The actor Gwyneth Powell, who has died aged 76 after complications following an operation, will be remembered by a generation of television viewers thanks to her decade-long stint as Mrs McClusky, the firm but fair principal of the eponymous London comprehensive school in the popular BBC children’s TV drama Grange Hill.
Created by Phil Redmond in 1978, Grange Hill was a high-watermark in children’s broadcasting. The series had urban reality and hard-hitting storylines at its core, without ever patronising its audience or losing its scampish sense of humour and likable characters. It was already a success when Powell joined in 1980, but it went from strength to strength during her “tenure”, covering such topics as bullying, racism, inappropriate teacher-pupil relationships and, perhaps most famously, the character Zammo McGuire’s heroin addiction, which spawned the drug awareness campaign Just Say No in 1986.
