For the first time ever the legendary Joanna Lumley is embarking on a thirty-date UK tour throughout the Autumn months (2018). The tour, “All About Me” takes the audience through the expansive career of the model-turned-actress, through Lumley’s hilarious and interesting adventures from her incredible career spanning more than four decades. It recounts some never heard before stories.
Joining her on stage (for Act 2) was friend and producer Clive Tulloh, who put some of the audiences questions to Lumley (following question cards and pens being available in the interval and collected by theatre staff before Act 2 commenced).
Despite my attending the tour a couple of weeks into the stretch of it (having started in Belfast on 6th October), and most dates now being sold out, along with tonight’s performance at Manchester’s Lowry Theatre, the event still had a lovely intimate audience feel with Lumley reaching out and engaging with the audience from start to finish.
The souvenir brochure (or scrapbook as it is referred to as) boasts hundreds of photographs from her career, with a projection screen on stage displaying a grand visual piece before the legend herself graced the stage. Dressed fashionably with some 'bang-on-trend' trainers on her feet, Joanna literally floated onto the stage, looking far younger than her seventy two years. She thanked the audience for being there and stated that she stays faithful to Manchester because of her role in Coronation Street (which we see clips of during the 1 hour and 45 minutes in-depth look back at her life and career) - where she had a small role as Ken Barlow’s girlfriend. She stated that she wanted to stay in Coronation Street and become Mrs. Barlow - and towards the end of the show Lumley referred back to this again stating that she eventually did become a Mrs. Barlow - when in real life she married a Stephen Barlow (but not the Corrie one!) in 1986.
As a child growing up in Kent, Lumley had a Catholic upbringing and education, attending The Convent Of Our Lady School in St Leonards-on-Sea, Sussex where she was advised to audition for RADA to which she says she was “thick as a plank and did not read the script” thus failing her RADA audition. Joanna has had no formal training at Drama School yet went on to become a household name.
When she failed at starting her acting career she turned to modelling instead (cue a video montage of photos of her early career as a model in the '60s - yet decades later and in her 70's Joanna still has the perfect model's figure whilst retaining her natural outstandingly good looks). Her first lesson in modelling from her then agent was “how to be graceful” and that “when you come into a room your hip bones should be the first thing people see”. A long conversation followed with several funny demonstrations from how to keep your legs together whilst getting in and out of a car and how to do your hair if you - like her - couldn’t afford Carmen heated rollers back in the day.
Although she admitted to the audience that she enjoyed modelling, she knew deep in her heart at the time that acting was where she really wanted to be in life. Following an appearance in a James Bond film (“On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”) Lumley tried her hand at West End theatre - only for her first role to be such a minor one where she was only in the very last scene! But this led onto her short (six episode) role in Coronation Street. Following this Lumley admitted she struggled to find further roles - resorting to playing the girlfriend of Harold in Steptoe and Son - a then popular TV show. After writing to fifty one companies in desperation to get work - her big break came when she was offered the role of Purdy in The New Avengers.
Her other major role - and probably the one she gets recognised for the most (depending on the age of the person I suppose) - is the louche, selfish and often-drunk fashion director Patsy Stone in the 1990s (1992-1996) and then 2001-2004 and 2011-2012 television series Absolutely Fabulous (which also stemmed a movie in 2016). On first meeting Jennifer Saunders she immediately asked her, “Can I call you Jen?” to which Saunders bluntly answered “No!” Speaking fondly of Jennifer Saunders, Lumley recalls off set she appeared shy until the pair got to know each other. Lumley also spoke fondly of “The Five Js” that formed the cast of Absolutely Fabulous (herself, June Whitfield, Jennifer Saunders, Julia Sawalha and Jane Horrocks).
Throughout the evening Lumley had the audience in fits of laughter as she re-enacted some of the highlights of the career, answered some of our burning questions and took us back in time with video clips of her long career. Towards the end Lumley said that “at 18 I wanted to be 21; at 21 I wanted to be 40; at 40 I wanted to be 50. Now I’ve got to 72 - I want to be 90!”
Acting has obviously kept Lumley looking so splendid - she doesn’t look a day over 50 and she continues to charm fans with her warm personality (she reminded me of the Gloworm toys in the 1980s - in the nicest possible way, because whilst ever Joanna Lumley is around to make fans laugh, the world could never be a dull or sad place).
“It’s All About Me” is an absolutely fab-U-lous insight into the wonderfully entertaining person that is Joanna Lumley. I feel so privileged to have witnessed this splendid tour.
Reviewer - Charlotte Davis-Browne
on - 14/10/18
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