Celebrities could learn a things Miriam Margolyes

As Alan Yentob’s Imagine program reminds us of how fortunate we are to have Miriam Margolyes, she opens up about her accomplishments and fears.

“Miriam Margolyes, Up for Grabs” (BBC One), the most recent Imagine… film, was a softly revealing portrait. That doesn’t seem very appropriate for an actress who enjoys being provocative and has found her niche as an outlandish talk show guest later in life. A previous co-star, Richard E Grant, described her as follows, “I think her volume button fell off at birth. She is like a five-year-old masquerading as an octogenarian.”

Margolyes decided to enliven proceedings by lifting up her T-shirt and flashing her breasts when she went into hair and make-up for Martin Scorsese’s adaptation of The Age of Innocence in 1993; Grant recalled that when Margolyes went into hair and make-up, she decided to enliven proceedings by lifting up her T-shirt and flashing her breasts. Margolyes explained that she had simply wished to lift everyone’s spirits after a difficult day.

However, the program revealed that this behavior is a cover-up. Margolyes described her shame and agony as an adolescent at school dances, where she was a “fat and ungainly” wallflower who was never invited to dance. We learnt that her following career in the spotlight was all about “getting attention, approval, and affection.”

That is not confined to the screen, or appearances on The Graham Norton Show. The film began, amusingly, with presenter Alan Yentob lurking behind a hedge while watching Margolyes sitting on the steps outside her front door and engaging passers-by in conversation. Apparently, she does this often.

Blackadder, Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet, Call the Midwife, Harry Potter, many Dickens adaptations, and her Bafta for The Age of Innocence are just a few examples of her amazing career. Most people know her as the famous Cadbury’s Caramel rabbit from the 1980s advertising, but did you know she also voiced the border collie in Babe, a PG Tips chimp, and a sexy lady in Manikin Cigars ads from the 1970s? When the latter’s director heard Margolyes, he was astonished, “I can’t believe that voice has come from that body.”

Margolyes is pathologically honest, saying that when the stress of her job became too much, she attacked her disabled mother. She was as candid about everything else, from her job worries to s**, admitting to being both baffled and excited by her newfound celebrity as she approaches her ninth decade. Some individuals find her obnoxious and overbearing. But, in a world when so many celebrities are PR-trained bores, we should be grateful for one who tries to entertain us.