Keeping Up Appearances legend Patricia Routledge shared her brutal verdict on her iconic character, Hyacinth Bucket.

Dame Patricia Routledge reminisced about her iconic role as loveable snob Hyacinth Bucket in the beloved BBC sitcom, Keeping Up Appearances. The show, which also featured stars Clive Twist, Geoffrey Hughes and Judy Cornwell, was a staple on BBC One from 1990 to 1995, as fans delighted in Hyacinth’s hapless attempts to climb the social ladder.

Dame Patricia brought the character to life and landed herself two BAFTA nominations and a British Comedy Award for her portrayal.

However, speaking in a documentary about the sitcom, Patricia confessed that her character was somewhat of a “monster”.

The 95-year-old said in Channel 5’s Keeping Up Appearances: 30 Years of Laughs: “She’s a monster, really. Her standards are high, too high for most people. But we all know that pretending to be something better than you are and quite often slipping on the banana skin makes for good comedy, if it’s well written.”

The series was created by comedy geniuses Roy Clarke and Harold Snoad, but Patricia says she also had a hand in the creative process.

Keeping Up Appearances cast

Keeping Up Appearances aired from 1990 to 1995.

In the 2023 documentary, she added: “Harold Snoad knew exactly what he wanted and was thoroughly in charge. We sometimes disagreed with him, which made for an interesting explosion or two occasionally. That’s good for us all.

Patricia says she is “immensely appreciative” of what the show brought her, but explained why she decided to bow out after five series.

In an interview last year, she disclosed: “Well, I brought it to an end, which, of course, the BBC didn’t care for very much.

“I thought the writer was beginning to recycle old ideas. And also, remembering the glorious Ronnie Barker, he always stopped when he was at the height of something and he always left with people saying, ‘Oh, aren’t you doing any more? ‘ Rather than people saying, ‘Is that still on?’

“That’s the place to be, really, and I had other adventures to explore. I’m an actress, and I wanted to take on the stories of other people.”

During the BBC Four special, Patricia Routledge Remembers…, Patricia expressed her astonishment at the enduring success of Keeping Up Appearances, even three decades after its last episode.

Reflecting on what initially drew her to the character of Hyacinth, the Talking Heads star revealed: “I had opened the script for a moment at one o’clock in the morning, read straight through and Hyacinth leapt off the page.

“I knew that woman, I knew several of that woman,” she said with a laugh.

Post Keeping Up Appearances, Patricia continued to shine, taking roles such as Hetty Wainthropp in BBC’s Hetty Wainthropp Investigates from 1996-1998. She later graced the stage again with a two-year performance as Lady Bracknell in Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest from 1999-2001.