Blythe Duff

Blythe Duff (born 25 November 1962) is a Scottish actress best known for her role as Jackie Reid in the ITV television series drama, Taggart.

Background

Duff was born and raised in East Kilbride, Glasgow. Her love of acting started with youth theatre. On leaving Hunter High School she joined The Company, a youth opportunities theatre company, based at the Glasgow Arts Centre in Washington Street and spent her summers with the Scottish Youth Theatre. She entered the profession in 1983 with her first job at the Young Playwrights Festival (Scottish Youth Theatre/The Traverse).

Career

Duff's career began in the theatre, starting with the Scottish Youth and Community Theatre in Glasgow.

She worked in theatre for seven years, appearing with Scottish Opera in Street Scene as Shirley Kaplan in 1989, and at the Coliseum Theatre in London with the English National Opera. She also performed on the soundtrack album which was released on Decca Records in 1989. She was working for Scottish Opera when she landed the role of Jackie Reid in the sixth series of Taggart in 1990. Her first appearance was a community police officer in the second episode of the sixth series, "Death Comes Softly", on 3 December 1990, in which she is credited as playing WPC Reid. In the third episode, which first aired on 31 December 1990, she was credited as playing Jackie Reid and her character was seconded to CID as DC Reid. By series eight in 1993 her character was promoted to Detective Sergeant. She became the longest-serving member of the Taggart cast after James Macpherson left the show in 2002. The last Taggart was shown in 2011, seeing Jackie Reid finally reach Detective Inspector.