 English novelist Rebecca West, perhaps best known for her reports on the Nuremberg Trials, personally picked Dean to play Laura Bowen, the heroine of her novel "The Birds Fall Down" in a five-part BBC adaptation produced by Jonathan Powell in 1978.Critically acclaimed, this led to Dean going on to play many parts on television including Guinevere in "The Legend of King Arthur" for the BBC in 1978, Belinda Harlowe in "The Far Pavilions" opposite Ben Cross and Rupert Everett in 1984, and the Lynda La Plante series "Trial & Retribution" in 1999.Dean went on to play Mrs Clay in "Persuasion", directed by Roger Michell.