Dame Joanna Lumley celebrated a milestone birthday this year, but turning 80 hasn’t really changed her outlook on, well, anything.
When asked about it, the Absolutely Fabulous icon told HELLO, “80 is the same as 85 or 60 or 90. It doesn't mean much to me because I'm still walking, working and operating.”
Not only is she doing those three things listed, Joanna - who recently shared that she keeps herself grounded and happy thanks to the extraordinary effect of gardening - is still making new dreams come true, and one of them involves how she plans to spend her 40th wedding anniversary with her husband, Stephen Barlow.
Speaking about her upcoming Ruby anniversary, Joanna revealed she hopes to spend it in one of the few countries she’s not previously visited, with her husband by her side. She shared, “With any luck, he's going to be able to join me at the end of our shoot in Argentina and we'll spend some time in Buenos Aires.
“The only place I'd never visited was South America, so to go to Argentina and do a three-episode programme was a dream come true.”
The pair, she revealed, have similar philosophies to getting older, with both adamant that they just keep carrying on. She said, "We just keep on going, but probably, gradually, dust will settle on our heads and people will stop using us.”
As for her own future acting roles, she added with a joke, “I play very good ancient grannies, vicious, ghastly mothers and sorrowed aunts."
A post shared by BBC iPlayer (@bbciplayer)
A photo posted by on
Of course, we’ve last seen Joanna pulling no punches as the hilarious and sobbish Felicity in the BBC’s smash hit sitcom, Amandaland. Speaking about finding success on another sitcom years after Absolutely Fabulous, she said, “ Gosh, it's just the best fun and Lucy Punch is a dream - the whole cast, we all adore each other.
“I think Lucy is quite exceptional; she's extraordinarily beautiful and physically very funny, she's got funny bones."
And speaking of Ab Fab, how does Joanna picture an 80-year-old Patsy Stone?
“I think as long as there was some drink involved and Eddie was by her side, she'd be happy as anything... I think Patsy had a vodka drip into her arm and they'd opened some champagne - even though they were cracking their wrists, dribbling and blubbering. They were as happy as clams.”
Not quite Joanna’s reality, then, who instead has more of Netflix’s Wednesday in the pipeline, as well as her aforementioned ITV travel show where she finally gets to make her dream come true of exploring Argentina.
Now that sounds absolutely fabulous, indeed.
