Dame Judi Dench has disclosed the offensive remark made to her by a director that prevented her from appearing in significant roles in films for the best part of three decades.
By the time the 1960s arrived, Dench was already a well-known performer.In addition to her theatrical performances, she has also played a variety of TV characters.
When her agent arranged up an audition for her with a director, Dench began seriously considering making the switch to the film industry
Dench, however, made the decision to temporarily shelve her ambition to play a starring woman after overhearing a derogatory remark made by a director.
He was quite kind, but in the end he said, ‘You’ll never make a picture; you have the wrong appearance,’ according to 87-year-old actress Judi Dench.
That’s wonderful, I don’t like movies anyhow, she added, to which I replied, ‘That’s great.’ She admitted that she missed going to the theater.
And she did, but she would later have her big break at the age of 63 in the 1997 movie Mrs. Brown, playing Queen Victoria, giving the director a taste of his own medicine. The director received a dose of his own medication as a result.
She was even given consideration for an Oscar in the category of Best Actress in a Leading Role because of the excellent job she did in the part.
Despite not winning, Dench received an Oscar nomination the following year for her work in Shakespeare in Love, for which she later won the Best Actress in a Supporting Role prize.
Over the course of her acting career, she received a total of four additional nominations for the Academy Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role, the most recent of which was for her portrayal of Philomena in 2013.
For her roles in the movies Iris (2001), Mrs. Henderson Presents, Notes on a Scandal, and Iris, she had previously been nominated.
The 1960s movie director who didn’t think Judi Dench was spectacular obviously didn’t know what he was talking about.