| abstract | - Patricia Phoenix (26th November 1923 - 17th September 1986) was born Patricia Frederica Manfield in St Mary's Hospital, Manchester. Her parents were Thomas Manfield and Anna Maria Josephine Noonan, the latter who originally came from County Galway in Ireland where Phoenix later claimed she had also been born, although she stated some time after that that she was merely agreeing with something her elderly mother had already told the press. Her parents had been married for sixteen years and Pat was eight when her father was involved in a road accident and in court it was revealed that his marriage was in fact bigamous as he had never been divorced from his real wife who was living some miles away and who he had been paying maintenance to for many years. She later described this period in her life as a, "nightmare" saying, "I lost my safe, secure, normal world." Pat's mother later married a painter and decorator named Richard Pilkington and it was her hatred for her stepfather which led to her becoming an actress as he laughed at her efforts when, aged 11, she submitted a monologue to the BBC and got regular employment on Children's Hour. She attended Chorlton Central High School for Girls in Manchester where she acted in a play, The Death of Tintageles with fellow pupil Betty Alberge who joined Coronation Street with Pat in December 1960. Her presentiment school report stated, "Patricia is not exactly a model pupil, but on stage she is just marvellous." She spent many an hour in the "gods" at the Palace Theatre in Manchester watching performances by Laurence Olivier, Sybil Thorndyke, Ralph Richardson and Emlyn Williams and when she left school worked as a filing clerk for Manchester Corporation's gas department while spending her evening in amateur dramatics. Still determined to become a professional, she joined the Arts Theatre in Manchester and many other repertory companies. Credited as "Patricia Pilkington", she gained a role in the local 1948 film Cup Tie Honeymoon opposite star Sandy Powell and alongside future Street co-star Bernard Youens. A summer season in Happy Days at Blackpool followed with Thora Hird who gave Pat a bottle of champagne to mark her success, however the determined girl refused to drink it, stating that she had not yet "made it" and would only open the present when she had done so. In 1953 she married fellow actor Peter Marsh but they were only together for twelve months and were divorced in 1961. In the meantime she gained a small but notable success when she appeared in the 1955 play A Girl Called Sadie with her red hair dyed blonde and opposite actor Anthony Booth. The story, daring for its time, gained Pat some notoriety and a brief fling with Booth but real success eluded her. She later recalled times of near-starvation in a basement flat in London and an attempted suicide attempt which failed when the gas ran out and she hadn't any more money for the meter. She had a forgotten sideline as a writer of sketches for television ventriloquist Terry Hall and his puppet Lenny the Lion but she still hankered after acting success and was disappointed to miss out on a role in the 1958 film Room at the Top. At the end of the 1950s, she returned to Manchester, with her surname changed again to "Phoenix" from the book Phoenix Rising by Marguerite Steen but considered that her ambitions of stardom were probably now dead.
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