The Mischief & The Majesty

As a young actress, Judi Dench was told she didn’t have the face for success in the movies. Decades later, the indomitable dame is swathed in accolades and this year, in her 80s, she has no less than four major film roles. Emma Clifton looks at how she became international acting royalty and why she detests being called a national treasure.

- Emma Clifton

At 84 years old, Judi Dench is one of the busiest actresses in Hollywood. But when she’s not playing a spy, or Shakespeare’s wife, or an elderly cat, or a gender-bending fairy police commander – yes, these are all actual roles for Judi in 2019 – you’ll find her in amongst her greatest passion: trees. “My life now is just trees. Trees and… um… and Champagne,” she says, with a characteristically naughty wink. But there is one particular place she goes to pay pilgrimage. For the past 30 years, Judi has been tending to her own area of woods at the back of her two-hectare property in Surrey – the area she keeps as a tribute to loved ones who have died. Every time Judy loses a close family member or friend, she plants a tree. There are trees for her husband Michael, her brother Geoff, actress and friend Natasha Richardson, and actor Robert Hardy. “I think of my trees as part of my extended family.”