As she begins her tenth decade, Dame Sheila Hancock would be forgiven for wanting to put her feet up and lead a quieter life.
But the outspoken actress has never been a wallflower.
In fact, after celebrating her 90th birthday last week, she is more determined than ever to be heard.
For when it comes to putting the world to rights, there’s a lot to be done.
“It is really difficult now to be not angry, isn’t it?” said Dame Sheila.
“I won’t be here much longer realistically and I would like to leave the world a happy place, lovely and full of life.
“There are many natural disasters at the moment like those poor people caught up in the Turkey earthquake.
“And then of course the everlasting worry about the planet.
“It is terrifying if you read about it.”
The beloved actress made headlines last year after her memoir, Old Rage, lashed out at the class system, Brexit, lockdown, social inequality and how Britain’s older generation were treated by then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his Conservative Government.
Now, 12 months on, Dame Sheila, is “angrier than ever” with Britain on the brink under Rishi Sunak.
An avid Labour Party supporter, one of her passion causes is the ongoing cuts to her beloved theatres and the arts, especially since Sunak’s new drive to make every child study maths until they are 18.
She has warned that the PM’s numbers are all wrong if they are to the detriment of the arts.
“How dare they cut arts funding and say children need to do more maths?” she said.
“We need culture in this country. To say maths is a priority and the arts isn’t is crazy. The arts make life worth living.
"We are blessed with a lot of theatres in this country and it is essential for our mental and physical health. The arts means a lot now.”
She is also livid at the recent appointment of Lee Anderson as Tory deputy chairman.
Anderson has said in an interview: “Nobody has ever committed a crime after being executed.”
The actress raged: “Somebody has just been appointed by Rishi Sunak who believes we should bring back hanging.
“These are leaders who we should look up to. How can anybody say that?
“We hanged people who were innocent in the past.”
Dame Sheila is on fighting form despite suffering pneumonia in January and her ongoing battle against auto-immune disease rheumatoid arthritis.
Last year the star revealed she has needed weekly injections to manage her condition since 2018.
She also needs regular hospital check-ups and blood tests.
Yet she continues to live by the old mantra: “The show must go on.”
During her appearance at The Upper Room Winter Lectures, she said: “I think there is something odd about me... I do recover so well. I have rheumatoid arthritis, annoying as your body suddenly turns against you.”
She added during the lecture series at St Michael and All Angels Church in Turnham Green, West London: “I also had pneumonia three weeks ago.
“I woke up spitting up blood and I had emergency scans and lots of antibiotics but in three days, I felt all right.
“I think it has something to do with acting. You cannot let people down. I mean you could be dropping dead and go on a stage and be fine and then come off and you are dead again. I had coronavirus and for two days, I was really ill and then I was fine.”
Dame Sheila lost her husband John Thaw to cancer in 2002.
The Inspector Morse star was just 60 and she’s determined not to let her own age get her down. She said: “I think in old age you have to make up your mind that it is not going to get you, that you are going to adapt and find a new way of going to be fine.”
But Dame Sheila admits she has started to make lifestyle changes, including reluctantly saying goodbye to her home in Provence, France.
She said: “I have lived in France for 30 years. I loved being a European. I speak the language. But the last time I went to the house after lockdown, I realised I have aged.
“The drive to get there, I found it nerve-racking for the first time. I also had to climb over the bath to have a shower, all sorts of silly things.
“Also I don’t think I should be flying to France so often now. I don’t think it is right to have a house abroad and you are constantly flying.”
She plans to settle down in Chiswick, West London, her main home. Dame Sheila, made a DBE in the 2021 New Year Honours list, has a stellar showbiz career to look back on there.
It began with training at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, which led to a career in repertory theatre.
She went on to perform in plays and musicals in London and earned a Tony Award nomination for her 1966 Broadway debut in Entertaining Mr Sloane.
She has also done countless TV shows including The Rag Trade, EastEnders, New Tricks, Hustle and The Catherine Tate Show. In fact she has done so much, she jokes that she can’t remember some of it.
An insomniac, she recalled listening to a play on Radio 4 one night, after which the announcer said: “Jessica was played by Sheila Hancock.”
But she said: “I had no memory of it whatsoever!” Bizarrely for such a luminary of showbiz, she claims not to be proud of any of her roles.
The most enjoyable to work on though were what she calls the “trashy comedies”, explaining: “It is lovely watching the audience laugh.”
Work aside, Dame Sheila says one main thing that helps keep her going today is her Quaker faith. Fellow national treasure actress Dame Judi Dench is also a believer. Dame Sheila said: “I think when you get older you look for the spiritual in life.
“I have been a humanist, an atheist, but since 1997 I have been a Quaker and it is suits me very well.
“We believe in absolute equality and every human being is sacred, even the bad ones. It is to be treasured to sit in union with a group of people you can trust for 60 minutes.”
Above anything however comes her role as nan to her eight grandchildren.
“The grown-up ones tell me things they don’t tell their parents. It is just lovely. I can’t give advice as there have been so many terrible errors in my life.
“But I am a good listener.”
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