Saturday, September 23, 2023

PRESS UPDATE : THE TELEGRAPH MAGAZINE - MY SATURDAY .. SEPTEMBER 23RD 2023 ..

Joan Collins: ‘Everyone thinks I’ve had work done – here’s the truth for the record’

BY JOAN COLLINS

How do famous names spend their precious downtime? In our weekly My Saturday column, celebrities reveal their weekend virtues and vices. This week: Dame Joan Collins...

7am

I’ll wake up, but try to sleep in until 10am. Then I’ll slip on my marabou-feather bed jacket and call down to whoever is in the house for scrambled eggs with caviar to be brought up. I consider eating in bed with a good book to be one of life’s ultimate pleasures, and I always have three or four on the go at once. I’m currently reading The Swans of Fifth Avenue by Melanie Benjamin; a romantic novel about Princess Diana called Di and I by Peter Lefcourt; and Susannah Constantine’s autobiography. I’ll also read five newspapers every day: three in the morning and two in the afternoon. I like to stay well informed.

10.30am

After breakfast I’ll lie back in bed, put on reruns of Dynasty, and see how Alexis might spend her Saturday. Sometimes I’ll look at Alexis and think, ‘My God, she’s so beautiful’ – then look at my own reflection in the mirror and think, ‘What a hag!’ [Collins laughs.] I’m joking, obviously.

11am

When it comes to my own writing, I’m very much a dilettante butterfly. I’ll start to write something, and then get distracted. I like to write in bed with a big child’s notebook and a Biro – whatever is around, really. I’ll always write long-form, like Jackie [Collins, Joan’s late sister], but she was very organised. She had a big desk and proper paper and everything. Whereas I either write in bed or on one of my many sofas.

11.30am

People probably think I’m one of those women whose husband only ever sees them looking ‘done’, but Percy sees me very ‘un-done’. [Percy cuts in: ‘And let me tell you that “un-done”, Joan looks like the most beautiful little angel. In fact, I think she looks better un-done.’]

My skincare routine isn’t elaborate, but if we’re going out for a morning walk in the local gardens [the couple live in central London], which we like to do, or even staying in, I will always wear lipstick. First thing in the morning I put in eye drops. Then a French sunscreen and moisturiser. If I don’t wear make-up I’ll slap moisturiser on my face all day long, every time I wash my hands. But I’m a bit lazy with my hair. I’ll usually just brush it through and twist it up into a ponytail.

A lot of people think I’ve had a ton of work done. To set the record straight: I have not. I haven’t had Botox, I haven’t had any tweakments, I haven’t had fat injections, and honestly, when I look at the women who have – certainly a lot of women in their 40s – it appals me.

12pm

As we walk in our private gardens I have to try to escape the dogs that insist on coming up to me. Dogs love me. Whenever I’m playing poker at Julian Clary’s, he’s always astonished by how much his three love me, but I was bitten on the ankle by one when I was four, so I’m a little wary. If I see a baby in a pram, however, I will always stop and talk to it. I’m such a baby person. Babies love me, too.

1pm

After that we’ll usually call my various children and see if any of them want to come out for lunch. They’ll probably say no, because they have their own lives now, but I do enjoy going out to lunch. I love restaurants generally – the theatre of it. Percy always says that people look at me when I walk around, and I don’t either enjoy it or not. I don’t even notice it, to be honest. I’m usually too busy looking at babies.

1.30pm

I’m pretty good at controlling my intake of everything, not just alcohol, so I’ll usually just have one glass of wine with my lunch. I don’t understand why people seem to find self-discipline so hard. For me, it’s really very simple: I want to look, feel and be a certain way, and I know I won’t get any of those things if I’m a glutton. Also, I’m not very tall: I’m 5ft 5in, so I couldn’t eat as much as some of my friends even if I wanted to. I’ll generally only eat half of what’s on my plate.

A long time ago, I was told, ‘Always leave the table feeling like you’d like a little bit more,’ which has been a life mantra. Also, I don’t eat crap. I mean, I haven’t had a doughnut or a hamburger bun in years; I simply will not eat that sort of thing. But I will eat birthday cake – mine or somebody else’s – I do drink wine, and when I’m in California [where she spends part of the year] I will eat finger sandwiches with my girlfriends. These little pleasures never descend into slobbishness, because I’m too aware of the fact that it doesn’t feel good – and that I want to fit into my clothes.

3.30pm

Percy and I watch more Dynasty together in the afternoon. You see this is actually the first time I’ve ever watched it. Isn’t that funny? I was always too busy. So now I’ll keep turning to Percy and saying, ‘Christ. How did they let me wear that hat?’ They put me in the most hideous hats! Also, I was so slender! It’s unbelievable how slim I was. I think I was 120lb, and now I’m 133. That’s 13lb more! But I’ve kept it down to that because from a health perspective, I’m aware that if you want to live a long life, you have to do the work. I hurt my back last year and a lot of people thought I probably wouldn’t walk again. But I did some serious physiotherapy, I did the work – and look at me now. In the end, life is all about work ethic.

I admire women who graft, but I’m shocked by the younger women from a certain generation who think it’s all going to be handed to them on a plate. The entitlement of some people nowadays is unbelievable.

7.30pm

I used to cook. Of course I did, I’ve raised three children. There are many dishes that I make wonderfully: toad in the hole, shepherd’s pie, spaghetti bolognese. But then, when Percy and I got together and I started making him my spag bol, he’d be there behind me in the kitchen, hovering, so in the end I said: ‘OK, you do it.’ Now, he does all the cooking, which is fine by me, because it means I can go and watch Friends on TV.

I want to point out that this is of my husband’s own volition. I can’t make Percy do anything he doesn’t want to do. He won’t even put on sunblock when he goes out to play tennis, even though I’ve been trying to make him for years. So now I just shrug and say: ‘You want to be all wrinkly like Joe Biden? Fine.’

8.30pm

For 40 years I’ve been taking my make-up off with Nivea. I use their £5.50 cleanser. I just put it on my face with a Kleenex and wipe it off with one. Then I put on a heavy night cream by Charlotte Tilbury. I also always, always sleep on my back. I’ve trained myself to, because I used to sleep on my side, scrunched up into the pillow, and then I was told not to because it gives you ‘scrunchy face’. Which is absolutely true.

10.30pm

You want to know about ‘my nighttime ritual’? Well, that’s a little rude [chuckle]. But if you must know I like a night light. You’re picturing a little glowing Hello Kitty number, aren’t you? Sorry, but it’s a run-of-the-mill Peter Jones night light.

11pm

I just love watching TV. For me it’s the equivalent of going to the cinema, which I used to do three or four times a week – whenever I possibly could – and just get lost in those movies with Gene Kelly and Betty Grable. I’ll usually drift off after having watched a film or a load of television. That said, last night, just before we fell asleep, Percy made the most spectacular… late-night scrambled eggs. You thought I was going to say something else, didn’t you?

Behind the Shoulder Pads: Tales I Tell My Friends by Joan Collins (Orion Publishing) is out on Thursday, Sept 28. Order now for £22 at books.telegraph.co.uk or call 0844 871 1514

As told to Celia Walden

Friday, September 22, 2023

PRESS UPDATE : THE SPECTATOR .. SEPTEMBER 23RD 2023 ..

Joan Collins

Elizabeth Hurley deserves a damehood

From magazine issue:23 September 2023

With the boiling, broiling summer here in Provence now at an end, it’s time to start thinking about rehearsing for the tour of my one-woman show based on my new book, Behind the Shoulder Pads. The show opens in Newcastle next week. I’m looking forward to revisiting some of the places that I was evacuated to during the war. Cheltenham, for instance, where as a terrified six-year-old I had to start a strange new school all those years ago. In Brighton, I remember standing at the balustrade with my aunts, seeing the pebbled beach covered with barbed wire and wishing I could go swimming.

It’s always fascinating to interact with audience members during the shows and the most fun part of the evening for me is when the audience ask me questions. Live audience interaction can, on occasion, be tricky to handle. A new season of Strictly Come Dancing has begun so it feels like the right time to recall the day a very drunk Craig Revel Horwood insisted on coming on to the stage during my show. He kneeled at my feet and directed a torrent of praise at me. It was most flattering, but after about five minutes the audience started yelling: ‘Get ’im orf!!’ Craig, a tip for the future: brevity is the soul of wit.

Travelling the length and breadth of the UK really opens one’s eyes not only to the beauty of the countryside, but also the sad side effects of all the road regulations, the cycle lanes, one-way systems, Ulez and mystifying traffic signs that make our cities a nightmare to drive in. I travel by train when I can, but that has its own irritations. I don’t relish being stuck in Whatstandwell or Wait-A-Bit.

Christopher Biggins, the most amusing of house guests, came to stay with us at the same time as lovely Elizabeth Hurley. Great fun and laughter ensued, but I was particularly impressed by Elizabeth’s handiness. At breakfast one day, while I was bemoaning the fact that our French gardener had thrown me the old Gallic shrug when I asked him to trim the leaves off an overgrown palm tree, Elizabeth said she would do it…and she did! I was amazed to watch her and Percy chopping away until the palm triumphantly emerged, divested of its overgrown foliage. When I’m asked what I would take with me to a desert island, I’ve always in the past said Percy. Henceforth I will say Elizabeth too. During her sojourn, she gave us more invaluable gardening tips, taught Biggins how to do various things on Instagram, and even managed to detangle some backcombed knots from my hair.

Ican’t understand why Christopher Biggins, who has done more for charity than anyone I can think of (royals aside), has not been awarded a gong. The man has travelled the length and breadth of Britain supporting, among hundreds of others, Barnardo’s, Comic Relief, Childline, Make-A-Wish Foundation UK and Heart Research UK. Come, on King Charles! And if you’re feeling munificent you can add Elizabeth Hurley for services to this Dame.

Party season in Saint-Tropez was a bit of a washout this year because of the intense heat and the mistrals. However, we did visit the trendy nightclub restaurant L’Opéra, where contortionists, trapeze artists, opera singers and tap dancers strut their stuff while the diners eat fine food and quaff jeroboams of rosé. Unfortunately, the night we went, the stage lights failed and the performers were left in the dark. We asked our waiter what the problem was, and he told us ruefully that the lighting director had gone for the night and no one could access the main panel to repair the fault. ‘Do we get a refund?’ joked one of our guests. ‘No,’ he snapped, ‘the show is still going on.’ At that very instant, he dropped a tray of tequila shots which spilled all over three of our guests.

So many memories flooded back about my dear friend Nolan Miller, the costume designer of Dynasty, while I was writing my book. He had a wicked sense of humour. One day while fitting me for a lavish gown, his assistant came in and whispered in his ear. ‘Help,’ he exclaimed, ‘My wife’s ovulating. I’ll have to go make love to her.’

‘But what about my fitting?’ I wailed.

‘I’m sorry, it’ll have to wait. She’s desperate for a child.’

‘And you?’ I asked.

He sighed. ‘Guess I’ll have to lash it to a toothbrush!’

Behind the Shoulder Pads is published this month and tickets for the tour are available now. Visit joancollins.com.

Monday, September 18, 2023

PRESS UPDATE : THE MAIL ON SUNDAY YOU MAGAZINE .. SEPTEMBER 17TH 2023 ..

When Joan met Jones: Three children, four grandchildren, five husbands, 90 years on the clock and still full-on fabulous. As eager diva JOAN COLLINS revs up for her new UK tour, Liz Jones discovers why there really ain't nothin' like a dame...

By LIZ JONES FOR YOU MAGAZINE

PUBLISHED: 12:19, 16 September 2023

'I'm not wearing designer! I can't afford designer! I love clothes but I draw my own designs. I hate handbags. Every time you see someone with a Chanel bag it could easily be a knock-off.'

I'm in Yorkshire, on Zoom with Dame Joan Collins. It being August, she – of course – is at her villa in St Tropez. I'm having a panic attack as the screen is black, though I can hear her Rada-trained, decidedly-not-old-lady voice.

'Percy!' I squeak. Her husband is hovering. 'We were told it was sound only,' he says. Ah. Hence my first question. I've been imagining a picture hat, shoulder pads, signature wig. But it turns out Collins is not the brittle cliché that is part of the cultural landscape.

'This morning,' she booms, 'I woke at 8.45 as we were at a party last night. I threw on a dressing gown then another as it's freezing: it's the Mistral. I had some fruit and coffee, was reading the papers online, then the maid said, 'Can I do the room?' I said, 'No', as it's the only quiet spot in the villa.'

Is she the same size as in her 20s?

'No! I still have quite thin legs, arms and butt but the middle part's not as good as it was. I dress well enough to hide it.'

I tell her she looks fabulous in our pictures where she's wearing Richard Quinn.

'We are in control of the way we look. It's all to do with pushing yourself away from the table, not eating too much. Stop eating bread, buns! I eat everything except shellfish, as I'm allergic.

'I always ask for half a portion, and I leave some on my plate. People eat too much. When I was a young woman, we all ate much less. I think we have a problem, and everybody's too scared to address it.'

She has 'really good skin' as she won't go out in the sun without a hat, sunglasses and sunscreen. Has she make-up on now, 11am?

'Are you kidding? Who puts make-up on first thing? We did have a very famous actress stay, a great friend from the 1950s, and she would come down in the morning with a full face, a pearl necklace and a negligée. I wear a baseball cap and a kaftan, or shorts and a T-shirt. Moisturiser.'

When I interviewed Raquel Welch a few years before she died, she told me, 'I'm a professional beauty. Without make-up I resemble a little grey wren.'

What does Collins look like?

'I don't consider myself a professional beauty, I consider myself a working actress. I also know I'm pretty good-looking, and I don't need a lot of make-up. For last night's party, I put on some darker base as my body is brown so I have to.

'Some eyeshadow. I never wear false lashes or mascara. I have friends who have lashes on permanently. They look strange with a pale face and spidery lashes.

'I mean, these reality stars all have lashes, pumped-up lips and frankly I can't tell them apart! Does that sound horrible? Take it out! Judi Dench looks fabulous.'

And the famous face ice bath to de-puff?

'I only do that if I'm going to an event.'

A ton of friends have just left and more are due in a few days. Does family stay?

'It's the sort of house that lends itself to having groups, not more than seven or eight. There's a beautiful view, a pool, not much to do except eat, drink and lie in the sun. We've got lots of CDs, Netflix, all that.'

She has three children, four grandchildren. Her eldest daughter, Tara Newley, is a novelist and has two children: a girl called Miel and a boy called Weston.

Then there's her only son, Alexander Newley, who's a novelist too and also has two children: an girl called Ava Grace and a one-and-a-half-year-old called Deia Shanaya.

Collins's youngest daughter, Katyana Kass, known as Katy, is the most private. She appeared as a baby in one film in 1973, The Optimists of Nine Elms, but there's not much known about what she did after.

Are they in awe? 'I don't talk about my career, they don't want to hear about that.'

Any contemporaries left alive to invite? 'Yes!' She thinks. 'Michael Caine.'

Who does she miss most?

'Roger Moore. And my sister, of course.'

Jackie died of breast cancer aged 77 in 2015. I venture they only became close at the end of her life. 'No, we were terribly close a good four or five years before she died. All siblings have rifts. We still loved each other.

I was devastated. I kept thinking, 'It's not possible, why?'

Their mother, Elsa, died from the disease in 1962, aged 52. 'Even when the bombs were dropping in London and we were in an air-raid shelter, she would never let us see a newspaper, she would make jokes about it, so we never felt threatened or upset.

She kept everything inside, never showed fear, and I think that contributed to her cancer. She was a great mother. We ate organic greens, she sent me to ballet school when I was two or three. I've danced all my life.'

Her sister would never go for a mammogram, but Collins gets checked regularly. 'I'm practically a hypochondriac! You have to put the work in. Last year, I had a back problem and was in a wheelchair.

'I had physio three times a week, and now I swim every day. Nothing happens without the work.'

The sisters were pioneering feminists: Jackie with her steamy novels encouraging women to be selfish in bed, Joan with her portrayal of her sister's heroine, Fontaine, in The Stud. It was 1978: 'No one at first was interested in a woman slightly over 40 having sex, showing her breasts. It was shocking.' Collins did Playboy aged 50: 'The only cover I was ever paid for.'

Despite the #MeToo movement, does she think feminism has regressed, given the likes of Florence Pugh are now walking the red carpet in see-through dresses?

'They think it's empowering. But I see it as showing off. You know your breasts and the crack in your bottom will get you more space in the papers and the most likes. I'm trying to think of someone who doesn't do it!'

What does Collins think of Meghan and Catherine? 'Meghan isn't really in my consciousness. Catherine never puts a foot wrong.' (She's not too keen on Kate's favourite label, Alexander McQueen. When she was made a dame in 2015 for services to children's charities, she wanted to wear McQueen, but designer Sarah Burton demurred.)

She is soon to play that other great royal pariah, the Duchess of Windsor, in a new biopic, In Bed with the Duchess, depicting the last years of her life. 'I think she was somewhat maligned… The press can put a noose around your neck by giving you a title, like they did with me: the Bitch.

'I know I made the movie but some people have made movies called The Murderer and they aren't tagged with that.'

How did she celebrate her 90th birthday in May? 'I didn't celebrate, OK? Please don't mention age again. I don't talk about my age, I don't want to be identified with an age group, because it's all different.

'Biden might as well be 105. It's a question of your physicality and mental abilities. I think people give up. There's so much, 'Oh, women over 40.' I had that. I looked fabulous when I was 40. Some of it can hurt, but I just think about how I am as a person. My life is really good. I was born with a happy gene.

'Everyone thinks I wear wigs all the time but I don't. I have fine hair, I wear it scraped back, which doesn't look too bad. My husband loves it. I haven't gone grey. During Covid, I stopped going to the hairdresser, let it fly loose, and it's almost twice as thick now.'

Collins doesn't believe in cosmetic surgery, or anything with needles (Jackie, on the other hand, had a nose job).

'I've had nothing done. I tried Botox once, this was the late 1980s, I'm needle phobic anyway. I screamed and rushed out and I've never been back. I'm very happy with the way I look.'

She puts her enduring beauty down to good nutrition and exercise. Is she obsessive about food?

'I don't believe in being obsessed about anything. There's too much obsession about treatments and whatever that stuff is they're sticking in their bodies to make them thinner.'

What does she think about Davina McCall et al who won't stop moaning about the menopause?

'Me and my girlfriends, all the same generation, none of us had a problem with it. I think the reason today so many women have problems is the poisonous stuff in our diets. I took HRT for 20 years, thought when I stopped I'd turn into a crone but I didn't. I married Percy, so I wasn't a crone.'

She met Percy in 2000. A theatre producer, he was working on her US tour. They were married at Claridge's two years later.

He's 32 years her junior. I tell her I don't believe an age gap works. My ex-husband used it as a stick to beat me with.

'I've been reading [in the Daily Mail] about your horrible husband,' she says. 'What a nightmare! He sounds worse than all four of mine put together! You keep going back to your exes, why is that?'

Relationship counselling from Joan Collins! I tell her she's lucky to have found someone supportive.

'My husband is happy with the way I look. If I say, 'Should I do something about my neck or my eyes?' he'll say,''No, I love you the way you are. I don't want you to change anything.'

Is it harder, getting older when you have been a great beauty? 'I don't think it's a curse. If you're born with a certain amount of good looks, which I was, and if you take care of yourself and you do not abuse yourself by booze, drugs, too much sun and the wrong food, I think you can still look pretty good.'

Collins left Rada aged 17, lured by a contract with Rank, the British film studio.

I wonder if she tended to marry beneath her to retain control of her career. 'My first husband [Maxwell Reed] was a very famous movie star in England. He might have been inferior in many ways. My second, Anthony Newley, was a genius.'

She was 17 when she met Reed, who was 32. He drugged then raped her on their first date. In those days, it was the done thing to marry the person who took your virginity.

They wed in 1952 but by 1955 she was in Los Angeles, under contract to 20th Century Fox, and they divorced in 1956.

The Hollywood years of the 1950s and early 1960s must have been thrilling: the day she arrived she spotted Fred Astaire, out window-shopping; the well-documented romance with Warren Beatty who, when she became pregnant, promptly arranged an abortion – Collins was 26. She hung out with Paul Newman, Steve McQueen, Brando: he'd raid her fridge for ice cream.

Back in London, in 1963 she married Anthony Newley. He had been a child star, playing the Artful Dodger in the 1948 David Lean adaptation of Oliver Twist. 'He was a serial womaniser,' she says.

'I wouldn't have married him if I'd known. He had this insatiable urge.' They had two children – Tara, born in 1963, and Alexander, in 1965, and divorced in 1971.

She met Ron Kass, who worked in the music business. They married in 1972, and quickly had a daughter, Katy, who, aged eight, was knocked down by a car and went into a coma with serious head injuries.

Collins camped outside the hospital for six weeks (Katy recovered and is now a mother). She stayed home, even cooked. But then Kass insisted they move back to Los Angeles.

She became the breadwinner. Unknown to her, Kass was plundering her earnings to fund his drug habits, but hid how bad it had got.

'Honestly, it was shattering. My brother, Bill, came to stay, and he said, 'What are all these unopened bank statements on your husband's desk?'

I said, 'I don't deal with the banking, Ron deals with it. I act, I write, I'm a mother. I look after Katy [who was still recovering].' I found out £100,000 – all that I had – had been embezzled. [Kass forged her signature. She won't discuss his drug use, out of respect for their daughter.] I had to sell my beautiful house, another in Marbella. I had three children to support. Dynasty saved me.'

US TV mogul Aaron Spelling needed a ratings boost for an ailing show. Collins pipped Sophia Loren and Elizabeth Taylor at the post. Ah, the glorious years (1981-89) of Alexis when she was watched, at the show's peak, by 150 million worldwide. Her lines were fantastic.

'I didn't ad-lib as such, but I did suggest some of the dialogue. It worked because viewers like seeing attractive people having a miserable life. During Covid, we opened a Dynasty box set: my god, I thought it was good.'

Her acerbic wit is sharp today. She enjoyed Succession but found the clothes 'hideous'. When we talk about Taylor, she snaps, 'Elizabeth was a girl's girl. And very good with money.'

To promote her latest memoir, she is about to tour the UK with Joan Collins: Behind the Shoulder Pads. As well as St Tropez, she has homes in London's Belgravia and LA. Does she need the money? She banks at Coutts, after all.

'Yes, and I haven't been excommunicated! I don't need to, but I have heavy family responsibilities, I won't go into it. It's hard work being an actress. I ask for questions from the audience. Percy goes round with a mic. Everyone is very polite.'

What if someone were to ask if you still have sex? 'I would say that's a very intrusive and rude question.'

How is she with social media? 'I have an old smartphone. Percy keeps on at me to get a new one. I'm not doing Twitter any more. I have strong opinions but I don't want to be cancelled.'

I wouldn't have thought that she was scared of anything.

'I'm not scared, I just don't want to stick my toe into a boiling cauldron of hatred.'

What I love most about Collins is her confidence: too many of us claim imposter syndrome.

She's so together, so unapologetic, so respectful when talking about her husband when all we do these days is – sorry, Joan – bitch.

I don't let on that we once met, in 1999, at a party in aid of a breast-cancer charity. She was gracious, adept at small talk.

She even smelled wonderful. Joan Collins for Prime Minister! One final question. Has she planned her funeral and, if so, who's invited?

'Oh, shut up! Is this article about death?! It would be quite nice to hit 100.