Joanna Lumley

Speaker 30:00

Hello, I'm Kirstie Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen eighty seven, and the presenter was Michael Parkinson.

Presenter0:29

Our castaway's career has pursued a route beloved by people writing sensational paperbacks, shop girl to sex symbol. Throw in a childhood in India, a convent education, plus the normal gossip column speculation linking her with superstar this and royal that, and you have the ingredients for an international bestseller, followed no doubt by a mini-series. I'm amazed, in fact, she's not written it herself, because she's quite capable, having once been a columnist on The Times. She is the actress Joanna Lumley. That makes you sound like a very exotic bird. It does, doesn't it?

Joanna Lumley1:00

It does, doesn't it? Uh

Presenter1:01

Do you do you think of yourself that way, Jonah?

Joanna Lumley1:04

Well, I think I've probably had quite a an unusual life. I feel perfectly normal in the middle of it, but in actual fact, when I've look back over some of the things I've done, they do seem to be quite exotic.

Joanna Lumley1:13

And so I decided to sit down and do a bit of writing, which I'm doing at the moment, just sort of trying to remember some of the the stranger and the more amusing parts of it.

Presenter1:20

Is it difficult remembering what happened?

Joanna Lumley1:22

I find it very easy. I have an enormous recall from about five onwards, and glimmerings before then. What begins to happen, and might it be great age, Michael, is that the nearer we get to now, the dimmer it all becomes.

Presenter1:33

Yes, I mean that's probably true. The great age you're speaking from, of course, is forty one. Forty one? Let's put this thing in perspective. Let's also ask you then, in looking back and recollecting on your life, what part did music play in it? Any part at all?

Joanna Lumley1:37

Forty wal is

Joanna Lumley1:39

Yeah.

Joanna Lumley1:46

Yes, my parents both loved music, and so we had it playing a lot, you know. We had m things like Mozart, Deinekelein and Nachmusic playing around the house, and also because my father was keen on jazz and things, we had quite jumpy, nice music. And I can also remember vividly things like When South Pacific must have come out,'cause I can remember hearing the th the tun people humming the tunes from that when I was three in Hong Kong. So it must have just about come out then.

Presenter2:07

Yeah.

Presenter2:08

But let's go for the first choice then of music on your desert island. What's it going to?

Joanna Lumley2:12

Yes. We're in Malaya, where we moved after India, after Hong Kong, we had a little wind-up gramophone which we would sort of crank up and put on seventy-eight records. And one of them was a selection of beautiful Negro spirituals sung by Paul Robeson. And I've chosen one of the ones I love most of all, called Mary Had a Baby.

Speaker 22:29

We had a baby.

Speaker 22:32

Yes, my Lord, Mary had a baby.

Speaker 22:42

The people keep a coming.

Speaker 22:48

And the train gone.

Speaker 22:54

What did she name him yes?

Speaker 23:03

What did you name him?

Speaker 23:07

Yes, my Lord.

Speaker 23:11

Named him Mighty Kong.

Presenter3:14

Uh

Speaker 23:14

Yeah.

Speaker 23:19

The people keep a common

Speaker 23:24

And the trained on

Presenter3:28

Paul Robeson Mary had a baby.

Presenter3:32

John Alumney, let's go back now on this uh uh childhood of yours. Where exactly were you born?

Joanna Lumley3:37

I was born in Kashmir.

Joanna Lumley3:39

The capital of Kashmir called Srnaga.

Joanna Lumley3:42

And but we left a year after I was born, so I really don't remember it at all. I've since been back there and find it quite incredible, quite spectacularly beautiful and strangely familiar, although of course it can't really be.

Presenter3:51

Hm. And from there to where?

Joanna Lumley3:54

From there, with with sort of sea voyages back to England for leave, we went out to Hong Kong, and then from Hong Kong we came to Malaya, when I was five. The army always sailed on my birthday.

Joanna Lumley4:04

So whenever it's my birthday we were on on a troop ship, it seemed.

Presenter4:07

And your father was what? W what price man was he?

Joanna Lumley4:09

He was with the Second Sixth Gurkha Rifles, and he was stationed out in Millair for three years while we were there, and then he went back again afterwards.

Presenter4:15

Mhm. What memories do you have of Malaya particularly?

Joanna Lumley4:18

Terribly vivid, immensely wet, being so tropical, it was it rained every day, it seemed, and was terribly hot, but sweaty hot.

Joanna Lumley4:24

It's quite odd now to find people who go out to a places like Malaire to sunbathe, because of course we never did. You never if it was hot you kept

Joanna Lumley4:31

Out, you know, you'd go swimming in the afternoon, but nobody ever sat out in the sun or tried to get brown, so we went through yellow.

Joanna Lumley4:37

We became very sallow.

Joanna Lumley4:39

And I loved it there. I can just remember the noises and the smells. Everything was very vivid and immediate.

Joanna Lumley4:44

And of course quite a a a a cultural mix out there too, because there were the Malays and there were Tamils who'd come from South India, and um a great deal of Chinese there too.

Presenter4:53

What sort of friends did you have there? Was it a mixed bag again, or

Joanna Lumley4:56

Well, we went to the army school. I mean, as usual, you tend to have at that age friends from school. And, um, we went to the b a a big army school in Kuala Lumpur, which is the capital of Malaya.

Presenter5:00

Yeah.

Joanna Lumley5:05

and um had friends there, but um I had a sister who I'm who I'm very close to, and we were two years apart, she was two years older than me, and we t we tended to probably keep each other company as much as anything.

Presenter5:16

Hmm.

Presenter5:17

Let's have another choice of record.

Joanna Lumley5:19

Well, um, Rossini came into my life very early on.

Joanna Lumley5:23

Not not quite as early as Malaire, but I loved him because he was so good natured and so happy.

Joanna Lumley5:28

And I've chosen a part of the overture to Semiramede.

Joanna Lumley5:32

Conducted by Toscanini, who is a great magician, played by the NBC Symphony Orchestra.

Presenter6:34

Part of the overture to Semiramede by Rossini, played by the MBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Arturo Toscanini.

Presenter6:42

General alumni, you went to school in England when you were eight. What kind of a school was this?

Joanna Lumley6:44

Bye.

Joanna Lumley6:46

Well, the first school I went to, which was from eight to eleven, was a marvellous, tiny little school in an Oost House. You know what an Oost House is, with the dry hops? Converted Oasthaus.

Presenter6:52

Is with a dry hole.

Joanna Lumley6:55

And there were only about, at the most, sixteen borders.

Joanna Lumley6:58

And the school was really quite small, about seventy girls, I think.

Joanna Lumley7:01

And um and I loved that. And then we then I moved from there to a um a convent, an Anglican convent near Hastings, called St. Mary's, which, alas, has ceased to exist. The convent still goes on, but the school is shut, which I simply adored. I think it's because I was a boarder. And being bad ish by nature,

Joanna Lumley7:18

I found it very pleasant to be sent off to a place where I could be bad solidly for three months.

Presenter7:22

What form did this badness take?

Joanna Lumley7:24

I think it was just sort of I was pr people used to give me B order marks for looking like that, you know, just for having sort of a horrid expression or being cheeky or for breaking bands or whatever.

Joanna Lumley7:34

I just loved it, and I was quite bright to start with. I was pushed up a year, which I have from which I never really recovered, because I found it frightfully easy to be easy clever, and as soon as I had to study or really work, I was dismal.

Presenter7:45

Were you a rebellious child at all?

Joanna Lumley7:47

Um, faintly rebellious. Not not not horridly rebellious. I would never have set fire to the chapel or anything like that, but we did. We did do sort of fairly quaint things.

Joanna Lumley7:56

Remember, this is all it seems a long time ago. And I look at the way children behave nowadays, it makes me gasp, because we were very young, you know, we took a long time growing up.

Presenter8:03

Yes. We're your leader.

Joanna Lumley8:04

We're your leader.

Joanna Lumley8:06

I think I probably was, yes. I was also quite tall and had broad shoulders, so I sort of scared people in.

Presenter8:10

into following me here.

Presenter8:12

And what what what did you look like in in those days?

Joanna Lumley8:15

I was probably the most unattractive child you could imagine, between the ages of, say, twelve and fifteen or sixteen.

Presenter8:20

Silly.

Joanna Lumley8:21

I grew very fast. I had very long legs and a rather sort of

Joanna Lumley8:25

Body like a piece of dough in the middle. It was not really sort of perfectly formed at all. It was just a sort of ward in the middle. And my hair suddenly, from having been long and silky as a child, became incredibly frizzly and crispy, and a mass of spots came out. My sister wasn't at all like this, she w remained pretty with silky hair and no spots. But I suffered frightfully from then t suddenly turning into this sort of incredible hulk.

Presenter8:46

Did it destroy your confidence?

Joanna Lumley8:47

Hugely. And I still find it very difficult when people you know, I find it terribly difficult when people say, Oh, you look lovely. I tend to overcompensate still with makeup, and I always wear too much makeup now to cover up the frizzly hair and the spots.

Presenter8:59

Good justice.

Joanna Lumley9:00

Slightly gone away.

Presenter9:01

Did boys play any parts in your life at this

Joanna Lumley9:03

Well, we stayed um holidays with cousins, um, many of whom were boys, and we we went to parties in the holidays. But

Joanna Lumley9:10

Nevertheless, I found boys rather sort of distant creatures and qu and quite often because of the kind of school I went to, which was a private school, and quite a lot of the boys I met were were private school boys, if you know what I mean, public school boys in fact.

Presenter9:20

Public school boys and fam.

Joanna Lumley9:22

They were all rather shy, so we had jolly odd sort of dances, you know, a great deal of swanking about, you know, who could give the best Latin quote. I mean, it was not at all

Joanna Lumley9:30

Not at all romantic, really. And occasionally, snogging would break out if the lights were put out, but it was all rather a rushed romantic. Romantic snogging.

Presenter9:36

Frantic snogging is

Joanna Lumley9:38

It wasn't at all groovy like these sort of cool teenagers nowadays.

Presenter9:41

It's trying to break the record for the twenty-four hour kiss.

Joanna Lumley9:43

Yeah.

Presenter9:46

Let's have another choice of record for John.

Joanna Lumley9:49

Well, when I was twelve, I suppose, I met Chopin for the first time. I'd just come out of hospital.

Joanna Lumley9:54

where I'd had my appendix out, and it was Christmas time and I was given this little record for Christmas.

Joanna Lumley9:59

And I played and played and fell completely in love with him. So I should like to hear very much. Incidentally, my husband, who plays the piano quite brilliantly, plays this for me in the evenings now. So although he can't come to the Desert Island, this is a recording, not of him, but of the lovely Tamash Vashery playing Chopin's nocturnal

Joanna Lumley10:15

Opus seventy two number one.

Presenter11:18

Chopin's Nocturne opus seventy two number one, played by Tamash Vacheri.

Presenter11:23

Jonah Lumley, when you were growing up, this hideous child in this school in England, what kind of ambitions did you have? What do you want to be?

Joanna Lumley11:31

I suppose because I hadn't got at the head of a realist, I wanted to be all sorts of things, although I was lazy at biology.

Joanna Lumley11:38

I wanted to be a surgeon. I thought that would be wonderful.

Joanna Lumley11:41

I wanted very much to be a Prime Minister, but that was because I was so bossy I couldn't see why I shouldn't rule the country.

Joanna Lumley11:46

And then I discovered that all these things were probably that I just wanted to

Joanna Lumley11:50

Be them and not really have to do any of the work. And of course, this all means an act is an actor's job.

Presenter11:54

Yeah.

Joanna Lumley11:54

All you want to do is to do it for a bit.

Joanna Lumley11:57

And then just leave it alone.

Presenter11:58

Were there were there times in at school when in fact you realize it's ambition to be an actress? I mean, did you take that?

Joanna Lumley12:03

Oh, yes, I oh indeed, yeah. And uh back to the tall shoulders and the and the m I g got to wear a lot of moustaches.

Presenter12:10

Play chaps. Did you? Of course. Can you remember any of the thoughts?

Joanna Lumley12:10

Play chats.

Joanna Lumley12:13

Well, one was Petruccio in The Taming of of the Shrew, which I came up to London to see to see an Aldrich production and queued backstage because it had um Vanessa Redgrave and Diana Rigg in it and of course since I've met them both they're

Joanna Lumley12:25

Perfectly wonderful people, but it was very odd. I'm only a little bit younger than them, but nevertheless they were both acting and I was just queuing up for their autographs and I remember thinking how tall they were.

Joanna Lumley12:33

But um yes, and I was also quite a sort of

Joanna Lumley12:35

H her suit wise man, I think, in a school, in a sort of chapel.

Presenter12:39

No, you know. When was the transformation then from the ugly duckling into the into the swan? What happened?

Joanna Lumley12:45

When did I get prettier? I think well, um, I think probably after I'd left school.

Presenter12:46

Think

Joanna Lumley12:48

I I went to become a model, and those days you could enroll at the Lucy Clayton School of Modelling, and for twelve guineas and mornings only in a month you were turned out as a model with a little blue eye shadow round the edges.

Joanna Lumley12:58

And of course I'd gone well over the top and stuck on eye false eyelashes and fingernails and made black lines everywhere. But however, um and th that's when I began. And that's also when I got this penchant for painting my face up like the Whore of Babylon, which I still do'cause I just actually love it, you know, that's all it is.

Presenter13:13

What they actually teach her, the School of Modelling, I mean, they teach her to be, apart from models, to be proper young ladies. Yes, oh, yes, indeed.

Joanna Lumley13:13

What do you actually think?

Joanna Lumley13:18

Yes, oh yes indeed. Yes, because um modelling had got rather a bad name because it was just shortly after the Perfumer Affair and and everybody seemed to call themselves models in those days. So we had to call ourselves top photographic models to show that there was a slight difference. But we learned how to get in and out of an E-type dragger with our knees together.

Presenter13:35

Terribly important.

Joanna Lumley13:36

Yeah.

Joanna Lumley13:37

And all sorts of small things like that, which have stood me in good stead. They have, you remember?

Presenter13:40

They have, you remember them. They have. You've not actually regretted the money that's been done.

Joanna Lumley13:42

They have you m

Joanna Lumley13:45

Not a bit. Arriving at premieres in unsuitable clothes I can always extricate myself from the machine, you know.

Presenter13:51

So there they were then this model. And you were were you a successful model?

Joanna Lumley13:54

Oh yes, after after a bit. Um I was never a top top model, but like Gene Shrimpton or or Twiggy. But I w I worked all the time and I was called one of the top ten models, which means that we worked all the time. And for three the three years that I did it, we worked all day and every day on anything.

Joanna Lumley14:08

But it was good work, you know, it was it was good women's magazines quite grand, even as grand as Vogue or Queen sometimes, and the papers and trips. But we didn't do catwalk modelling so much then, and um I made a few commercials, but very few.

Presenter14:19

Then

Presenter14:22

Did you get bored, Ben?

Joanna Lumley14:23

Never. It was fascinating.

Presenter14:24

Really?

Joanna Lumley14:24

But in the it was very hard work too, and also you were always afraid that these dreaded spots would come back and, you know, the hair would go very crispy in the rain or something, or you'd put on a bit more weight. And in those days you had to be skeletal, and that was a big

Joanna Lumley14:36

fight, you know,'cause when you're eighteen you're naturally rather sort of huge, I think.

Presenter14:38

The 60s we're talking about, isn't it?

Joanna Lumley14:40

Yes, absolutely.

Presenter14:42

Let's have another choice of record, John, please.

Joanna Lumley14:44

Well, um

Joanna Lumley14:45

I should like to take this very much. Perhaps, um although I won't take a musical instrument with me, if I did take the trumpet, I would sit secretly and learn this. This is one of my father's favourite players.

Joanna Lumley14:54

Eddie Calvert, the man with the golden trumpet. I remember this so much from a lair when I was six or seven, and my mother didn't care for it much, and Daddy used to play it rather defiantly, and I'd like to hear him playing Cry My Heart.

Presenter15:34

I was Crying My Heart, played by Eddie Calvert.

Presenter15:38

General I'm w what was the the the the start of the acting career for you? Did you go to to acting school?

Joanna Lumley15:44

I didn't know. I tried to get into Roger and they turned me down, which was a frightful shock.

Joanna Lumley15:48

It was the first real blow to me in my life, and I was so enfeebled by this that I didn't dare try any more schools in case they turned me down as well, in which case I'd have had to give up or never start acting.

Joanna Lumley15:58

So I did this modelling for three years, and then I sort of weaseled my way in through the back door. I got a one-line in a film.

Joanna Lumley16:04

And which got me my equity card. Then I got sort of three lines in a film, you know, and and it was a bond film, which of course made you

Joanna Lumley16:11

Um it allowed me to work on a film, on one film, for two whole months, even though one didn't do very much. At least you learnt what a brute was and a pup was. These are the names of lights. And, you know, you learnt when the red light's up what it means. Important things to learn.

Presenter16:18

Uh

Speaker 216:18

These are the names of lights.

Joanna Lumley16:23

Yeah.

Joanna Lumley16:24

But the only drawback, which is a huge drawback, is is that people doubt you forever because you haven't learnt your craft properly, you haven't gone to the school to learn it, and so they never trust you with things like um

Joanna Lumley16:35

I don't know Shakespeare or Wilde or Card.

Joanna Lumley16:37

And it's only much later on that I've managed to convince people that A I can remember lines.

Joanna Lumley16:42

and that I w I understand them and I would be able to play them. And I've still never played any Shakespeare. I've never been up for an audition for Shakespeare.

Presenter16:48

You're a very good comedian, actually, aren't you?

Joanna Lumley16:50

Well, how very sweet of you to say so. I love it. Yes, I do love it. Yes.

Presenter16:51

But you are, I mean, you're funny. I do love it, yes.

Joanna Lumley16:54

But I also love tragedy, and I love to play tragedy a bit more. I've only played one really serious part, which was Hedda Garbler, a really sad part.

Speaker 216:54

Uh

Presenter16:55

I'm not sure.

Joanna Lumley17:00

which I adored doing and was lucky enough to get quite good notices. But um there are great drawbacks. I mean, acting is a juggling game anyway. It most of it is luck, the chance that they'll pick you rather than somebody else. And then the hope that that the other actors are going to be good and and dedicated. Most important that the director is good.

Joanna Lumley17:21

But it all comes back to the words in the end and it's um I've always had a great longing to work for the great, great playwrights and it's just beginning now and I'm, as you say, forty one.

Presenter17:30

There's time, yes, there's time yet. But what about b but going back to those days then in the sixties and there you were getting the odd bits in parts in films and and desperately w wanting to to get the the the more serious parts, if you like.

Joanna Lumley17:31

But what about

Presenter17:43

But how much of a struggle was it according to what

Joanna Lumley17:44

Well, it was odd because I sort of started off with quite a rush. You know, after these I did several films, then I starred in in a film and had my name above the title and then another one and then I did a television show and it all seemed to be just bubbling along.

Joanna Lumley17:55

But in the way that the waves come on to the sea and then on to the shore and then suck back in, I suddenly found there was a sort of dearth. There was no work at all, and I was doing very small parts in splendid shows, but I mean being paid perhaps sixty pounds, and then another three weeks, three months without work.

Joanna Lumley18:10

And, um, I got to the stage where I wrote round to all the theatre companies in Britain saying, Could I

Joanna Lumley18:14

Oh, I say act, but if I can't act, can I make tea?

Joanna Lumley18:17

And only three companies actually bothered to reply, which shocked me terribly.

Joanna Lumley18:21

And all those three said I'm so sorry, we're full up.

Joanna Lumley18:24

And it was just at that time that they'd started to audition for the Avengers.

Joanna Lumley18:28

And I put my name forward for that, and they wouldn't see me. They said, no, no, we know her work, frightful.

Joanna Lumley18:34

Don't darken our doors and I got quite desperate bloody knuckles beating on the door. And eventually I went along and managed to get into a sort of queue down at Pineville, like people waiting for the dentist, and we all got up and moved along every five minutes.

Joanna Lumley18:46

And I got in through the door, and all my old aggressive que characters came back, and big shoulders suddenly sprung up. Probably spots appeared, who knows, anyway. They were so amazed and astonished that they promised to test me.

Presenter18:46

But

Joanna Lumley18:57

And then I had to test again and again, so it wasn't a piece of, you know, cake thrown into my lap.

Presenter19:02

Mm.

Joanna Lumley19:02

It was quite a struggle.

Presenter19:03

Hmm.

Joanna Lumley19:03

Thank goodness I got it.

Presenter19:06

Another choice of record, please.

Joanna Lumley19:07

I've always loved Mozart, one particular piece that charms me enormously.

Joanna Lumley19:11

And here played by the clean Carl Berm, a piece of symphony number 39 in E-flat, um, with the piano film.

Presenter20:19

That was part of the first movement of Mozart Symphony No. thirty nine in E-flat, played by the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Carl Bohm.

Presenter20:27

John Lumley Purdy in

Presenter20:30

The Avengers was obviously a dream come true. I mean, for any actress. It was a hugely successful series, and the image was projected all over the world.

Speaker 220:30

Yeah.

Speaker 220:34

Yeah.

Presenter20:38

Let's look at first of all the positive side of of of that. What did it do for you, that that part in terms of your career?

Joanna Lumley20:44

It was semi-permanent employment. Really, it was a job which went on for more than one week, and that was just thrilling. Secretly, because the version with Diana Rigg had been such an enormous success.

Joanna Lumley20:56

And although not so great a success with Linda Thorsen, those were the names, you know, imprinted on people's memories along with Honor Blackman. I had no idea that this would even be shown. I thought it would probably flop after six episodes. But that didn't concern me because I'd been given the beginning of a five-year contract, although we only did two years of it, and at least twenty-six episodes to make, and I couldn't have given a button. In fact, I never watched them when they went out. All I was interested in was doing the work and getting paid for it, which wasn't very much money either, meaning we were actually paid peanuts.

Presenter21:22

Hmm.

Joanna Lumley21:22

But it it that doesn't matter because it was so lucky for me to get the part.

Presenter21:25

Yeah.

Joanna Lumley21:25

And the plus sides of it, I mean, there's always this debate: millstone or milestone, you know, and of course it was a milestone, it put me forward and.

Presenter21:29

And yeah.

Joanna Lumley21:32

I've been reg regarded in a way that I wouldn't have been if my name hadn't become so well known.

Speaker 221:36

Hmm.

Joanna Lumley21:37

Of course people after that say that the dumbest things you know, you get offered always the same job of a strongish policewoman.

Joanna Lumley21:43

Or they think that, you know, because you play that part, um, that you then perhaps can't play Shakespeare and heroin because they are playing such an obviously modern woman.

Joanna Lumley21:51

I mean, there are drawbacks to it, but n they are heavily outweighed by the advantages, I think.

Presenter21:56

What about the image of you it projected and the and the reaction uh in the in the public to that image? I mean, there you are on screen, you're self-possessed and cool and all that.

Joanna Lumley22:03

There was a terrific tussle when when I got the part, and they said, Joanna Lumley vows I'll be a suspenders girl, stockings and suspenders and I was going, No, steady on I said I'll be gym shoes and track suits girl They absolutely pushed that aside.

Joanna Lumley22:16

And my great um argument was that if if she was a good spy, you know, she'd wear dark clothes and creep about in the bushes.

Joanna Lumley22:22

Instead of which I'm stuck in these high heels with very flimsy dresses, always shinning up to trees and things. Patrick McNeed summed it up. He said, It is comic strip, and we are real people in the comic strip. There are no really violent fights, you know. Of course we are faster than goats and mountain eagles and

Joanna Lumley22:39

You know, we conquer every week because that's part of the comic strip.

Presenter22:42

Good.

Speaker 222:42

Uh

Joanna Lumley22:43

And so we played it all fairly tongue in cheek.

Joanna Lumley22:45

and as skilfully as we could, I hope.

Presenter22:48

No choice of record, please.

Joanna Lumley22:49

Well, I've got a music box at home. It's a sort of thing it's called um an Ariston organette, and it's like a paper gramophone, if you're not, I mean it's got bellows. And one of the tunes on it was this beautiful thing called Aria of Lucia de l'Amamor, and all I had was this gramophone record.

Joanna Lumley23:03

When I married Stephen he played me the real bit, the real sextet, which it comes from.

Joanna Lumley23:07

And the record he played it to me had Maria Callas singing, who I think is quite extraordinary. So this is part of the sextet from Act to Donizetti's opera, Lucia di Lamamore, with the great Callas singing.

Speaker 223:29

Uh

Presenter24:17

That was part of the sextet from Act Two of Donisetti's opera L'Uce de la Mama, featuring the voice of Maria Callas.

Presenter24:25

Gentlemen the

Presenter24:26

Let's now talk about the sort of a personal side of your of your life. You've for nineteen years now you've you've been a single parent family. You've raised a child. How much has that been a a problem in in to you?

Joanna Lumley24:39

Well, it's really only a problem. I mean, it's anybody who's who's a single parent, whether they've been widowed or divorced or whether th they are just a single parent. Um the problems are never whether you can

Joanna Lumley24:49

think of a right way to guide your child or or moral dilemmas or whatever, it is always the practical problems, which is that you usually have to work, but you've also got to be a parent. And so you've got to be shopping and cleaning and working and collecting the child from school.

Joanna Lumley25:04

And you get round it, that's all. But those are always the problems, practical problems, that if you go at, for instance, as an actress, if you get a job.

Joanna Lumley25:10

We can't just pick jobs, you know. You grab them when they come your way, and it might be during the summer holidays, and there's that terrible dilemma of sh

Joanna Lumley25:17

When you're very poor you can't turn them down. The richer you get you simply suit your you know, you say, I shan't be working for July and August and then you can go off with the children. But otherwise you find, you know, perhaps you're doing pantomime over Christmas and heartbreaking. I mean it's

Joanna Lumley25:30

You know, people say, How can you bring up a child without a father, or in men's cases, without a mother? The answer is it's happened all over the world again and again and again, and it's really not a problem. As long as they're given lots of love and affection and encouragement, I don't think it is a problem.

Presenter25:42

Of course, the other pressure, of course, to you or somebody like you would be the

Presenter25:46

would be because of the fame, uh the the gossip, the speculation and all that sort of thing that goes on. I'm I'm not talking about the child now, I'm talking about about you and whatever you do, you know, in general.

Speaker 325:51

See?

Joanna Lumley25:54

In general

Joanna Lumley25:56

Yes.

Presenter25:57

And I wo wonder how you've succeeded with that.

Joanna Lumley25:57

They sort of like to they

Joanna Lumley26:00

When they remember you again, they suddenly sort of spin their binoculars round on you and start pairing you up with somebody quite unsuitable.

Joanna Lumley26:06

But on the whole, if you duck and dive, you can kinda get through that thorn bush.

Joanna Lumley26:10

And remain friends with some of them as well. I mean, not some of the people, but some of the journalists even. It is a rocky road to to travel, and I I regret very much the way that some of the popular press is going at the moment, where where truth is is not their mil you know, their yardstick, which it used to be.

Speaker 326:25

Yeah. Hmm.

Joanna Lumley26:25

With a little bit of a bend, but now it isn't really that. But still, nevertheless, I'm certain that the pendulum will swing and they'll become.

Speaker 326:25

Uh

Joanna Lumley26:31

you know, absolute carry-and-care truth tellers soon.

Presenter26:34

Of course, you've been a member of the Press Corps. I mean, you've won for a time in your career. You were a columnist on the Times.

Joanna Lumley26:37

Well

Joanna Lumley26:38

You were a columnist on the television. Well, I was, yes, but I didn't have a ticket for the NUJ because they assured me that I wouldn't need it, whether this is because they were anxious about their own jobs and didn't want me to become too much of a permanent fixture or what, I don't know. But it was wonderful training, and nothing clears the mind so much as having to turn something in by the right time. I think that's the best thing there is. And I now find it terribly difficult to write if I don't know that I'm obliged to, either by money or by a certain hour, that I've got to turn the piece in. If people just say I'll write something on spec, I never do it. I'm far too lazy.

Presenter27:06

So the book you're writing at present, the memoirs, that's that's that's commissioned.

Joanna Lumley27:08

As commissioners.

Presenter27:11

But what about fiction? Have you ever thought about doing that? Yes, I have.

Joanna Lumley27:13

Yes, I have. I have. And I've started and

Presenter27:14

The

Joanna Lumley27:16

Completed in secret and kept very much under lock and key, several sort of small plays and

Joanna Lumley27:20

Um, short stories and things.

Joanna Lumley27:22

And I would love to do that very much indeed. I remember Raul Dahl saying to me once that to write fiction in

Joanna Lumley27:29

Prose is about the greatest achievement a writer can do. What do you think about that as a writer? Do you think that's true? I think it's probably true.

Presenter27:33

As a writer, I think it's

Presenter27:35

Absolutely right. Another choice to record, please.

Joanna Lumley27:37

This I heard um one of my twin cousins who'd who'd been out in Vietnam.

Joanna Lumley27:41

said that it had become a great favourite with the war correspondents, he worked with writers. And um this piece touched me terribly. It's Bruch's violin concerto, played by Kyung Wao Chung.

Presenter27:45

Yeah.

Joanna Lumley27:50

with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Rudolf Kemper and its Part of the First Movement.

Presenter28:54

That was part of the first movement of Bruch's violin concerto number one, played by Kyung Wai Chung, with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Rudolf Kempen.

Presenter29:03

John alumni

Presenter29:04

What about the the acting career? You've talked about your ambitions as a as a writer, but I mean what's in it for you now in acting, do you think?

Joanna Lumley29:10

I don't know. You know, I've just finished doing a lovely play down at the Chichester Festival, An Ideal Husband, which is my first time of playing Oscar Wilde, and my goodness, it was fun. And all I want to do is to play more of the classics, actually.

Joanna Lumley29:21

Of course, if there was any chance of doing some of our modern playwrights like Akeborn or Pincher or Stoppart, I'd be thrilled, because they are classics. Modern classics.

Joanna Lumley29:30

All I really want to do is to is to do good work, and it's terribly important now, I think, when you get to a certain stage, is not to accept jobs simply because they're jobs.

Joanna Lumley29:38

To look at them absolutely, and only do them if they're absolutely right. And this might mean doing very much fewer than you would. And I find now I sometimes

Joanna Lumley29:46

only undertake one or two jobs a year. You know, most um by that I mean that they are in fact perhaps stage plays which don't just last a couple of days.

Presenter29:53

Uh

Speaker 329:53

Hmm.

Presenter29:53

Yeah.

Joanna Lumley29:54

But nevertheless, I'd rather do that than than rush in and just cram up my days with all sorts of things. I'd like to see better writing on television, too.

Presenter29:59

That

Presenter30:01

And how much has has marriage'cause you're recently married how much has that changed your life?

Joanna Lumley30:05

Fantastically, in every way, yes, in every way. It's just been terrific. I walk about grinning, I wake up grinning in the morning and I'm as happy as a bee. And uh I can't think that that will be anything other than getting better and better all the time. It's wonderful.

Presenter30:17

But I mean you you were a long time sort of bachelor girl, weren't you?

Joanna Lumley30:20

Yes, it wasn't because I I really uh hated the idea. You know, people said, Oh, you must be a feminist and so on. Not so, but marriage is a very important step and you can only take it really with one person. And both of us having made mistakes before, I think we were both

Joanna Lumley30:35

Determined, you know, to make sure that it was the right one. So this was I mean, this is just magic. Truly, I believe in magic now.

Presenter30:42

So it really in your case it is a case of life beginning at 40 is it? Yes it is. It is. Yes. Mm-hmm. Let's have another choice of music please.

Joanna Lumley30:46

Yes, it is. It is.

Joanna Lumley30:49

Well, the great great man, Beethoven, who is my great great hero, and I he's just stands like a giant above

Joanna Lumley30:55

Everybody

Joanna Lumley30:57

for all sorts of reasons, but um I think one of them that I fell in love with this particular piece of music when I was again quite young and impressionable.

Joanna Lumley31:04

And it seemed to me that he dedicated it to Napoleon until he discovered Napoleon had declared himself Emperor or something, and then he withdrew it, and I thought that was such a wonderful gesture to tie up with such a wonderful, tempestuous piece of music. So it's Beethoven's Eroca Symphony, conducted here by Sir John Barbaroli.

Presenter32:20

That was part of the first movement of Beethoven's Heroica Symphony, played by the B B C Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sir John Barbaroli.

Presenter32:28

John Alumni, you're now on your desert island. First of all, d do you think you'll be any good on this desert island?

Joanna Lumley32:31

First of all

Joanna Lumley32:33

Oh, I'd like it a lot. Would you? Yep, I'd like it very much. Well, because it's going to be quite hot and there'll be avocado trees and things.

Presenter32:40

They've been ordered up.

Joanna Lumley32:41

There'll be peace and quiet and a lot of swimming and a lot of um just lazing around. I'd like it a lot.

Presenter32:46

You're capable of looking after yourself, do you think, in that situation?

Joanna Lumley32:48

Oh, I think so, yes. And I think that I should create some makeup out of

Joanna Lumley32:52

And sort of squeezed berries. I should probably f get some sort of papyrus and make a kind of ink, and I'd write a few.

Joanna Lumley32:58

Sort of notes. I'd love to write a book, actually, but I might write it all in my head and make up a few plays as well.

Joanna Lumley33:03

And I'd construct a house, I'd do everything, yeah.

Presenter33:07

What about then, all right, imagine on your island that one day the a wave comes along, it it w it takes away seven of your records, you're left with one. Which one would you want to keep?

Joanna Lumley33:11

Okay.

Joanna Lumley33:16

Beethoven would stay with me. Beethoven's a rocker.

Presenter33:19

What?

Joanna Lumley33:20

Because he's my main man. Yes.

Presenter33:23

And what about the book that you'd uh choose for company?

Joanna Lumley33:26

Well, the book now this just encompasses English life, and it's also very, very long in that it's in twelve volumes. It's a dance to the music of time by Anthony Pohl.

Presenter33:33

And what about the luxury object, inanimate?

Joanna Lumley33:36

Well, this has better be com commissioned as soon as possible, because it's going to take a bit of time. I would like my dear friend and great, great man, John Ward, the Royal Academician, painter,

Joanna Lumley33:46

to make a painting of all my family and all my friends. So he's very good at these things, but it's going to be an enormous canvas, and it'll take a bit of time. But I shall prop it under the palm trees, and look at them all, and love them all, and think of them all, and um

Joanna Lumley33:59

and wait for them all to come and get me, as I'm sure they will.

Presenter34:02

John Lovely, thank you very much indeed. Thank you.

Speaker 334:11

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk/radio4.