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In 1999, Judi
Dench was in New York starring in Amy's View by David Hare. One night,
the theatre took a block-booking of people from all over the continent,
and something set this group of fans apart. She may have won an Oscar,
but they weren't drawn by Dench's film and theatre reputation. They were
fans of As Time Goes By, the mild-mannered sitcom about flappy Jean
(Dench) and her lugubrious husband Lionel (Geoffrey Palmer).
After the show, Dench came back on stage for a Q&A session. 'Well,
why not?" she says in that inimitable voice. "I mean, it is
fantastic in America. People would stop me on the street and say, 'What
have you done with Lionel ?' "
With fans like these, and a strong enough following on this side of the
Atlantic to sustain eight series, it would be hard to envisage Dench and
Palmer walking away from their clearly loved alter egos. Yet, on the
night of recording the final part of this series, Dench is saying
farewell.
'When we were filming the first episode," recalls Palmer, "we
said, 'Do you think this will go to more than one series ?' "
"We thought four," adds Dench. "That's when we started
saying goodbye. I make a joke of it now. At the end of each series; I
say goodbye to everybody."
As Time Goes By is not the longest-running sitcom, nor the most,
ground-breaking. Its fans are not for the most part in the first flush
of youth. "It is predominantly a middle-aged audience," says
Palmer, "but every time you say that someone says, 'No, this is
untrue. My son and daughter wouldn't miss it;' There are an awful lot of
quite young people who do like it." "And John Gielgud,"
adds Dench, somewhat pulling the rug out from under Palmer's theory.
"He loved it," "Yes, he told me as well."
The show's longevity is in its copper-bottomed pedigree: its
producer/director, Sydney (Sid) Lotterby, produced Porridge, and writer
Bob Larbey penned The Good Life. But the real reason for its popularity
is that in an era where matrimonial sitcom is scarce, Dench and Palmer
are the funniest couple on television. And although happily married to
other people, off screen they have turned into a sort of couple, too.
They finish each other's sentences, bicker and even seem to have taken
on some of their characters' foibles. Is the marriage a complicated
recipe ? "Like any marriage, I think it is," says Dench.
"Sometimes I think my character gets irrationally upset. Then, I
have to say to myself that wouldn't be me. But I'm not playing me - I'm
playing this other woman." I ask Palmer to list Jean's flaws.
"One flaw would be the dilemma the male is in: why can't a woman be
more like a man? He obviously was potty about the young Jean, he is
still potty about the present Jean, but she has turned into something a
little bit over-female, hasn't she? She does go off.. ."
"...at tangents," interrupts Dench. "You're describing
every woman in the world!" "She snaps..." resumes Palmer,
"at which Lionel thinks, 'Good God, that's not what women are meant
to be like.'" "Well, I think he goes on about things, like the
bloody pension plan. He went on and on." "But I shouldn't have
to be provided for." "That's ridiculous. That's male. You want
to go and kill the stegosaurus. I say, 'No, we've got one in the
freezer.' " "Yes, but you caught it."
Although Dench is the megastar, Palmer is the senior partner in terms of
sitcom screen-time. Dench's only previous sitcom was A Fine Romance,
with husband Michael Williams, while Palmer's jowly looks became a
national landmark when he played a baffled retired major in The Fall and
Rise of Reginald Perrin and a baffled husband in Butterflies. As Time
Goes By was an idea that Palmer took to the BBC. Finding a leading lady
was the difficult part. "That's a long story, " says Palmer.
"We ultimately found Judi Dench, who happened to have a minute
off." "The 16th person," she grumbles. "We found
then that she wasn't available for three months," says Palmer.
"Then the BBC said, 'We can't wait three months. Find someone
else.' After about ten days, I rang Sid and said, 'This is bloody
rubbish. If Judi Dench will do it, we'll do it when she's free.
Otherwise I'll walk away.' Then the BBC said, 'OK, we'll wait then. Who
is she?'"
Palmer still gets the scripts long in advance. Dench prefers to learn
them in the bath the weekend before filming. They had not even met
socially much before As Times Goes By, but have since acted together in
the films Mrs Brown and Tomorrow Never Dies, in which Palmer played an
MoD honcho to Dench's M. "The joy is that you're completely relaxed
and confident in the person because you've built up a relationship of
total trust," says Palmer. "Judi is an extraordinarily
generous person. We get the laugh together. Actors and actresses can be
deeply competitive. If that happens, I'm out. I'd rather not work."
"Nor me," says Dench. So, are Dench's goodbyes at the end of
the series going to be for good this time ? "I think I'll have had
enough pretty soon," says Palmer. "If it stopped, it would be
a very happy memory." What does pretty soon mean? "I think he
means now," says Dench. With negotiations for a ninth series in
progress, let's hope she's still joking.
Thanks to
Cindy Lou F. for sending this to me.
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