Dame Judi Dench likes that her mother was honest with her growing up.
The ‘Best Exotic Marigold Hotel’ star is glad her mom told her she was "intolerant" as a young girl because she feels it has helped her become a better person.
She told The Sunday Times’ Culture magazine: "Oh, I don’t know. I have a happy nature. I have been very, very unhappy, like everybody, but usually I have quite a sunny nature, which is something you don’t manufacture. It’s either something you’re born with, or you’re not. And I think that comes from my parents. They had great, great senses of humour …
"Well, I remember my mother saying to me when I was at art school, ‘You are without doubt the most intolerant person I’ve ever met.’ I think I found fault with everything. And I remember not being able to say anything back, and just looking out of the window. She said it to my back. It’s very good to be told that early. I hope [I took it on board]. Because I think I am quite tolerant now. To a certain extent."
Meanwhile, the 82-year-old actress previously criticised young actors for their apparent lack of interest in theatre greats.
She said: "What is so shocking is that young actors don’t want to find out about the legacy that we’ve been left. They don’t want to know about David Garrick and Sir Henry Irving and Peggy Ashcroft and Edith Evans, and that seems to me to be a terrible shame.
"Because although the fashion now may not be to speak the way that John and Peggy and Ralph Richardson and Sir Laurence Olivier spoke, nevertheless if you listen to Sir John you will always get what Shakespeare means.
"They’re just not curious. It’s just non-curiosity. I think it’s terribly important to know the huge history of theatre that we have, why you’re in it, what people did before, the lives of actors."
Dame Judi Dench prefers honesty
