Miss Browning

Miss Browning is one of the two spinster Browning sisters who anchor the gossiping, watchful social circle of Hollingford. She is the elder and more forthright of the pair, given to firm opinions delivered without much tact, and she takes a proprietary interest in the doings of the Gibson household and everyone else's business besides.

Barbara Flynn plays her with a brisk comic certainty that never tips into caricature, finding real affection underneath the busybody manner. In a story built from small-town scrutiny and whispered judgement, Miss Browning is the embodiment of that world's watchful warmth, and Flynn makes her funny without making her small.