "The initial idea we had for Connie was to have a year of seasons. She arrived in Holby during her spring. Taking over the ED was her summer. And in autumn she began to disintegrate after she lost Grace. Alfred’s arrival marks her winter of despair."[26]
Grace returned to Casualty in Hearts and Flowers and Connie fought to make Grace stay with her. Grace discovers that Connie is in a relationship with Jacob Masters which results in conflict between Connie and Jacob. When new consultant Elle Gardner joins, Connie discovers that she grew up with Jacob, making her feel intimidated. In Sticks and Stones Connie's car crashed into a ravine, leaving Connie and Grace seriously injured.
In 2017 Connie experienced chest pains and breathlessness. She sought private medical investigation which found a left-atrial leiomyosarcoma. Connie kept her cancer diagnosis secret from everyone except Ethan Hardy, who at one stage had to perform an emergency embolectomy when an embolus thrown off from the tumour blocked the blood flow to her right arm. Her continual refusal of treatment and attempts to hide her condition began to negatively impact her work, raising suspicions amongst other staff members. Ethan persuaded Connie to begin chemotherapy, which led to her losing her hair. Connie insisted on coming into work even when the chemotherapy left her immunosuppressed. Eventually, an infection acquired at work led to her collapsing in resus (where Ethan was forced to explain her condition to all the staff members). After self-discharging from HDU, Connie insisted Ethan drive her to London for surgery and, despite her health seriously deteriorating, her life was saved.[27]
Reception
Discussing public reception of her character, Mealing states that: "The response has been amazing - from men, women and children. I'm often stopped out shopping or dining etc. and told 'You're so mean to (whoever).. but we love you!' I think there's a little in all of us that would like to say what we really feel, the way Connie does".
The storyline which saw Connie's infant daughter Grace injured after falling downstairs was received critically by The Guardian's Sarah Dempster, who summarised: "Four years after she first dazzled viewers with her ability to smirk at current hospital expenditure figures while simultaneously patronising sobbing cardio patients, Connie Beauchamp finds herself beset, suddenly and violently, by actual emotion when her daughter falls down the stairs. What follows is a thinly veiled condemnation of working mothers and their potentially deadly desire to occasionally leave the house. Can it really be 1985 already? Apparently so".[32] Fellow Guardian journalist Kathryn Flett deemed the storyline "gripping",[33] and commented that "I empathised hugely with Connie",[33] explaining "although she may be tough and cool and careerist, and therefore have her priorities completely gluteus maximus-over-mammary, she's also a Good Woman who Deserves a Break".[33] Flett's overview of the episode was that: "Despite containing so many mixed messages about whether working mothers should be punished or celebrated it would have needed a dedicated team at Bletchley to decode them all, this was top-notch primetime telly - and a tour-de-force from (working mother of two) Amanda Mealing."[33]
In August 2017, Mealing was longlisted for Best Drama Star at the Inside Soap Awards.[36] She made the viewer-voted shortlist,[37] but lost out to George Rainsford, who portrays Ethan Hardy.[38]
References
- ^ "Series 6 — 35. In at the Deep End". Radio Times. Retrieved 24 July 2015.
- ^ "Series 19 — Episode 17". Radio Times. Retrieved 24 July 2015.
- ^ Tobin, Christian (30 June 2010). "Amanda Mealing to leave 'Holby City'". Digital Spy. Retrieved 24 July 2015.
- ^ Daikin Marsh (director), Martha Hillier (writer), Myar Craig-Brown (producer) (28 December 2010). "Snow Queens". Holby City. Series 13. Episode 11. BBC. BBC One.
- ^ "Connie Beauchamp". BBC. Retrieved 24 July 2015.
- ^ Rigby, Sam (23 July 2013). "'Holby City' star Amanda Mealing to reprise Connie role in 'Casualty'". Digital Spy. Retrieved 24 July 2015.
- ^ "Connie Beauchamp - Casualty Profile". BBC. Retrieved 24 July 2015.
- ^ McGreevy, Hannah (30 October 2021). "Casualty legend Amanda Mealing addresses return to BBC show amid sudden Connie break". Express.co.uk. Retrieved 4 April 2022.
- ^ a b Brand, Claire (29 May – 4 June 2004). "Wonder woman!". Inside Soap. No. 22. p. 31.
- ^ a b "Will Connie get her man?". Holby Gazette. 8 September 2004. Retrieved 27 April 2008. [permanent dead link]
- ^ a b "Career on the Line". Holby Gazette. 24 August 2005. Retrieved 27 April 2008. [permanent dead link]
- ^ "Connie Exposes Michael's Lies". Holby Gazette. 5 October 2005. Retrieved 27 April 2008. [dead link]
- ^ IPC Media. 22 June 2009. Retrieved 22 July 2009.
- ^ a b "Amanda Mealing Interview". Holby Gazette. 1 December 2004. Retrieved 27 April 2008. [permanent dead link]
- ^ a b c d e "'Holby City' star Amanda Mealing to reprise Connie role in 'Casualty'". Digital Spy. 23 July 2013. Retrieved 31 March 2014.
- ^ a b c d e "'Connie Beauchamp will be top dog'". Digital Spy. 6 November 2013. Retrieved 31 March 2014.
- ^ "Valves to Vagrants (30 March 2014)". Digital Spy. 22 March 2014. Retrieved 31 March 2014.
- ^ Writers: Michelle Lipton; Director: Steve Brett; Producers: Rebecca Hedderly (5 March 2019). "Powerless". Holby City. BBC. BBC One.
- ^ Andrew Holden, James Strong (1 June 2004). "In at the Deep End". Holby Cit'. Season 6. Episode 35. BBC. BBC One.
- ^ Jennie Darnell (director), Alex Child (writer), Darren Guthrie (producer) (28 July 2014). "One Small Step". Holby City. Series 16. Episode 42. BBC. BBC One.
- ^ Lee Haven-Jones (director), Tony McHale (writer), Jonathan Phillips (producer) (29 March 2014). "Valves to Vagrants". Casualty. Series 28. Episode 31. BBC. BBC One.
- What's On TV. 19 June 2014. Retrieved 24 July 2015.
- ^ Kilkelly, Daniel (19 February 2015). "Sweet Little Lies". Digital Spy. Retrieved 20 February 2015.
- ^ Kilkelly, Daniel (14 April 2015). "Casualty spoilers pictures: Connie Beauchamp accused of murder". Digital Spy. Retrieved 25 July 2015.
- ^ "Connie's charged with murder!".
- Trinity Mirror). 1 May 2015. Retrieved 29 August 2016.
- ^ "Episode 5–Episode 18". Casualty. Series 32. 23 September 2017 – 6 January 2018. BBC. BBC One.
- ^ "BBC Drama Awards". Holby Gazette. 28 December 2004. Retrieved 27 April 2008. [permanent dead link]
- ^ "TV Quick Awards". Holby Gazette. 24 May 2005. Retrieved 27 April 2008. [permanent dead link]
- Times Newspapers. Retrieved 7 May 2009.
- ^ "National TV Awards". Holby Gazette. 4 July 2005. Retrieved 27 April 2008. [permanent dead link]
- ^ Dempster, Sarah (11 March 2008). "Watch this". The Guardian. Retrieved 8 November 2008.
- ^ a b c d Flett, Kathryn (16 March 2008). "Wait till your mother gets home". The Guardian. Retrieved 8 November 2008.
- The Daily Mirror. Retrieved 8 November 2008.
- The Daily Mirror. Retrieved 8 November 2008.
- Hearst Magazines UK. Retrieved 22 August 2017.
- Hearst Magazines UK. Retrieved 4 November 2017.
- Hearst Magazines UK. Retrieved 6 November 2017.