❤❤H eart ❤ ❤ to Heart Actress Penelope Wilton chats about Downton and Best Exotic Marigold Hotel co-star Dame Maggie Smith, her fascination for India and her joy at becoming a grandmother for the first time By Alison James
‘Why Dame Maggie is my heroine’ Real-life friends: Off screen, there is none of the rivalry played out by Penelope and Maggie’s Downton characters
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❙ star chat ❙ enelope Wilton is in the middle of filming the third series of Downton Abbey, which starts on ITV in September. While some things are bound to have changed at the Grantham family’s stately pile, there is one element that will hopefully remain the same – the spats between the forwardthinking Isobel Crawley and her nemesis, old-school aristocrat the Dowager Duchess of Grantham, played by a veritable member of the acting aristocracy, Dame Maggie Smith. Penelope just loves those scenes. “They are so much fun to play,” she says, “especially as Maggie and I are great friends.” Penelope says that Dame Maggie is also a personal heroine. “When I was starting out as an actress, the person I admired more than anyone else was Maggie Smith. I used to go and see her in everything at the National Theatre and I remember wishing I could be like her. Downton Abbey was the first time I’d acted with Maggie and it was such a thrill.” So, working with her again on the smash hit movie The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, which has just been released on DVD, must have made for double delight. “Oh absolutely,” Penelope agrees. “We had such a wonderful time. In addition to Maggie, I was also working with Judi Dench, Celia Imrie, Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson and Ronald Pickup. I’d worked with all of them before on various projects so it was like being with old friends – and we were in India! I’d never been to India before and I adored it. Everything is so vibrant and, as Judi’s character says in the film, it really does assault all your senses – the noise, the sights, the smells and so on.” During breaks in filming, Penelope, Maggie, Judi, and Celia used to go and explore the area.
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The cast of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel at the London premiere. Right: Penelope plays unhappy wife, Jean
‘Working with the cast was like being with old friends – and we were in India!’ “We even hired bicycles,” says Penelope. “We girls were much more adventurous than the boys. They tended to stay put until their wives arrived. I’d love to go back.” The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel tells the tale of a group of assorted British retirees who travel to India to take up residence in what they wrongly believe is a newly-restored hotel. Penelope plays Jean, who is unhappily married to Bill Nighy’s character and arguably the least sympathetic person in the film. “Well, she’s having a difficult time,” Penelope explains. “She’s the kind of person who thinks everything in her life will change for the better if she moves to a different, totally new place. She seems to forget that she’s still the same person wherever she is. You can’t run away from yourself – I think sometimes people forget
that. I’m not going to say what happens because I don’t want to spoil it for people watching the film on DVD but Jean does go some way to redeeming herself in the end.” The film has been a runaway success – both here and in the US. Is Penelope surprised by the popularity? “Yes – and no,” she laughs. “When you’re making a film or TV drama or you’re doing a play in the theatre, you just hope you’re doing something that people will like. This film has no special effects or gimmicks, yet people like it for what it is, which is marvellous. It’s about a group of people who are in their 60s – my age – and there aren’t YOURS
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Style notes
21anti-ageing b We all want to look the best we can without spending a fortune, so we’ve scoured the shops for the best budget anti-ageing buys priced from just £1.50
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Boots Time Delay Mature Skin Repair Anti Age Spot Serum (£7.33/30ml) Age spots become more visible once you’re in your 50s. Using a product to help reduce their appearance will keep you looking young. Apply twice daily after cleansing.
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L’Oreal Wrinkle Decrease Collagen Re-modeller (£7/50ml) An intensive filler to help reduce the appearance of deep wrinkles, especially around the eyes and mouth.
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Nivea Visage Q10 Plus Anti-Wrinkle Pore Refining day cream SPF15 (£9.99/50ml) A quarter of women have enlarged pores, which become more obvious as we age. This day cream has seaweed extracts to refine pores, plus creatine and Q10 to speed up skin cell renewal. 36
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Boots Time Delay Wrinkle Reduce Night Cream (£7.33/50ml) This antioxidant firming complex helps to repair your skin while you sleep, to give you a younger, more radiant complexion in the morning.
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Neutrogena Multi-Defence Daily Moisturiser SPF15 (£7.99/52ml) Your number one anti-ageing ally is a moisturiser with SPF15+ protection to guard against future wrinkles and age spots. This one ticks all the boxes, plus it’s easily absorbed and great value.
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Dirty Works Lift + Firm Super Skin Serum (£7.99/30ml) Apply serum first then moisturise and apply foundation for instantly smoother, tighter and more radiant skin. This contains calendula, panthenol, butcher’s broom and yeast extract to stimulate skin cell renewal and fight ageing signs.
g beauty heroes ... from £1.50
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Garnier Caffeine Anti-Dark Circles Eye Roll-on (£5.09/15ml) The cooling rollerball soothes tired eyes, while caffeine reduces puffiness and mineral pigments will conceal dark circles.
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Palmer’s Line Smoothing Eye Cream (£6.95/15g) Eyes are the first area to show ageing signs. This cream is a soothing blend of cocoa butter, aloe and evening primrose oil combined with age-busting retinol and peptides to target lines. Use twice daily.
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Phytaoil (£9.99/60ml) This contains rosehip oil, the latest beauty anti-ageing must-have ingredient. It’s a powerful antioxidant to fight the ageing effects of free radicals. The oil also contains anti-ageing Vitamins A and E plus natural oils extracted from apricot kernel, jojoba seed, lavender, lime and geranium to help skin renew faster.
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Dr Nick Lowe Redness Relief Calming Cream (£15.31/50ml) Mature skin is prone to flushing, especially after the menopause. This contains arnica, and chamomile to calm colour, Vitamins A, C and E to nourish skin, and is slightly tinted to cover redness.
Superdrug Vitamin E Hot Cloth Cleanser (£5.99/200ml) This gentle cleansing cream, which you remove with warm water on a muslin cloth, exfoliates skin while it cleanses and leaves it hydrated, too. Designed for normal/dry skin, it works just as well as its more expensive competitors.
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The Body Shop Vitamin E Neck Gel (£9/30ml) How many of us finish our skincare routine at the chin? Necks are an age giveaway, so look after yours with a nourishing cream. This contains Vitamin E and wheatgerm oil to care for delicate skin.
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E45 Nourish & Restore body lotion (£3.99/250ml) Designed especially for mature skin, it contains Vitamin B3 to restore suppleness in just three weeks. It hydrates skin for up to 24 hours and is suitable for sensitive skin, too. YOURS
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Recharge your
health
There’s no such thing as a healthy sun tan, so follow our expert guide to keeping your skin safe this summer By Rebecca Speechley ale might be interesting, but most of us would like to look a little tanned – especially in summer. The sun might make you look and feel better, but in the long term too much sun accelerates skin ageing and ups the risk of sun cancer. Whether you’re seeking sun on a far-flung beach or having a ‘staycation’, be sure to pack your sun cream. Regularly applying a high factor SPF sun cream is the best protection against skin cancer. But a shocking one in four women are ignoring the risk, according to cancer support charity Macmillan. A huge 100,000 people are diagnosed with skin cancer each year in the UK. Of those, 8,000 have the deadliest form of skin cancer, melanoma. “Your risk of melanoma increases as you age because your skin has had more time to become damaged by harmful UV rays,” says Anna Gucova, nurse specialist at The Mole Clinic (www.themoleclinic. co.uk). “If you’ve been worshipping the sun for years your risk of skin cancer will be higher, especially if you’ve been burnt or used sunbeds. A single case of bad sunburn could double your chances of getting skin cancer. And, using a sunbed before the age of 35 increases the risk of melanomas by 75 per cent.” But, it’s never too late to start protecting yourself and prevent further damage. Follow these rules to keep safe in the sun.
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Forget anything under SPF 30
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Cover up
“Use a minimum of SPF 30 to protect yourself against burning,” says Anna. “Look at the back of your sun cream bottle – there should be a star rating to tell you the level of protection the cream offers against skin-ageing UV rays. Opt for lotion with a five-star UV rating (the highest) to protect against premature ageing.”
No sun cream, no matter what the factor, can provide 100 per cent protection from the sun – so it makes sense to take precautions. Stay in the shade between 11am and 3pm and always wear a hat, sunglasses and loose clothing if you’re out in the sunshine.
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Buy a new bottle
Sun cream expires, so that bottle you had left over from last year won’t provide as much sun protection as it claims on the box. Get a fresh bottle and keep applying it. According to the experts at www.sunsmart. org.uk you should use about two teaspoonfuls of sunscreen if you’re just covering your head, arms and neck, and around two tablespoonfuls if you’re covering your entire body while wearing a swimming costume. Pack plenty and buy your sun cream in the UK if you’re going abroad – other countries might not have such strict regulations to guarantee the SPF of their sun tan lotions.
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Fake it
While fake tan doesn’t protect your skin from UV damage, it could help to reduce your risk of skin cancer. US researchers have found that women who get their tan from a bottle are less likely to spend time in the sun or under sunbeds – which, in turn, lowers their risk of skin cancer. Visit www.yours.co.uk/ faketan to find out how to get a gorgeous, but fake, golden glow.
Spotting the damage Even if you’re fanatical about sun protection, you still need to check your skin regularly for signs of cancer. “Use the ABCDE rule to help you spot the signs,” says Anna. A is for Asymmetrical shape ✤ For more details on spotting sun – where one half of the mole is unlike damage visit www.yours.co.uk/ the other molecheck B is for Border –irregularity, or where ✤ See your GP if you notice any of these the mole is scalloped or poorly defined changes. Alternatively, visit The Mole C is for Colour – that varies from one Clinic – an independent screening area to another, or has different shades centre for skin cancer, with clinics in of tan, brown, black many Superdrug stores nationwide. A D is for Diameter – of a mole when it is single mole check costs from £30 and a bigger than 7mm full body screening from £90. E is for Evolving – or changing size, Call 0845 6789 111 or visit shape or colour www.themoleclinic.co.uk for locations.
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d follow! reapply and reapply again 5 Apply,
Even if you’ve bought sun cream that claims you only need to apply it once a day, keep rubbing it on. Sand, water, sweat and even just moving around makes sun cream rub off, leaving your skin exposed to UV damage. “Put on your sun tan lotion half an hour before going into the sun, let it soak in, then apply another layer,” says Carol Goodman, a Macmillan information nurse specialist. “The lotion should be applied thickly to skin, or the protection you get may only be a quarter of what the bottle says. Reapply every hour to maintain protection.”
‘Put sun lotion on half an hour before going into the sun, let it soak in, then apply another layer’ What about Vitamin D? Vitamin D is made in your skin in response to sunshine. Researchers linked having sufficient Vitamin D to a lower risk of heart disease, osteoporosis, some cancers and strokes – so it’s important that you get enough. Experts advise getting ten minutes of sun cream-free sunshine a day to top up Vitamin D levels. After that, it’s time to slap on your sun cream. “It’s important to remember that sun cream reduces the Vitamin D production – it doesn’t eliminate it completely,” says Anna. Plus if you leave your skin unprotected and you get burnt the damage to your skin actually depletes Vitamin D levels, so take care.
Turn the page for Lorraine Kelly’s call to action... YOURS
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allocated a display window on the side of the building. Although this was plate glass, it had probably been installed in the Twenties, and the layout of the interior space was odd and inconvenient. The display area comprised an upright metal stand with glass shelves. The distance from the shelves to the window was narrow, and the only way to get there was to roll under the bottom shelf, then straighten up. As I suffered from claustrophobia, this was not something I enjoyed doing. Having got upright, my job was to dress the narrow shelves as well as I could by displaying underwear and children’s clothes on inadequate stands. When this had been done, I had to roll out again. My antics must have seemed odd to passers-by, but fortunately, as I had my back to them most of the time, I was unaware of any stares or sniggers. Between serving customers, most of my time was spent ironing new items when they were delivered, before they were displayed or put in drawers. I found ironing piles of underslips boring – and I even had to iron knickers! Today, when I see crumpled clothes on hangers in shops, I am reminded of the hours I spent at the ironing board. How times change. I found my relationship with Miss U quite odd. For a start, she seemed to have great difficulty in remembering my surname and, of course, nothing as informal as Christian names were allowed. My maiden name was White,
and she seemed to recollect that it was some colour or other, so called me Miss Green or Miss Brown! Also, in spite of finding fault with my work, she must have thought it was all right, as she insisted that I qualified as a corset fitter. So, several hours a week, I studied the lessons supplied, and eventually passed my exam. I then became the owner of a corsetry certificate supplied by the famous Berlei corsetry manufacturer. In those days, the principle of ‘The customer is always right’ was still very much in vogue, and I did my best to be polite and professional and not upset anyone – but once I slipped up badly. A customer came into our department, accompanied by a crop-haired teenager dressed in slacks and a loose top, and asked for garments for the youngster. “I’m sorry, madam, but for clothes suiting your son’s age you need to go to the men’s department,” I said. Imagine my embarrassment when she exclaimed indignantly, “She’s a girl!” Although I quite liked working in a shop, as time passed I began to think that I had chosen the wrong kind of shop to work in. Eventually, I left the store and prickly Miss U behind, and found a job in a grocer’s shop in Lyme Regis. I worked there happily for a number of years, and corsets and difficult windows became things of the past. And, as an even bigger bonus, there was no dreaded ironing to be done!
Yours Have you got an amazing story to tell? We’ll pay up to £100 for
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every story we print. Send your story (no more than 1,000 words) and pictures to: ‘Your Memories’, Yours magazine, Media House, Peterborough Business Park, Peterborough PE2 6EA. Or you can email your stories and pictures to laura.bradder@bauermedia.co.uk
Do you remember...
The Honeycombs D Even at the height of the Sixties music scene, pop had never seen a girl drummer. But when Honey Lantree showed she could drum, sing and look good – people took notice. D Honey, a hairdresser’s assistant with a beehive hairstyle, her boss, Martin Murray, her brother John and two friends were originally The Sheratons. They were so popular that their London pub would shut its doors when they played to stop more people crowding in. It was there they were spotted by songwriters Ken Howard and Alan Blaikley, who composed songs for Lulu and Elvis. D Howard and Blaikley renamed them The Honeycombs (a combination of Honey’s name and job) and their song Have I The Right reached No 1 in 1964. They never repeated the success and split within three years, shortly after their record producer, Joe Meek, committed suicide. D The Honeycombs – led by Martin Murray – and The New Honeycombs, with associations to the original group, still perform. Honey – real name is Ann – has long cut her ties with showbiz to be a gran!
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Earning a certificate to fit the famous Berlei corset, modelled here, was the highlight of Rosemary’s career in corsetry
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y knitting y
partypretty Knit the perfect cover-up for baby’s first party dress for
knitters with more experience
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