PRESS UPDATE : MAIL WEEKEND MAGAZINE ... MAY 30TH 2026 ..

 

The Cannes Film Fest­ival was treated to a dash of old-school Hol­ly­wood glam­our earlier this month when Dame Joan swept in to the open­ing cere­mony look­ing stun­ning in a white cou­ture gown and diamonds and accom­pan­ied by dash­ing French actor Laurent Lafitte. So it’s a sur­prise to dis­cover that Dame Joan, a true Tin­seltown legend for the past 70 years, can often be found ambling around the aisles of a super­mar­ket dis­guised in an anorak and base­ball cap, doing her weekly food shop.

One chap found out to his cost recently when he bumped into her with his trol­ley in M&S, leav­ing Joan   fum­ing and her devoted hus­band Percy Gib­son spring­ing to her defence. ‘Fire came out of his eyes!’ exclaims Joan, ‘And I said, “No, no, no, no, don’t darling! It’s fine, I’m not hurt.” I was, actu­ally! Only slightly. You don’t like to be bumped with a trol­ley!’

Joan has con­cluded that we Brits are no longer as polite as we were. She com­plains that ‘cyc­lists ride on the pave­ments in Lon­don now’ and sev­eral of her friends have had close calls with them. ‘My grand­chil­dren and my neph­ews and nieces are all very polite and well-mannered, but I’ve seen some young people who are not. I’ve seen some old people who are not too, like the man who bumped into me: he was in his late 60s. I think there’s a cul­ture: Great Bri­tain used to be known for every­body being incred­ibly polite and well-mannered. I don’t think we’re as polite now. We’re not known for our politesse as much as people in Spain and Italy, for example.’

Joan on the Cannes Red Carpet 

Today over lunch at an exclus­ive Lon­don hotel, the act­ress looks none the worse for her encounter with a shop­ping cart, under a wide brimmed white hat, her dazzling eyes still have that twinkle in them....

‘This is my face, my ori­ginal face, and it’s got lines and fur­rows and things,’ she says. ‘I don’t do any tweaks. Noth­ing. I would never use Moun­jaro or any of those weight-loss shots because to me that’s put­ting poison in your body. I mean, it was bad enough hav­ing to take the Covid jab, which I didn’t want to do!’

What’s her opin­ion of women who use Botox and fillers? ‘It’s a fad, isn’t it? I think, “Why?” Youth is wasted on the young! You see a beau­ti­ful 25-year-old who wants to change her face – I find it really sad. And of course, as you get older it’s going to look worse and worse. I like people who look the way they are. And I do not like the trout pout.’

Would she ever go for a tat­too? An anchor on her arm per­haps, like Popeye? Or ‘Percy For Ever’?

‘No,’ says Joan firmly. “Some­body once said that put­ting a tat­too on a body is like put­ting a sticker on a Fer­rari.’

She looks as glam­or­ous as you’d expect today in a jacket by Veron­ica Beard over a Karl Lager­feld sweater. ‘Glam­or­ous from the waist up only, darling!’ she smiles. ‘I’m wear­ing workout trousers and rub­ber shoes.’ Well, she is a work­ing woman. Her latest project is a new who­dun­nit, A Murder Between Friends, in which she plays ‘sharp and sassy show­biz sleuth’ Francesca Carlyle, presenter of a true-crime TV show.

Francesca has a home near a castle where a group of couples in their thirties are spend­ing a boozy week­end – until murder ensues. The movie was shot out­side Prague, says Joan, who is also one of the pro­du­cers. It was writ­ten for her by her friend Mark Razzano and the cast includes Toby-alex­an­der Smith, who played Gray Atkins in East­enders. ‘Every­body who sees it really enjoys it because there are scary things in it, which I think audi­ences want to see,’ says Joan. ‘But it’s not too blood-curd­ling. There is some inter­est­ing sex! And there are some very good twists and turns.’

Joan as Francesca Carlyle in Murder Between Friends

Unlike her Ms Carlyle, Joan is not a fan of true-crime stor­ies. ‘I don’t want to see stor­ies about real people who’ve suffered. I love those Agatha Christie films like The Mir­ror Crack’d, the one with Elizabeth Taylor and Kim Novak in 1980 – which I’d like to have been in! They put Kim Novak in instead! I like Angela Lans­bury and Dex­ter. I loved Starsky And Hutch! I was so thrilled when I was asked to be in it.’  Would she have made a good detect­ive in real life? ‘It’s amaz­ing you’ve asked me that ques­tion! When I was a kid I used to listen to Dick Bar­ton: Spe­cial Agent on the radio. I was glued to it every night. I said, “Mummy, I’m going to be a detect­ive.” She said, “I thought you wanted to be an act­ress?” I said, “Well, an act­ress and a detect­ive.” She said, “I don’t think that’s pos­sible.”

‘For Christ­mas they gave me a detect­ive set. It had spe­cial powder for tak­ing fin­ger­prints, a mag­ni­fy­ing glass, a note­book and hand­cuffs. And I put the powder around to see if my younger sis­ter Jackie had been going into my private closet.’ And had she? ‘Yes! She was about eight, I was 11 or 12.’

Best­selling author Jackie died in 2015 at the age of 77. Joan says she still misses her sis­ter and raised a glass to her at a recent din­ner atten­ded by many of her fam­ily, which includes three chil­dren and four grand­chil­dren, not to men­tion an army of god­chil­dren, who range in age from one to 51. The younger mem­bers of the fam­ily call Joan ‘DJ’. Is that because she’s a whizz on the turntables? ‘No! It’s for Dame Joan.’ Is that what Percy calls her? ‘Percy has his pet name for me but I’m not going to tell you what it is. You have to have a cer­tain amount of mys­tery, darling!’

Percy is 60, more than 30 years Joan's junior. Some wondered about the age gap when he became the act­ress’s fifth hus­band in 2002. ‘We’re com­ing up for our 25th wed­ding anniversary – can you believe it, our sil­ver wed­ding anniversary! And I’m already plan­ning it.’

They got to know each other when Joan was appear­ing in a play in the United States that Percy pro­duced. ‘We found out we had so much in com­mon. We both loved musical theatre and hated sports! We loved read­ing. We just loved the same things and we were on the same wavelength. And he’s the kind­est, nicest, sweetest, most caring man. But that doesn’t mean he’s a wimp,’ adds Joan, cit­ing her hus­band’s role in the trol­ley incid­ent.

‘Percy and I are very much home­bod­ies. We stay home and we have massive TV screens, includ­ing one in the bed­room.’ They go out to see friends, attend events linked to the char­it­ies Joan sup­ports, and watch films. They have tick­ets for the new Michael Jack­son biopic, Michael.

‘I liked Michael: every time I met him he’d come up to me and say, “Hello, do you know who I am? My name’s Michael,”’ says Joan, in a very pass­able impres­sion of the King of Pop. ‘And I’d say, “I know who you are, I’ve met you three times before!” The first time was when he came to the set of Dyn­asty with his sis­ter. He said, “I’m such a huge fan!” After that I met him sev­eral times at dif­fer­ent places. The last time was at the Royal Albert Hall. We were doing a trib­ute to Eliza­beth Taylor and we were all on stage together singing.’

The young Joan used to write to the stars of the time in the hope of a signed photo – and she’s with­er­ing about (unnamed) celebrit­ies who she says don’t sign their own auto­graphs. She went on to encounter many of the biggest names in show­busi­ness dur­ing her long career. Gene Kelly, star of Singin’ In The Rain, once told her never to do her own stunts ‘because it puts a stunt girl out of work’.

‘Dur­ing the golden age of Hol­ly­wood, which I came into at the end, there was an agent called Sue Mengers. And she would have parties with every­one there – James Stew­art, Eliza­beth Taylor, Ryan O’Neal, Dud­ley Moore and Woody Allen. I saw Woody once as he was leav­ing and I said I’ve got to meet him because I’m a bit of a fan. So he’s just about to go out of the door and I’m wear­ing this very low-cut dress. “Mr Allen, Mr Allen, I just have to tell you how much I adore your work, it’s so won­der­ful.” He said, “Well thank you very much. But I’ve got to get out of here, I’m very, very shy.” I said, “Well actu­ally, I’m shy too.” And he looked at my cleav­age and said, “Well, you could have fooled me.”’

The actor Rupert Ever­ett wrote in a recent mem­oir that he stood up a group of Hol­ly­wood pro­du­cers one night because he wanted to have din­ner with Joan instead. ‘Oh I think that’s one of the stor­ies Rupert makes up!’ she laughs. ‘Like Julian Clary made up his story that he saved me from drown­ing in the South of France. He’s said it so many times! I said, “Julian, this is not true!” He said, “Well I know, but isn’t it a great story? You were in the swim­ming pool try­ing to get out of one of those rub­ber chairs and I helped you.” I said, “Yes, but I wasn’t drown­ing!”’

How much time do Joan and Percy spend at their five-bed­room villa in St Tropez? ‘Well, thanks to Mr Mac­ron I can only spend 90 days there! And that’s for the whole of Europe! So if I go to Paris for the week­end, which I haven’t done since before Covid, I’m allowed 90 days, that’s it. And we have tons of friends who want to come and stay. I some­times say that place is like a hotel, because I have this big board with who’s com­ing when: “Tara (Joan's daugh­ter) is com­ing then, Big­gins is com­ing then...” Chris­topher Big­gins is one of my best pals.’

Will Joan say how she voted in the recent local elec­tions? ‘No, but I’m sure you can guess! I don’t believe in act­ors get­ting on their podium and talk­ing about polit­ics. I have strong views about polit­ics but I don’t share them because I don’t think it’s right.’ News junkie Joan says her favour­ite news chan­nel is GB News, which includes Reform politi­cians among its presenters, so that might give us a clue.

She takes care of her­self by eat­ing well, doing Pil­ates and dan­cing. ‘I star­ted dan­cing when I was three and I have a the­ory: use it or lose it. When I’m sick, like when I have the flu, and don’t do any­thing for a week or ten days, I’m really creaky. So I like to go back and exer­cise everything, even my hands and my eyes.’

With that she fixes her gaze on the far side of the din­ing room. ‘You look at something in the dis­tance and con­cen­trate on it for ten seconds; then you con­cen­trate on something close to you. You do that three times and then you swing your eyes around: left, right, left, right!’

So could she still strut her stuff on Strictly? ‘No! I was asked ten years ago. My friend George Hamilton did it in Amer­ica. He said whatever you do, don’t do it – you have to be a con­tor­tion­ist! Nobody over 40 should do it because if you fall and you break something, you’re sc **** d! But I love watch­ing it! My daugh­ter Katy and I watch it every single week.

‘I tell you what I would like to have been in – Down­ton Abbey! I’d like to have played the mother of Lady Grantham, who’s mar­ried to Hugh Bon­neville’s char­ac­ter.’ That would have meant her appear­ing oppos­ite Dame Mag­gie Smith. ‘I loved Mag­gie Smith! Wouldn’t that have been fun!’ laughs Dame Joan.

A Murder Between Friends will be avail­able on digital (includ­ing Amazon, Apple TV, Sky Store) from 15 June (Plaion Pic­tures).

EVENT UPDATE : THE CASTING DIRECTORS LUNCHEON .. CORINTHIA LONDON .. MAY 29TH 2026 ..

Joan with My Duchess co-star Charles Dance  (Dave Benett)

 

Party season is in full swing as Joan attended The Casting Directors Luncheon hosted by Kate Lenahan and Antony Rush in association with Jimmy Choo and held at Corinthia London.. Joan caught up
with many friends and co-stars including her My Duchess co-star Charles Dance, Celia Imrie and her Sins co-star Marisa Berensen..

Joan with Sins co-star Maris Berensen   ( Dave Benett )

PRESS UPDATE : THE TELEGRAPH .. MAY 22ND 2026 ..

 

Dame Joan Collins: I was taking supplements before they were all the rage

The actress is as sprightly as ever but insists there is no secret to her longevity..

Dame Joan Collins: ‘I don’t eat junk, I get eight hours of sleep, I exercise. It’s very simple’ Credit: Shutterstock

Dame Joan Collins is fighting fit, but you don’t have to take her word for it: she has the paperwork to prove it. “I just finished making a movie, My Duchess, a few months ago,” she says of her latest role, in which she portrays Wallis Simpson in her twilight years, alongside a glittering vintage cast including Isabella Rossellini, Charles Dance and Miranda Richardson. “Before we began filming I had to have a medical test for the insurance, to confirm I was OK to work. They told me I was more healthy than any of the other cast!”

Dame Joan has recently returned from the biopic’s premiere in Cannes, where her youthful appearance on the red carpet prompted a flurry of articles about how she has stayed so sprightly. “Somebody wrote that I take an avocado a day, which is completely untrue,” she exclaims, with mock outrage.

With a career spanning over eight decades (Dame Joan made her acting debut in a stage production of Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House in 1942, aged 9), she remains every inch the Hollywood icon. Arriving for our chat on the arm of her fifth husband, 61-year-old Percy Gibson, Dame Joan is dressed in an expensively tailored black jacket, complete with the sort of dramatic shoulder pads Dynasty’s Alexis Carrington Colby would be proud of, and a bow that nips her in perfectly at the waist. A hefty rope of pearls and a slick of crimson lipstick complete the look.

There are, however, she insists, no tricks to her longevity. “I have very good genes – I’m very lucky. My father lived to be 87, and for somebody born in 1903 that’s pretty amazing,” she says. “My mother took incredibly exceptional care of me and my sister. When we were growing up she gave us all supplements when nobody was taking supplements.”

When I interject, to ask what specifically she and her novelist sister, Jackie, took, Dame Joan wafts her hand around as if she wants to bat away the question like a fly, exclaiming, “I don’t know, I was too young – all kinds of things,” before adding: “Oh you know, cod liver oil, Virol” – a syrup made from bone marrow, malt extract, beef fat and eggs and marketed for infants – “horrible things like that”.

We meet at the ribbon cutting of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center’s new outpost on London’s Harley Street. For decades, the original hospital in Los Angeles has been the go-to medical centre for celebrities, treating A-listers from Lucille Ball and Frank Sinatra to Elizabeth Taylor and Kim Kardashian. Now it is bringing its combination of “high-quality primary care, executive health and concierge medicine” to the UK’s private healthcare market.

Joan’s own patient journey there began in 2011, following a back injury. “I was in LA filming this television series called American Horror Story – and it was indeed a horror story,” she quips. “All of the cast were sitting around on this incredibly cold soundstage, which had been built on the Paramount lot. The whole crew were wearing scarves and sitting in chairs with no backs for weeks. I remember waking up in the middle of the night in screaming agony, so my husband, Percy, called Dr Lawrence Piro, the medical director of Cedars‑Sinai, who I had met before socially. He sent an ambulance and within five or 10 minutes I was in Cedars being taken care of, which was wonderful. From then on I would go and visit him whenever I was in LA, because I believe that taking care of yourself is one of the most important things.”

It seems that Dame Joan’s back has been an ongoing concern in recent years – in July 2022 she was airlifted to the Princess Grace Hospital in Monaco, having been rendered immobile by a trapped nerve. It stopped her exercising for some time, but she’s mobile again and impressively agile. “I work out with my trainer a couple of times a week – just basic Pilates-type exercise, rather than using one of those [reformer] pilates machines, though,” she clarifies.

Recalling her previously saying that she took morning walks with Percy, I ask whether that’s still part of her daily routine. She looks appalled. “I hate walking – it bores me,” she cries. “I’ll walk around my apartment tweaking the flowers, but that’s about it.” Turning to Dr Piro, she says: “That sounds so ridiculous, and it will look ridiculous when you see it in print, but it’s true.”

Dr Piro says he and Dame Joan have “worked together to optimise her health over the years”, adding: “We don’t ever talk about things like age – people often bring that up, which she particularly dislikes.” He’s not wrong: before our chat, I’m advised at least three times not to raise the subject with the actress. “But the fountain of youth is curiosity, and Joan is the most curious, engaged, intelligent person that you might meet.”

She’s certainly a firm believer that prevention is better than cure, saying she will go to the doctor “even if I have a pimple on my face that doesn’t go after a couple of months,” continuing: “I will go before it gets serious. Someone who was very close to me had a lump and did not check because she thought it would go, but it didn’t and then she died, which she shouldn’t have. Had she had it taken care of, she would have been fine.”

What have been Dr Piro’s top tips for helping her stay well? “I think it was if your back twinges, lie flat on the ground,” she says, before adding that probably his best piece of advice might be to not allow yourself to get injured or to slip. “Anybody over the age of 60 who falls is doomed,” she says melodramatically. “It’s really true, because it keeps you out of the gym, you lose your flexibility, and everything spirals down.” It seems she still lives by the mantra “If you slow down, you die” – and clearly has no intention of retiring anytime soon.

“I just believe in healthy living,” she says. “I don’t eat junk, I get eight hours of sleep, I exercise. It’s very simple.”

I’m impressed to hear she’s still sleeping through the night, something many women struggle with in midlife and beyond. But it transpires that even Dame Joan has succumbed to the dreaded 3am wake-up; she’s just learned not to let it ruin her nights. “I heard about this thing called second sleep. It means that if you wake up at three or four o’clock in the morning, you don’t worry about it – you either have a cup of something or you read,” she explains. “So I go to bed at 10 or 10.30pm, I go straight to sleep, then when I wake up at three or four o’clock I’ll read on my iPad or do something for half an hour or so, then I go back to sleep again until seven.”

“What do I read? I’m not going to tell you!” she says with a playful smile.

SEE Below for full article...

Dame Joan Collins: I was taking supplements before they were all the rage

EVENT ALERT : TURN THE KEY SOFTLY .. BFI SOUTHBANK .. MAY 27TH 2026 ..

 Joan's classic 1953 drama 'Turn The Key Softly' will be screened at the BFI in London as part of a season of British postwar films. The screening will be on May 27th at 18:15.. You can book tickets ..

BUY TICKETS TURN THE KEY SOFTLY AT BFI SOUTHBANK HERE!

Read more about the season of films at The BFI below.....

It was the golden age of British cinema - but many can barely be recalled. A British Film Institute initiative aims to remedy that, shedding light on life in post-war Britain.

BY Sue Britt & Hannah Britt for The Mirror..

t was a golden age of British cinema, with classics such as The Dam Busters, A Matter of Life and Death and Reach for the Sky making stars of the likes of Richard Todd, David Niven and Kenneth Moore. Yet there were many more movies that thrilled audience but are barely recalled.

A British Film Institute season of films made between 1945 and 1960 aims to remedy that and shed light on life in post-war Britain. Ehsan Khoshbakht, the curator of Great Expectations: British Postwar Cinema 1945-1960, says: “In some ways this is the least known era of British cinema, a kind of lost period, yet it saw some of the finest films being made. The films portray a country coming out of war, reconstructing itself, but facing a real question of identity. The British Empire had collapsed, the conflict was over and now it’s every man for himself – so how does the country deal with that? This work mirrors the daily life of the British; it’s a window into the past.

“But it’s more complex. The class system had been blown to pieces and there was political optimism about Britain becoming a more equal society – we saw the NHS established in 1948. At the same time, people still looked for conformity and familiarity; there was a retreat back to tradition. Women were forced back into roles in the home and church-going went through the roof.” While the British stiff upper lip was still in evidence – both in life and on screen – beneath the surface was the imminent arrival of the teenager.

Mark Glancy, Queen Mary’s professor of film history, says: “There was real anxiety about the effect the war and the Blitz had had on children. That fed into fears about juvenile delinquency, especially with the emergence of ‘teddy boys’.” But, adds Dr Geiringer, people also wanted more from life, for themselves and the next generation. With the arrival of television people gained access to new ideas and there was a sense of looking more for personal fulfillment rather than simply adhering to duty.”

That concern for childhood is echoed in one BFI film choice, A Diary for Timothy – a 1945 documentary narrated by Michael Redgrave, taking the form of a letter to a newborn baby, exploring what the future may hold. Popular with critics and audiences, they recognised its air of optimism, mixed with apprehension.

The theme of childhood is also present in Ehsan’s BFI selection, Mandy, starring Jack Hawkins and Phyllis Calvert as the parents of a deaf girl, showing their efforts to help her connect with the world. The 1952 film was shot at Ealing Studios and nominated for a clutch of Baftas.

Iranian-born Ehsan, says it’s a metaphor for a traumatised nation learning to communicate again in peace time. Hawkins himself served in the war, in India and Asia. Ehsan recalls: “I grew up watching these films on TV. When I saw Mandy, years later, I could remember every scene. It’s very moving.“ In Hunted, Dirk Bogarde stars as a fugitive murderer who takes a war- orphaned boy on the run with him - forming an unlikely bond - after the child witnesses his crime.

The 1952 film won critical acclaim for its gritty approach to the austerity still facing Britain - the end of rationing was still two years away. Bogarde had been among the first Allied officers to enter the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp at the end of the war. Praised for his performance in Hunted, he struggled with the aftermath of conflict, once saying: “First there was the war, and then the peace to cope with.”

Dr Geiringer says: “We talk today about ‘broken Britain,’ but post war that was a literal phrase; you could actually see how broken it was just by the bombsites on streets and on screen. The Suez Crisis happened in 1956 and Britain had an identity crisis; suddenly we didn’t have so much power on the world stage.”

Ehsan, who originally curated the programme for the prestigious Locarno Film Festival in Switzerland, choose movies concentrating on the realities of everyday life. He says: “These are all movies that people would have seen at their local cinema. Movies of the era have a reputation of being mild and very conservative but many have their own edge.”

He highlights Turn The Key Softly, a 1953 drama which follows Joan Collins, as one of three women released from prison into a cold and dismal 50s London.

Critics called the actress’s performance “lush and brassy” but it was her co-star Kathleen Harrison who, according to one review, made ‘the loneliness of the poor and unwanted strikingly real’. Mark Glancy says it was a “challenging time” for many with those difficulties, which is reflected in the film. He says: “When I see people in movies from this period I always think how thin they look; they sit down to a meal of two boiled potatoes, a tiny slice of roast beef and some cabbage. But that’s how it was - there were few luxuries.

There were a lot of British films about ordinary people at this time because ordinary people were heroes.” The question of capital punishment was being explored in public life during the 50s – a theme reflected in the 1957 thriller Time Without Pity. Starring Michael Redgrave and Ann Todd, the story follows a father trying to save his son from execution.

Less than a decade later The Murder Act suspended the death penalty for murder in Great Britain. But while life’s meagre joys continued to be rationed, the search for escapism continued. One of the cheapest forms of entertainment remained going to the cinema - according to the UK Cinema Association, there were 1.64 billion cinema attendances in 1946.

Despite the movies featured in the festival being decades old, Dr Geiringer believes we can still draw relevance from them today. He says: “Post war Britain was trying to find its identity - there was a debate about what ‘Britishness’ really was. When resources are short that question of who we are - and who we are not - often arises. We’re seeing a similar thing here in 2026.”

*Great Expectations: British Postwar Cinema 1945-1960 is on at the BFI Southbank until May 30

PRESS UPDATE : THE SPECTATOR ... MAY 23RD 2026 ..

Joan Collins

23 May 2026

No one recog­nised me on the red car­pet!

‘We are tak­ing the pic­ture to Cannes,’ said John Gore, the pro­du­cer and fin­an­cier of My Duch­ess, my new film about the Duch­ess of Wind­sor. ‘How excit­ing!’ I said. Then, a minute later, I thought, ‘Oh God! What am I going to wear on the red car­pet?’ The fol­low­ing day I told my artist friend David Down­ton about my dilemma while lunch­ing at Clar­idge’s. ‘Let’s call Stéphane Rolland,’ he said. ‘Won­der­ful idea!’ I said. ‘He’s great! He made the red dress I wore for the Heart Truth Red Dress gala in New York a few years ago, and it was spec­tac­u­lar.’

David called Stéphane as we had cof­fee, and the tal­en­ted cou­tur­ier sketched a ter­rific draw­ing of a beau­ti­ful white dress with ruffles while they chat­ted, and texted it to David. ‘Amaz­ing!’ I exclaimed. It was per­fect – exactly what I would have wanted. He must have read my mind, and it took all of five minutes. Three weeks later, Stéphane and his long-time col­lab­or­ator Phil­ippe Delessard arrived at my apart­ment with a massive suit­case con­tain­ing a gor­geous dress that fit­ted me per­fectly.

My dresser, Chrissy, and I went through my entire ward­robe try­ing to find suit­able out­fits for the three days we were to spend in Cannes. I had to pre­pare for two din­ners that were sup­posedly cas­ual (dif­fi­cult as I can only do cas­ual when I exer­cise) and a lunch with press fol­lowed by a photo shoot with Isa­bella Ros­sellini, and finally another out­fit to appear on stage to intro­duce the screen­ing. It took Chrissy and me all day to col­late the right out­fits, shoes, bags, jew­ellery, etc. I don’t have a styl­ist on speed dial, but luck­ily I have lots of clothes. I prac­tised dance steps and bal­ance with my friend the cho­reo­grapher Paul Robin­son. God for­bid I should slip on the red car­pet steps. I watched some reels of act­resses at pre­vi­ous Cannes red car­pets and all I could say is: I had bet­ter watch out.

Joan with MY DUCHESS director Mike Newell at Cannes Luncheon at Carlton Beach

We arrived in Cannes on the Monday. The streets were clogged with people; I wondered if they were all cinephiles or just there to gawk at the celebrit­ies. We stayed at the Majestic hotel, where many beau­ti­ful young girls con­greg­ated in the lobby, some with attend­ants car­ry­ing all man­ner of light­ing and video equip­ment while the girls pranced around pos­ing pret­tily. ‘They’re influ­en­cers,’ said Alyn, my makeup and hair guru.

Cannes was boil­ing hot but there was a very high wind, so in pre­par­ing for the red car­pet and walk­ing up the stairs at the Pal­ais des Fest­ivals I was wor­ried my hair would blow all over my face. Sev­eral star­lets had been papped on the Crois­ette with their long exten­sions envel­op­ing their faces, so we decided to scrape my hair back and put it up in a chignon. Then, primped and powdered and hair sprayed like carved mahogany, off I went. My white dress, although gor­geous, was quite uncom­fort­able and I wor­ried that my high heels would catch on the cobble­stones, even though they were covered in car­pet. But none of these fears – hair, dress, shoes – mater­i­al­ised. What actu­ally occurred was far more embar­rass­ing. I got in the car with Laurent Lafitte, my co-star and one of France’s biggest movie stars, and Alyn, armed with a massive can of Elnett hair spray. In another car were Percy and John Gore, who were sup­posed to arrive ahead of us so that they and Laurent could escort me. However, a super-dili­gent gen­darme sent their car the long way round and ours the short way, so we arrived before them. As soon as my car stopped, Laurent dis­ap­peared, engulfed by fans wav­ing auto­graph pho­tos and tak­ing selfies. I des­cen­ded from my voit­ure to find myself alone and ignored on the red car­pet… Bambi in the middle of a flam­ing fire. No sign of Percy or John, while Laurent swam in a sea of scream­ing fans. An offi­cious, head­set­ted young woman came up to me and yelled: ‘Vite, vite, get in line. You can’t just stand here!’An actor’s night­mare. To my great relief, within what was prob­ably a minute dur­ing which guests looked at me blankly, though it felt like an etern­ity, John, Percy and Laurent all appeared at once and, to screams of ‘Joan! Joan!’, we star­ted walk­ing up the red car­pet while the snap­pers barked orders: ‘Over your shoulder!’ ‘Look left!’ ‘With Laurent!’ ‘By your­self!’

Joan and Isabella Rossellini in My Duchess

Imust admit it was ‘adren­alinely’ exhil­ar­at­ing, if I might coin a term, to be sur­roun­ded by so many people, all intent on cap­tur­ing magic moments. Sev­eral other luminar­ies walked behind us, includ­ing Jane Fonda, whom I’ve known since our early days in Hol­ly­wood. Although I’ve atten­ded the Cannes Film Fest­ival many times dur­ing my career, this was the most excit­ing occa­sion. The next day the media gave Stéphane’s white ‘orchid’ dress and me the most won­der­ful plaudits, so it was all worth it in the end.

EVENT UPDATE : CEDARS SINAI INTERNATIONAL LONDON LAUNCH PARTY .. THE WALLACE COLLECTION ... LONDON .. MAY 20TH 2026 ..

 

Joan with Dr Lawrence Piro - President and CEO, The Angeles Clinic & Research Institute, and Medical Director of Cedars‑Sinai’s Global Care programme...

Joan and Biggins enjoying the party

One of America's top medical clinics and most famous is Cedars Sinai, with it's Los Angeles clinic popular with many in the entertainment industry. Cedars International have just opened their flagship London clinic in Harley Street. To launch the clinic a party was held at The Wallace Collection with Joan as guest of honour. Joan took to the podium and spoke to the many guests including friends Piers Morgan, Jeffrey Archer, Gabriela Peacock, Andrew Pierce and Christopher Biggins.

Joan with Gabriela Peacock & Piers Morgan

EVENT UPDATE : RHS CHELSEA FLOWER SHOW ... LONDON .. MAY 20TH 2026 ...

 

Joan with Tamara Beckwith in the garden!

One of Joan's favourite annual events to attend is The RHS Chelsea Flower Show and she made time our of her busy schedule to attend this years show which opened this week. One of her highlights was a visit to her good friend Tamara Beckwith's Lady Garden Foundation Garden which is the first year the charity
has submitted a garden. Joan spent some quiet time in the tranquil creation called 'Silent No More' created by Darren Hawkes. Other guests this week at the show were Elaine Paige, Judi Dench, Gloria Hunniford and Joanna Lumley. The foundation was thrilled when creator Darren Hawkes was awarded a Chelsea Gold Award for his inspiring garden.

Lady Garden Foundation founders Tamara Beckwith & Clare Van Dam with Penny Plane, Alex Kingston & Joanna Lumley

PRESS UPDATE : THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER .. MAY 16TH 2026 ..

 

The Grande Dames: Joan Collins, Isabella Rossellini Bring Old Hollywood Class to Cannes..........

The screen legends discuss fashion, fame and female survival while unveiling My Duchess, a decades-in-the-making drama about the tragic final years of Wallis Simpson.

By Scott Roxborough

Collins is fresh from the Cannes red carpet, where the night before she had outshone starlets a third — a quarter — her age. The actress brought a blast of old Hollywood glamour to a festival that, this year especially, has often felt strangely drained of it.

Her sculpted white orchid gown, a custom Stéphane Rolland Haute Couture number with a sweeping train, paired with dramatic black opera gloves, diamond jewelry and similarly encrusted needle-toe pumps, gave off unmistakable Alexis Carrington energy — a reminder of the 1980s, when Collins, as the scheming queen of Dynasty, practically dictated the decade’s fashion vocabulary.

“It was very exciting. I had my glam squad do me up, the hair, the makeup,” she says. “I looked — well, I won’t say how I looked, but you can read what they wrote.”

Sitting opposite me now on the Carlton Beach, Dame Joan is only slightly more casual, wearing a thigh-length patterned summer dress and oversized hexagonal sunglasses the size of tea saucers. Her famous mane is perfectly buffed into place.

Next to her, Isabella Rossellini is the bohemian counterpoint: Draped in a loose black-and-white patterned outfit with flashes of bright orange lining, her trademark pixie cut untouched by Cannes excess. Rossellini has flown in for this interview, joining Collins to discuss My Duchess, the first collaboration between the two screen icons.

But Rossellini skipped the red carpet entirely.

“I actually find it very intimidating,” she says. “It’s a whole production now. It’s not like when my mother [Ingrid Bergman] went to the Oscars. She wore her own jewelry, maybe something special that my father had bought for her.”

“Well, I wore my own jewelry last night,” Collins jumps in. “Because I didn’t want a security guard following me around. Which is what happens when they give you something to wear.”

Isabella Rossellini, Joan Collins in Cannes to promote ‘My Duchess’ Max Cisotti / Dave Benett

The two women bounce off each other like old friends rather than first-time co-stars, veering effortlessly between fashion, film and stories from another era of cinema.

“Your father and I almost worked together,” Collins says suddenly, turning to Rossellini.

She launches into a sprawling anecdote about Sea Wife, the 1957 drama in which she starred opposite Richard Burton. Roberto Rossellini had originally been hired to direct.

“Roberto fought with Darryl Zanuck over my character, who was a nun, and Roberto wanted her to have sex, a relationship with Richard Burton’s character. He said that would be real, natural. They fought about it for a week while we played Scrabble in the sand. The studio wouldn’t budge and Roberto said, ‘Well, it’s not true to life,’ and left.”

Rossellini laughs. “My father really liked you.”

Collins recently posted a photo of her with Roberto Rossellini on Instagram on May 8, which would have been his 120th birthday. 

“She’s very big on Instagram,” Rossellini says.

“Oh, you have more followers than me,” Collins retorts.

But Collins is not in Cannes simply to reminisce about the golden age of cinema. She’s here to launch My Duchess. Directed by Mike Newell (Four Weddings and a Funeral) from a script by Louise Fennell, the film tells the story of Wallis Simpson, the Duchess of Windsor, the previously divorced woman King Edward VIII, later known as the Duke of Windsor, abdicated his throne to marry. It focuses on the final years of her life, when she lived in France under the control of her exploitative lawyer, Suzanne Blum, played by Rossellini. The film picks up after the death of the Duke of Windsor in 1972 and traces the Duchess’ physical and mental collapse under Blum’s control.

Joan Collins as Wallis Simpson in ‘My Duchess’ Courtesy of Embankment Films

“People thought she had died, but she hadn’t. This lawyer [Rossellini] came in an destroyed her. She spent the last eight or nine years of her life blind, deaf and dying. And no one knows that.”
But getting the project made took decades. My Duchess is the first feature from John Gore Studios, the new outfit launched by the Broadway impresario behind Hamilton and The Book of Mormon, who agreed to finance the project after Collins pitched it to him at a King’s Trust dinner in late 2023. Embankment Films is handling sales in Cannes.

Collins has been trying to make her Wallis Simpson film for 30 years. In the early 1990s, Collins met Mohamed Al-Fayed — the father of Dodi Fayed, who died with Princess Diana in the Paris car crash, and, at the time, the owner of London luxury department story Harrods. 

“I told him how fascinated I was with Wallis Simpson,” Collins recalls. “He said, ‘I own her house in France.’ So I went there.” 

She was shown around the house by Bahamas-born Sydney Johnson, the Windsors’ former valet. “The place was immaculate, it looked just as it did, just as it does in the film. There were two mannequins, one of the Duchess and one of the Duke. He was wearing a kilt. She was wearing Chanel, of course.”
Collins admits to feeling a kinship with Simpson, who was the target of the tabloids of her day. 

“This film is a bit of me getting back [at the press], because I had a lot of problems in my time,” she says. “They always saw me as the bad girl because of the roles I played. When I was in Dynasty, the press would say: ‘She’s just like that,’ and I wasn’t!”

For Collins’ fans, My Duchess is something of a revelation. As Simpson declines, the actress appears frail, diminished, stripped of poise and makeup. Frighteningly exposed.

“Joan has this combination that I have never seen before,” says Rossellini. “She is beautiful, has great beauty, great glamor, but absolutely no vanity whatsoever.” “No, I am not vain. I have never been vain,” Collins agrees. “I’ll answer the door in shorts with no makeup. I don’t care.”

Joan Collins as Wallis Simpson in ‘My Duchess’ Courtesy of Embankment Films

That lack of vanity becomes the greatest weapon of My Duchess. The sight of Collins — one of the defining glamour figures of post-war cinema and television — as she physically withers onscreen is something we have never seen before. 

But there is, as Rossellini puts it, one “Joan Collins moment” in the film: when the Duchess finally snaps and lashes out at Blum. 

“I say the F-word one time in the film, in that scene,” says Collins with obvious delight. “As I was doing it, I thought: ‘I just told Ingrid Bergman’s daughter to F-off!’ ”

Despite the darkness of the material, there is an unmistakable lightness between the two actresses, perhaps because both have spent decades navigating the strange collision of celebrity image and artistic ambition. And both have also successfully adjusted to periods out of the spotlight. In an industry that often treats women as disposable, they are true survivors.

“I started working in this business when I was 17, and my father told me, ‘If you are lucky, you can work until you’re 27,’ ” says Collins. Seventy-five years later, she notes that she’s had probably “had the longest-ever career in show business. I’m certainly the oldest working.”

She says the secret to career longevity, both for her and Rossellini, was surprisingly simple.

“We had good families. We never had problems with alcohol or drugs. And we always wanted to work.”
The woman who spent decades playing glamorous monsters is now playing a victim slowly erased from the world. By the end of My Duchess, stripped of makeup, jewelry and image, there is almost nothing left of the Joan Collins audiences think they know. At 92, after more than seven decades onscreen, Dame Collins may finally have found the one role that destroys the myth she spent a lifetime creating.