Bette Midler isn’t sure she’s "strong" enough to tour any more.
The 74-year-old singer-and-actress would love to carry on performing for her fans but she’s unsure she’s physically fit enough or has the stamina for a series of concerts.
Asked if she thinks about performing again, Bette – who last toured in 2015 – said: "You know the old expression ‘The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak’?
"I still have interest, but I don’t know whether I am strong enough anymore."
And after live performances shut down due to the coronavirus pandemic, the ‘Wind Beneath My Wings’ hitmaker is unsure her fans will want to go to concerts again.
She told The Hollywood Reporter: "It’s a very hard question to answer, because you don’t know whether the audience will be there for you.
"A lot of my friends have called and said, ‘You know, it’s weird, but I think I’m retired.’ It’s not like you announce it or anything, the parade just sort of goes by.
"I know we’re all in a holding pattern — paddling around our ponds, learning and catching our breath — but, when this is all over, there will be a shakeout. I don’t know whether it will include my cohort.
"You just don’t know if they have, not just the energy to get into the car, but the money to buy a ticket.
"The schools, arenas, theatres and all places where people gather have a very steep climb ahead of them. Of course, if we had some leadership it wouldn’t be quite so bad — but we have none."
Bette can currently be seen playing Hadassah Gold in the second series of ‘The Politician’, having made her debut in the final episode of the first season, and she admitted she’s found filming a "tiring" experience, though she’s learned a lot.
She said: "I hadn’t worked on the streets of New York in a long time — and I have never done it in the winter, so that was a revelation. I was wearing a hot water bottle under my outfit. To be in the middle of Tribeca at rush hour was really … I’m old, too. Don’t forget.
"I’m old, and I’m wearing sensible shoes. I was wearing sensible shoes, I insisted on it.
"Really, it was exciting and exhilarating, but it was also tiring.
"I had never done anything like that. I had a little show in 2000 — a sitcom [Bette] that I didn’t understand, either — but I had never actually done episodic.
"I didn’t realise that you’d see a new director every week. It was like school for me, dipping my toe into yet another world."