PRESS UPDATE : HELLO! AUGUST 29TH 2016 .. TARA & NICK ARKLE WEDDING ..

Check out the latest issue of 'Hello!' magazine which features six pages devoted to Tara & Nick's fabulous wedding at Coome Lodge last weekend.. The bride & grooms fee from this article was donated to The Penny Brohn Cancer Care Charity, which Tara is a patron and the late great Jackie Collins was a supporter.. A donation was also made to The Kabbalah Centre where the couple held their spiritual wedding blessing...
For more on Penny Brohn Cancer Care see .....
 PENNY BROHN CANCER CARE

 

PHOTO UPDATE : TIMELESS BEAUTY ON QVC UK .. AUGUST 2016 ..

Earlier this month after completing her latest film 'The Time Of Your Lives', Joan made a special appearance on QVC UK to launch the latest additions to her bestselling 'Timeless Beauty' range. This super shot features Joan on set with among others presenter Alison Young .... Check out the full range here .....
JOAN COLLINS TIMELESS BEAUTY 

PHOTO UPDATE : CELEBRATING IN STYLE!

Tara & Nick with Joan & Percy..

Best wishes for the future to Tara & Nick Arkle..This stunning shot features a sensational bride and a fabulous Joan at Coombe Lodge in Blagdon..

PHOTO UPDATE : AT THIS CLUB JOAN'S THE STAR ATTRACTION!

Joan with Piers & Sugar

Joan is enjoying a welcome break in the South of France, before she resumes her busy schedule with the start of her UK tour of her brand new show 'Unscripted'.. She enjoyed a super lunch at St Tropez hotspot Club 55 with friends including her LA stylist Rene Horsch and bumped into Piers Morgan & Alan Sugar..

Joan with friend Rene Horsch

PRESS UPDATE : ABSOLUTELY MAGAZINE ... AUGUST 2016 ..

Absolutely meets one of the world’s most enduringly glamorous women,
Dame Joan Collins

Interview Pendle Harte

She’s known not only for her glittering acting career and her OBE, her writing and her impossibly youthful looks but also for her serial marriages – all five of them. Dame Joan Collins is the grande dame of British Hollywood stars and her life has been – and continues to be – impossibly glamorous. Her portrayal of Alexis Carrington in 1980s soap Dynasty defined the decade, not least for her way with a shoulderpad – and when she had a clearout of her possessions last year, among the items up for auction in Beverly Hills were a collection of letters from Warren Beatty as well as a glittering array of diva dresses, power suits and vintage Louis Vuitton travel trunks. All this and she’s Cara Delevingne’s godmother too.
Collins was born in Paddington and grew up in wartime Maida Vale. After studying at RADA, her varied film career took in everything from horror films to pantomime via German soap operas and she even played the Queen Mother to Elizabeth Hurley’s Queen in TV’s The Royals. Now, fittingly for someone who appears to have discovered the secret to eternal youth, she has launched a beauty range.

Pendle Harte: Your career has been multi-faceted. What is your favourite area of work?
Joan Collins: Acting without a doubt, although I really like writing too.
PH: You’ve worked with some big names. Who have you enjoyed working with most?
JC: Paul Newman was a great friend, actor and humanitarian. I loved our comedy scene in Rally Round The Flag, Boys and we remained good friends for life. I also adored the late Sir Nigel Hawthorne, one of Britain’s greatest actors and I was privileged to work with him in Clandestine Marriage. He also became a good lifelong friend.

PH: As a lifelong Londoner, how do you feel about the way the city has changed over your lifetime?
JC: As the French say, “plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose”. Of course London has changed radically. So has New York, LA, Paris – any great city evolves. But London has remained the cultural centre of the world with its immense choice of museums, art galleries and theatres.
PH: Tell us about the new skincare/make-up range…
JC: I have been very fortunate to have learned many beauty secrets from great makeup artists and celebrities so I wanted to share these with other women. The Timeless Beauty range was created for women who take pride in their appearance and know the value of investing in their skin. I have total input with everything we do. There are so many celebrities who are ambassadors for makeup brands and fragrances nowadays, but with the Timeless Beauty collection I am a partner which makes it very different. I have been part of the collection from the beginning; I’ve chosen the colours, the design and made sure that all benefits of the products are what I believe in. The lipsticks are named after characters I’ve played over the years. For example, Fontaine was a wild woman so we created a hot, flirtatious pink for her.

PH: You also have a new novel out (The St Tropez Lonely Hearts Club). How do you find time to write?
JC: I make the time. If you want to do something you need to be disciplined enough to give up certain pastimes – reading, TV, shopping – and carve out the hours needed to write.
PH: What’s next for Joan Collins?
JC: Next I’m very excited about my one woman show Joan Collins: Unscripted which is touring around the UK in September and October. Also I am working with a great cast – Pauline Collins, Joely Richardson, Franco Nero and Michael Brandon – on a new movie The Time of Their Lives.

Joan Collins’ Timeless Beauty collection is available now at marksandspencer.com

PHOTO UPDATE : FOR THE BRIDE .. MOTHER KNOWS BEST!

Tara & Nick at Coombe Lodge

Joan spends some quality time with daughter Tara after a whirlwind weekend of celebrations for Tara's wedding to Nick Arkle.. From a spiritual ceremony at The Kabbalah Centre in London and then a civil ceremony and receprtion at The Coombe Lodge in Blagdon..

PRESS UPDATE : COUNTY WOMAN .. SEPTEMBER 2016 .

Global superstar Dame Joan Collins is set to tour the UK in September and October with her brand new one-woman theatre show Joan Collins Unscripted.
This all-new show for 2016 provides fans with a once in a lifetime opportunity to spend an intimate, entertaining and unforgettable evening in the company of a true Hollywood legend.
Actress, philanthropist and best-selling author, Dame Joan will visit 12 towns and cities across the UK and a not-to-be-missed night in her hometown at the London Palladium on Friday September 30.
During her all-new show, Dame Joan will share stories and secrets from her celebrated life and career as one of the world’s most glamorous and intriguing actresses.

Please find here, a Q&A especially put together ahead of the tour.
Q) Dame Joan, you are about to head out on your all-new UK Tour, what can we expect?
JC: “Well the show is called Joan Collins Unscripted and that is exactly what it will be. We go on stage each night with a blank sheet and that will lead to a different show each night.
“It’s going to be an intimate, hilarious and wonderfully stylish night with me, Percy and a few hundred dear friends reliving some great stories, great times and some of the fascinating people I’ve met along the way.
“In my shows I like to joke about everything – my men, my marriages, my life. Nothing is off limits… within reason!
“I so enjoyed my 10 years performing One Night with Joan all over the world that I am delighted to be doing an entirely new show.
“Each performance will be different so if you like me in Salford come see me in London…and if you don’t then stay at home and watch Corrie!”
Q) Your husband Percy, who you’ve described as ‘the greatest love of your life’, is appearing on stage with you on this tour. How important is Percy’s support on stage?
JC: “We simply love being with each other.
“Myself and Percy are soulmates – we like the same things, we laugh at the same things and that is so important.
“You could say I kissed a lot of frogs along the way, but I finally found the prince!
“It is totally a love match, but also a friends match so having him alongside me each night as we tour the country, playing to such wonderful audiences, will be a special moment for use both. We cannot wait.”
Q) Given your amazing career you must have plenty of hilarious anecdotes left in reserve. Do any of your former co-stars need to be worried?
JC: “Well it depends if they’ve got a sense of humour or not…  and of course some of them are dead!”
Q) The tour takes you from Brighton to Edinburgh and 10 other towns and cities in between. What is so special about Britain, what do you love most about coming home and what do you miss most when you’re away?
JC: “I’m English born and bred and that is in my DNA. I love the London parks, the greenery of the countryside, the London taxis, the morning papers delivered to your door and the cultural and social buzz of the city.”
Q) Does the theatre hold many special memories for you?
JC: “It certainly does. As a kid I used to go to the London Palladium often with my father and see variety shows. I remember seeing Johnny Ray there, Arthur Askey, Tommy Cooper – all those people that I love. I love variety.
“The British theatre is steeped in history, tradition and fun. There are so many venues I have loved performing at down the years and this tour is going to be very special.”
Q) This tour shows you are still prepared to put in the hard work. Do you feel this work ethic is missing from the entertainment industry today?
JC: “I have never shirked putting the hours in. When I started out that’s how you got on in this business.
“There are many young people who want to be ‘celebrities’ but not put the effort or hours in. They don’t want to do the training, go to drama school and study technique. They just want to be famous.
“It breaks my heart that people want it on a plate when to be really good and work with the best takes talent and a hell of a lot of hard work.”
Q) So you show no signs of taking your foot off the gas?
JC: “My mantra is ‘Don’t waste time’. Life is ever so sweet but it sure is short. You have to enjoy life, and I live totally in the present.
“I don’t feel any different from when I was 40. You’ve got to keep working and I love my work.
“I have a lifestyle I figure I’ve earned, I have three children and three grandchildren to support after all! But above all the reason why I am so active and so loving new projects is I love the work, the acting, the writing and, of course, my one-woman show.”
Q) Where does the energy come from?
JC: “I’ve always been restless, from when I was a young child. I have to move around and keep busy. “My mother used to call me ‘Miss Perpetual Motion’ because I never kept still for a second.
“My restlessness became ingrained in me from such a young age. I guess that is why I have always loved to keep on the move, to travel and most importantly work.
“One thing in life, I never want to be a crashing bore. I want to be amusing, entertaining and keep busy. I think I do OK on that front!”
Q) How do you balance life with work?
JC: “I try to spend time with my children and grandchildren as often as possible, in St Tropez especially. And I catch up with friends whenever I’m in town – be that London, New York or LA.
“Both myself and Percy like to travel. I’ve always considered myself a wanderer, a gypsy and that will never change. Next year we are really looking forward to seeing some places we’ve never been to before.”
Q) Dame Joan, you’ve had an incredibly busy 2016 with a book launch, new cosmetic range, not to mention the Ab Fab movie, shooting a new feature film in France, world travel. What have been your highlights?
JC: “The absolute highlight so far has been shooting the movie The Time of Their Lives with Pauline Collins. It has been a fabulous experience to perform in. It just has great script with such a great actress.
“On the personal front my daughter Tara is getting married this year and I’m sure this will be a major highlight; I’m very much looking forward to it.”
Q) You’ve spent the summer shooting The Time of Their Lives in France. What can you tell us about the project and what is it like working with your good friend Pauline?
JC: “I was very excited by the script. There are very few roles today for women aged over 45, let alone over 65. The fact that it’s a buddy movie along the lines of Thelma and Louise, with a hint of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, really interested me.
“People are sick to death of watching shoot ’em ups, blood and gore and explosions – those films for the 12 to 30-year-old market. It’s time producers realised that people also want to see stories about mature adults, not only teenagers.”
Q) Your cosmetics range Joan Collins Timeless Beauty was launched into M&S this year. You look stunning. What is your top tip for looking good in 2016?
JC: “Keep healthy, look after yourself and wear what brings out your best features.
“Beauty is not just for the young. I believe with a little care and attention any woman can look good through her 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s and beyond.
“I believe that looking good and feeling great is the right of every woman, and, with the right products and some clever techniques, any woman can look, and feel, fabulous.
“Looking good and feeling great is the right of every woman no matter how old she is. Beauty is timeless.”
Q) So, once your tour is over what is next for you?
JC: “A good long rest!”
Tickets for Joan Collins Unscripted are available from www.seetickets.com or www.ticketmaster.co.uk
Dame Joan’s new novel The St Tropez Lonely Hearts Club is out now in paperback (Constable). Her make-up range Joan Collins Timeless Beauty is at M&S and M&S online.

Tour Dates: Joan Collins Unscripted
09 Sept – Northampton, Royal & Derngate
11 Sept – Southend, The Cliffs Pavilion
12 Sept – Salford, The Lowry
13 Sept – Theatre Severn, Shrewsbury
18 Sept – Norwich, Theatre Royal
19 Sept – Bury St Edmunds, The Apex
22 Sept – Guildford, G Live
24 Sept – Edinburgh, Festival Theatre
26 Sept – Birmingham, Town Hall
27 Sept – Crewe, Lyceum Theatre
30 Sept – London Palladium
03 Oct – Brighton, Theatre Royal

PHOTO UPDATE : JUDY JETS IN TO CELEBRATE!

Joan enjoyed dinner at fashionable London eaterie Park Chinois with longtime pal Judy Bryer, who flew in from Las Vegas for Tara's wedding, also joining them was Sue St Johns..

PRESS UPDATE : VARIETY .. AUGUST 22ND 2016 ..

Joan Collins Comedy ‘Time of Their Lives’ Gets Release Date

Dave McNary

Film Reporter @Variety_DMcNary

 Universal Pictures Home Entertainment will distribute the comedy “The Time of Their Lives,” starring Joan Collins and Pauline Collins, in the U.K., Australia, France, and Nordics in 2017, Variety has learned exclusively.
UPHE will distribute the film across multiple formats, including cinema, home entertainment, and TV. Vertigo Releasing will serve as co-distributor of the film in the U.K.

Joan Collins plays a former Hollywood star who’s on her way to crash her ex-husband’s funeral with a friend, played by Pauline Collins. The film is directed by Roger Goldby (“The Waiting Room”) and produced by Sarah Sulick.

Fortissimo Films, which recently filed for bankruptcy, launched sales of the project at Berlin in 2014. “The Time of Their Lives” was filmed on Île de Ré in France, in Dorset in South West England, as well as locations in and around London.

“‘The Time of Their Lives’ draws on both the ongoing popularity of buddy movies and the public’s growing appetite for poignant comedies led by an more mature cast,” Sulick said.
Tim Rice is the executive producer and soundtrack supervisor. He said, “One of the aspects of this film that particularly appeals to me, as a former student at La Sorbonne in Paris, is the planned use of several wonderful French pop hits from the ’60s by artists such as Johnny Hallyday, Sylvie Vartan, Jacques Dutronc, and Francoise Hardy.”

EVENT UPDATE : TARA NEWLEY & NICK ARKLE WEDDING.. THE KABBALAH CENTRE LONDON .. AUGUST 19TH 2016 ..

Joan with Tara & Nick, Percy, Weston, Miel and Bill & Hazel

A Stunning Tara

          Joan spent a joyous weekend celebrating the wedding of her daughter Tara to Nick Arkle.. The happy couple's union was blessed in a ceremony at The Kabbalah Centre just of Oxford Street in London.. As you can see from this exclusive photo the bride looked stunning as did Joan and sister-in-law Hazel..        

PRESS UPDATE : THE MAIL ON SUNDAY EVENT MAGAZINE .. AUGUST 21ST 2016

Outspoken, outrageous and back on the road, Hollywood icon Joan Collins lets rip on her friendship with Donald Trump and why she hates British TV (except Poldark!)

By Cole Moreton For Event Magazine

Trump? A good looking guy who inspired my Alexis on Dynasty. British TV ? No thanks (unless it’s Poldark). My own-brand wigs? Yes, I wear them...they’re great! Back out on the road for one last time, Dame Joan Collins lets rip

Donald Trump needs all the friends he can get as he fights to win over American voters, but the outspoken candidate for president has an unlikely fan in Dame Joan Collins. ‘I based Alexis on ‘a businessman like Donald Trump,’ she says, describing her most iconic character, the ice queen of the Colbys in the gloriously over-the-top soap Dynasty. ‘She was tough and uncompromising, using her sexuality to manipulate people. I met Donald with [his former wife] Ivana, who is still a very good friend of mine. And he was a very good-looking guy.’

The controversial Republican candidate was a buccaneering businessman back in the Eighties when Alexis was created, but now he is challenging for the White House.

So how exactly was he an inspiration? ‘I used Donald more in what he did, how he worked, and how he was building his empire, than his sexuality. I didn’t know about that a lot, but I know that he liked beautiful women, blondes.

‘Alexis was a mixture of him and one of my best girlfriends, who sadly died shortly afterwards. Cappy Badrutt was a jet-setting... not a nymphomaniac, exactly, but she liked the boys, always went for the ones that were rich, which I had never done. She was very beautiful – all her clothes were couture, she wore loads of furs and diamonds.’

This is just one of the many astonishing stories Collins has to share as she heads out on the road with a one-woman show, telling tales of her days as a Hollywood star, one of the few remaining survivors of the golden age of the movies, as well as her spectacular triumph in Dynasty. She’ll talk about her extraordinary life – including five husbands and four divorces – because Collins is getting ready to say goodbye.

‘This will be my last tour,’ the Legendary star reveals. ‘So if anyone wants to see me, they had better come now.’

Collins is Hollywood royalty and looks positively regal as she glides across the lobby of a luxury hotel in the South of France in white Chanel dress slashed with black stripes, wearing huge sunglasses and a wide, floppy hat.

‘How lovely to see you,’ she drawls in a voice halfway between Beverly Hills and Buckingham Palace, and the lady owner of the hotel is so overcome at the presence she almost curtsies.

Collins’ fifth husband Percy, makes sure we are settled on the terrace then disappears off as discreetly as a man can in a bright Hawaiian shirt. She sets her phone to record, being wary of the press, and does not respond well to the suggestion that she is giving up one-woman shows because of her age. ‘Age is an over-rated subject. I really do believe you are as old as you look, feel and act.’

So is it the thought of having to endure all those dreary theatre dressing rooms from Brighton up to Crewe? She has been synonymous with luxury since Leonard Rossiter chucked his Cinzano Bianco all over her in first-class airline seats in the classic advertisements of the Seventies. ‘I don’t mind the dressing rooms. I could get my make-up and hair done under that table over there,’ says this life-long performer, who first appeared on stage as a child during wartime. ‘I just feel I don’t want to do it again. This will be it.’

Is that partly because she has become more keenly aware of her own mortality since the loss of her younger sister Jackie, the novelist, to breast cancer last year? ‘Yes. One would be stupid not to think about it. So you prepare your will, you think about your children and your grandchildren.’

Presumably she has a large pile of cash to leave them? ‘I don’t. All of my money went into property. I don’t have any significant savings. I don’t need to keep working – I can always sell a property, but I enjoy working if it is the right thing.’

They don’t necessarily need her money, she says. ‘Sacha is a very successful painter. My daughter Tara [a TV presenter] is doing very well. They also have a very good trust fund from their father Anthony Newley, because he wrote 15 or 20 amazing songs.’ Oddly, it’s only later that I realise that she doesn’t mention Katyana, her daughter by the record company boss Ron Kass.

At this stage in her career Collins doesn’t need to worry about money, but she is clearly trying to take care of her legacy.

That’s why she published her autobiography a few years ago and is going out on tour.

‘People can ask me about anything,’ she says. But what if audience members ask her more personal questions, about things like drugs, for example?

‘I hate drugs! I am vehement against drugs! All kinds of drugs. What are they going to ask me? “Have you ever tried heroin?” No.’ How about cocaine? ‘Once.’ She was forced to take it at a nightclub opening in St Tropez, only a few miles from here, in the Sixties, but insists she never did so again.

She’ll willingly talk about her five husbands: the actor Maxwell Reed, who she says raped her before they were married (they lasted four years); the actor and songwriter Anthony Newley (seven years); Ron Kass (11 years, although they remained close until his early death); the Swedish singer Peter Holm (less than two years); and film producer Percy Gibson, who will be the master of ceremonies for the stage show and who has lasted the longest at 14 years.

‘We are best friends. We argue of course, bickering and banter. What do we argue about? You’re driving too fast. You’ve got to stop smoking. Why are you still on the phone? Nothing things, that husbands and wives bicker about.’

They go everywhere together and today we’re going to get a rare glimpse of the life they lead away from the cameras, whether it’s sitting in the garden of their villa near St Tropez with a glass of something chilled watching a meteorite shower, as they did last night, or lounging on the sofa like a couple from Gogglebox with a good box set.

‘I don’t watch a lot of British TV because I don’t really like what’s on offer, but first thing in the morning I watch the news. Then, when it gets on to Jeremy Kyle I put on MTV, music. I’ll exercise to it. I don’t watch TV during the day, and at night we’ll go back to the news then watch a box set. Ray Donovan, or the Jennifer Lopez thing Shades Of Blue – it’s very good. And I love Poldark.’

She always turns the television on first thing in the morning – it’s a compulsion. ‘I don’t like that empty screen staring at me.

With Sacha & Tara in 1966

‘I woke up today at 10am. I had a bath, I washed my hair. I had some coffee and got here at 11.30. I put on my make-up because I have my own cosmetics line.’

She also sells Joan Collins wigs, which are surprisingly cheap at just £39 for the ‘St Tropez edition’, with its headband, tumbling black curls and the promise ‘to give you a new way of presenting yourself to the world’.

There are numerous other variations with glitzy names like the Emerald, the Katyana and the Alexis. Does she really wear those wigs? ‘I’m not wearing one now,’ she says icily, as I get a flash of the withering put-downs that made her so formidable on screen. On second glance, the shoulder-length hair under that huge hat is dyed black, but definitely real, as I tell her awkwardly before trying to save face by complimenting the hair she does have. ‘Yeah, but I’m very lazy about my hair. And I think that a woman has to make a decision: she either works on her face or her hair. All my girlfriends, they all work on the hair. They blow-dry it. I don’t even know how to use a blow-dryer,’ she says regally.

There’s still a stigma about wigs though, isn’t there? ‘This is what’s so weird to me. I mean, look at 80 per cent of actresses and models. You think all that long cascading hair is real? They all wear extensions. All of them. So I don’t understand why there isn’t a stigma about extensions when there is about wigs. It’s so much easier – you just put them on. Mine are great.’

Anthony Newley & Joan in 1963

How many has she got in real life? ‘Four or five. But I don’t use them in real life, which is like now. If I’m going out to dinner I will either go to the hairdresser’s, which takes two hours, or I will wear a hat or I will wear a wig. I like the way it looks.’

So she does wear them, although it is probably too hot today in St Tropez. She asks for water, which arrives in a carafe with ice, but Collins is not satisfied. ‘Is it from the bottle? Evian?’ The waiter replaces the water without a word. Collins looks from the bottle to the glass and then to me. ‘Pour me some,’ she purrs, and it is an order.

She wonders why I’m so fascinated by her off-duty life and I say it’s reassuring to people to hear that even she looks a state sometimes. ‘Well then, they will be very reassured to go and see my new film The Time Of Their Lives and see how ghastly I look. Did you see the photograph of me in the Co-op in front of the lettuces?’

Google it. She’s seen walking down the aisle in her new film in flat shoes, thick socks, a dowdy mac and a headscarf, using a walking stick. She has just finished an exhausting six-week shoot with Pauline Collins (no relation, of Shirley Valentine fame). Collins plays an elderly former Hollywood star now stuck in a retirement home who escapes to the funeral of the man she loved half a century before.

‘I wanted to play her with no make-up, but the director wanted her with a bit of make-up, badly done. I wear a tacky old wig, which is terribly old and much too harsh. I look terrible.’ That’s daring for someone who has worked so hard to personify Hollywood glamour.

She’s teasing her own carefully constructed image with this film, but doesn’t she mind looking awful given that she is, well, Joan Collins? ‘Why would I mind? I’m an actress,’ she snaps back.

That is something we may have forgotten over the years, with all the glamour and the gossip-column inches. Dame Joan Collins, honoured with the title last year for her services to charity, is now setting out to remind us of her skills in films and on stage.

The daughter of a dance teacher and a theatrical agent, she trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and signed to Rank Studios at the age of just 17. Five years later the legendary Hollywood director Howard Hawks (The Big Sleep) chose her for Land Of The Pharaohs, a big-budget epic.

She fled England for Hollywood in the middle of a divorce from her first husband, Maxwell Reed. ‘My first nasty divorce,’ she calls it now, although she’s had plenty of other bad marriages, from the womanising Anthony Newley to Ron Kass, who allegedly siphoned off her earnings, and Peter Holm, whom she called ‘a sociopath’.

Collins appeared on television shows like Batman and Star Trek and made a couple of  movies called The Stud and The Bitch, based on her sister’s books, while married to Kass, but her big comeback was playing Alexis the super-schemer in Dynasty from 1981-89. ‘I was forgotten. They didn’t know who I was. ABC wanted Sophia Loren or Elizabeth Taylor.’ She joined in the second series and rescued Dynasty. ‘The show went from almost being cancelled to the top of the ratings and everybody said, “It’s because of you!”’

So given she based Alexis on Trump, will she be supporting him for the presidency, as Saga magazine recently reported? ‘I’m absolutely neutral, I will not say who I support, Hillary or Trump. I want a strong leader of the free world. But that could be Hillary. She’s very strong.’

But what of her politics? Does she regret coming out so strongly in favour of Brexit before the referendum? ‘Well, what do you mean by strongly?’ she snaps again. I wasn’t going around with badges on, if that’s what you mean. Or baseball caps. How did I support it?’

Well, for example, by posting a tweet with union flags and thumbs-up emojis saying: ‘The journey of 1,000 miles begins with the first step.’ Or by saying ‘this tiny island’ is ‘going to sink into the sea’ because of immigration.

She frowns. ‘Did I say that? I didn’t say the word immigration. I said, “with too many people”. You’re getting me on a subject now that I said I wasn’t going to discuss.’

Joan with sister Jackie in 1974.

Yes I am, because a lot of people feel misled by those who campaigned for Brexit and I wonder if she is one of them.

‘Well I don’t. Nothing’s really happened has it? Since Brexit I have been completely dedicated to this movie. It’s not that easy to work for 12 hours a day and learn between two and six pages of dialogue at night, so I haven’t really thought a lot about what has happened. We have a new Prime Minister, who seems OK, but why would we regret something that hasn’t happened yet?’

This may not be a good time to mention a previous controversy in her career, The Stud. The movie she made as a comeback in 1978 was astonishingly daring for its time, an erotic story in which she has sex in a lift then on a swing over a swimming pool. The Stud looks tame now, which only goes to show how much more explicitly sex is shown on the movie screen these days, because of what else is available online.

‘I don’t watch porn, but I’ve heard that it is so vile, and the things they do are so abhorrent. The movies today have to compete.’ She is scathing about modern movies and the damage they do. ‘Guns, blood, explosions, noise. That’s why we have so many knife and gun crimes because of these movies and computer games. These young men who commit crimes are always hooked on computer games.’

Bizarrely, she then rounds on another sensation of our age. ‘Look at this Pokémon thing. Already three people have been killed, going over the edge of a cliff or something. I talked to my young grandchild in New York. Her face lit up. ‘You know about Pokémon Go?’ I said, “Yes Ava, and can you believe we had one outside our house?”’

Yes, she has made a living from acting for nearly 70 years now, even if the most compelling character she has created has been that of the public Joan Collins herself. And as she departs I am reminded of something Alexis once said in Dynasty: ‘I’m what I am, and that’s why I’m where I am. Don’t you ever forget that.’

If Collins has her way, with the tour, the book and the film, we never will.

‘Joan Collins Unscripted’ is on tour from Sept 9 to Oct 3 – see tickets.com or ticketmaster.co.uk. Her novel ‘The St Tropez Lonely Hearts Club’ is out now in paperback (Constable).

PHOTO UPDATE : JOAN'S CELEBRATING IN STYLE!

Joan stands proudly between her grandchildren Miel & Weston as they prepare to celebrate the wedding of her daughter Tara Newley to Nick Arkle.. Wishing the happy couple many years of good health & happiness!

PRESS UPDATE : GET SURREY ... AUGUST 18TH 2016 ..

Dame Joan Collins: Exclusive archive photos show star filming Subterfuge in Dorking

• 08:30, 18 AUG 2016
• BY BETH DUFFELL , GRAHAME LARTER

  Famous other actors who starred alongside Dame Collins in the 1968 film included Gene Barry, Richard Todd and Tom Adams

A young Joan Collins, now Dame Collins, filming Subterfuge in Westcott, Dorking, in January 1968

Westcott in Dorking welcomed a host of film stars including a young Joan Collins nearly 50 years ago when scenes for the movie, Subterfuge, were filmed in the village.

These photographs from the Surrey Advertiser archives show the striking actress alongside other big names of the day including Gene Barry, Richard Todd and Tom Adams.

Dame Joan, these days a patron of the Surrey charity Shooting Star Chase, was pictured on set at the wheel of a white Mercedes, wearing a smart outfit and patterned headscarf.

A make-up artist was at her side, ready to touch up her eye make-up as the scenes were shot.

The story featured in the Surrey Advertiser and County Times on January 27 1968 and alongside it, just one photograph of the filming was published.

Now, 48 years since the filming took place, we are publishing some of the unpublished shots for Get Surrey readers to enjoy.

At the time the story reported that the actors were recording a sequence for the new spy drama at Churchgate House in Westcott.

Gene Barry on set with Richard Todd

The article said: "This beautiful example of Elizabethan architecture is the home of Trevor Wallace, chairman and managing director of Intertel (VTR) Services Ltd, the company producing the film.

"Mr Wallace, also executive producer of the film, lived in the house when he was a child. Since then his wish was to buy the property, and seven months ago he did just that.

It's a wrap! The elegant Joan Collins at the wheel of a Mercedes-Benz during filming in Westcott, Dorking

"The film is being made because Mr Wallace believes the action of this spy drama is highly topical at this stage of international espionage."

The article went on to reveal a brief synopsis of the film about a top-line Pentagon official, who travels to England to find a leak in British intelligence. Actor Richard Todd played the head of British intelligence and other stars who appeared included Susannah Leigh, Scott Forbes and Colin Gordon.

Debonair American actor Gene Barry even hoped to fit in some shopping during his trip to England, with a plan to purchase handmade shirts and shoes.

Dame Collins showed her support for Shooting Star Chase when she opened its Weybridge charity shop in October 2013, donating designer clothing and handbags to be sold at the store.

A make-up artist on set with the young Joan Collins

The iconic actress and bestselling author will return to Surrey next month for her one woman show at G Live, Guildford.

PHOTO UPDATE : SIMPLY STYLISH THAT'S JOAN!

Joan looks super stylish in this shot taken for Marks & Spencer's 'Style & Living' magazine. Shop here!!
 TIMELESS BEAUTY at MARKS & SPENCER

PHOTO FLASHBACK : JOAN'S FEATHERS ARE NOT FOR PAWNING!

I had a few requests regarding 'Police Woman' asking for photos ... Joan appeared in two episodes of the hit series starring her good friend Angie Dickinson.. This still featuring Earl Holliman is from the episode 'The Pawn Shop' where Joan plays the glamorous Hollywood star Prudence who is the victim of a burgarly and an assault.. 

EVENT ALERT : JOAN COLLINS UNSCRIPTED ... THE ROYAL & DERNGATE NORTHAMPTON .. SEPTEMBER 9TH 2016 ..

Don't forget to book your tickets for Joan's exciting new show opening September 9th at The Royal & Derngate in Nottingham.. Check out Joan's invitation above!
BOOK YOUR TICKETS HERE!!