By David Raether
Judi Dench is one of the greatest actresses in the history of Britain.
“Well, that’s what people say,” is what my grandmother would reply to a claim like that. She was wary of praise for anyone or anything. (Although, to be fair, if you didn’t praise her cinnamon rolls, you were quickly on your way out the door.)
Regardless of what my grandmother would say, this is what people say about Judi Dench. People regard her as one of the finest actresses in British history. That assessment is primarily based on her work in the British theater. She has played every major female Shakespearean role during her long career on the stage—starting with her stage debut as Ophelia in an Old Vic production of Hamlet in 1957. In fact, the film Shakespeare Love features two roles that Dench has played on stage: Juliet from Romeo and Juliet and Viola from Twelfth Night.
She has a steady, substantial, and not-to-be-trifled-with manner in all her roles. Dench is 87 years old this year and has been a working actress for 63 years. And yet, her filmography is not as prolific as you would think. Furthermore, most of her performances are in supporting roles. It is a tribute to her skill, power, and presence as an actress that every movie she is in always seems, well, like a Judi Dench movie.
Take Shakespeare in Love (1999), for instance. Dench plays Queen Elizabeth and has a mere eight minutes of screen time in the film. But try to imagine that movie without her. It’s impossible.
Dench was never all that interested in being in the movies. She said it herself. “All I wanted to do was Shakespeare and be on the stage,” she once told an interviewer. It is this commitment to the theater that makes her so highly regarded (and beloved) in England.
Judi Dench was born in the village of Heworth, in York, to an Irish mother and an English father. Her father was a doctor; her parents met while students at Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland. They were Quakers, so she was raised and educated in that faith and remains a Quaker to this day. For those unaware, Quakers are members of a small branch of Christianity (only 210,000 globally and a mere 17,000 in the UK) that emphasizes each person’s “light within.” Regarding her Quaker faith, she once remarked, “It means everything to me. I don’t know what I would do without it.”
Dench was introduced to the stage when she accompanied her father on visits to the York Theater, where he was the troupe’s doctor. Initially interested in being a theater designer, she grew attracted to the stage from seeing her brother perform. Dench attended the prestigious Royal Central School of Theater and Drama in London, where one of her classmates was Vanessa Redgrave. In 1957, she made her stage debut in a performance at the Old Vic theater in Liverpool. Dench then spent nearly a decade appearing almost exclusively in Shakespeare productions, even playing Juliet at one point early on. In the late 1960s, she had an audition for a major film role but was told she didn’t have “the right look.” This shook her interest in film, and from 1968 until 1974, she didn’t appear in a single movie.
Another 11 years would pass while she continued to work steadily—and brilliantly—with the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Old Vic, and the National Theater. In 1985, she appeared as the English novelist Eleanor Lavish in James Ivory’s memorable romance based on E. M. Forster's novel, A Room With a View.
Her breakout role didn’t come until 1995 when she appeared as M, the head of MI5, in the James Bond movie GoldenEye. The movie also featured Pierce Brosnan as the new James Bond. She would go on to appear in eight Bond movies as M, the role for which she is now most famous.
Two other actors portrayed M before Dench, and both of them portrayed him as a tusty and put-upon headmaster at a boarding school that dealt with Bond as if he were a high-spirited teenager. Dench’s version is anything but. She plays M as a cold, imperious master of the spying netherworld.
Her appearances in these enormously popular, critically acclaimed movies opened up a budding film career that finally began to kick into high gear in her 60s. That’s right, Judi Dench didn’t become a big movie star until she was entering the age where most people started looking to retire.
She’s now been nominated for eight Academy Awards, all of which have come during her 60s, 70s, and now late 80s. She won the Best Supporting Oscar for her performance in Shakespeare In Love.
Overall, Dench seems to be a thoroughly commendable person. She has routinely been involved with Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) that work with oppressed and impoverished native peoples around the globe. And she does this work quietly. She was married once to the actor Michael Williams from 1971 until his death from lung cancer in 2001. Together, they had one daughter, the actress Finty Williams. Since 2013, she has been in a relationship with conservationist David Mills.
Dench has also spoken out against the prejudice older actresses face. "I'm tired of being told I'm too old to try something. I should be able to decide for myself if I can't do things and not have someone tell me I'll forget my lines or I'll trip and fall on the set. [...] Age is a number. It's something imposed on you. It drives me absolutely spare when people say, 'Are you going to retire? Isn't it time you put your feet up?"
And my favorite fact about Judi Dench? She is a lifelong supporter of Everton FC, the other soccer club in Liverpool.
Here are five Judi Dench movies I strongly advise you to add to your queue.
In 1985, when she was 52 years old, Dench returned to the movies after a nearly ten-year absence. By this time, she had already established one of the most extraordinary careers in British theater, but her filmography up to that point was scant and not particularly notable. However, Director James Ivory decided to give her a relatively minor role as a gadfly English novelist in this utterly enchanting movie about falling in love in Italy during a summer tour in the 1890s. Ivory’s decision paid off—Dench is perfect in the role.
This is a great movie to watch on a Friday night when you’ve finished another stressful week at work and just need to escape to a place where people are overdressed and exceptionally polite. What a relief from the brutes you’ve been dealing with all week at work! The script was written by Ruth Pravwer Jhabvala and is based on the E. M. Forster novel of the same name. The exceptional cast also includes Helena Bonham Carter, Julian Sands, the redoubtable Maggie Smith, Daniel Day-Lewis, and Denholm Elliot. Let me just say this: you need this movie. Toss it in the queue.
Another ten years passed, and Dench’s film output was modest at best. The James Bond franchise had sort of run its course by 1989. After 16 films, James Bond movies had devolved into near caricatures of themselves, so a new Bond was cast—Pierce Brosnan. And then some genius decided to recast the role of spymaster M with Dench playing the part. She was the first woman—and thus far, still the only woman—to play the role. The decision to cast a woman in the role was apparently based on the real career of Stella Rimington, the first woman to head MI5, who was still in that position when this movie was made.
Dench really dug her teeth into the role and made it her own. In her first meeting with Bond, she pours him a bourbon (after he asks for cognac) and then proceeds to tell him, “I think you’re a sexist, misogynist dinosaur, a relic of the Cold War, whose boyish charms are wasted on me.” Pow! Right in the kisser. Okay, now we’re dealing with an entirely different kind of Bond movie. Gone were the double entendres and smirk—for the most part. Dench would go on to appear in seven Bond films over the next twenty years. Her performance here is sharp-edged and intense. GoldenEye made her an international star at the age of 61, and in the ensuing years, her film output soared. Thankfully. This just proves that hiring a 60-something veteran is a good idea.
Rarely does a role seem so completely suited for an actor than Judi Dench as Queen Elizabeth. Of all the portrayals of Queen Elizabeth on film, this one is my favorite. This is a charming movie that tells the story (or at least screenwriter Tom Stoppard’s imaging) of the writing and first production of Romeo and Juliet. The film focuses on the romance between Shakespeare (Joseph Fiennes) and the wealthy Viola de Lesseps (Gwyneth Paltrow). Dench is on screen for just eight minutes, but what a performance! How many times have you seen this movie? Two? Three? Or, in my case, 11? It doesn’t matter. When she utters her signature line: “I know something of a woman in a man’s profession. Yes, by God, I do know something about that,” chills still go down my spine. John Madden directed the film from a screenplay by Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard, the latter of whom also served as the playwright of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.
This is the first Daniel Craig Bond film, one that turns Bond into a contemporary action hero instead of a witty, debonair, tuxedoed playboy. Early on in the film, Craig’s Bond orders a martini. “Shaken or stirred?” the bartender asks. “Oh, who cares?” says this new Bond. It’s clear that Dench dug even deeper into M for this picture and emerges practically a co-star to Craig as a result. Craig himself said of the changes Dench brought to the character, “We had Judi Dench. Why not let her run with it?” The ensuing Bond films would cement this relationship in all its contentious, hard-hearted glory.
The action here takes place early in Bond’s career, not long after he has received his license to kill. It’s truly one of the most gorgeous Bond installments. The movie was based on the 1954 British television series of the same name and the 1967 “non-canonical” Bond film of the same name that featured David Niven, Peter Sellers, and Woody Allen. I actually saw the latter years ago, and it was awfully funny. It would be great to see that version re-released.
Dench and Craig made two Bond films together: Quantum of Silence (2008) and Skyfall (2012). For my money, these are the three best Bond films, and I have to give the lion’s share of the credit to Dench for this. She plays M like I imagine a real M might be—professional, hard-minded, and secretly sentimental. If you decide to add this movie to your queue, be sure to add the other two as well. Then you can have your very own Judi-Dench-Was-the-Best-M movie festival at home. And you’ll enjoy every second.
Now we come to my favorite movie on the list. Dench plays Philomena, a working-class woman who gave up a son from an out-of-wedlock pregnancy and then spends nearly 50 years looking for him. Like all good stories, this one is true, based on the non-fiction book The Lost Child of Philomena Lee by Martin Sexsmith. British comedian, writer, and actor Steve Coogan plays a journalist whose career is on the ash heap—until he meets Philomena and realizes he has the tale of a lifetime to cover.
I am so used to seeing Dench playing magisterial characters—especially from Shakespeare—so it’s marvelous to see her playing a blunt-talking, working-class woman. Directed by Stephen Frears from a screenplay co-written by Coogan and Jeff Pope, Philomena is a deeply touching and often very funny movie that you won’t soon forget. And I say again; this is my favorite on this list. I hope that’s enough to coax you into adding it to your queue.
David Raether is a veteran TV writer and essayist. He worked for 12 years as a television sitcom writer/producer, including a 111-episode run on the ground-breaking ABC comedy “Roseanne.” His essays have been published by Salon.com, The Times of London, and Longforms.org, and have been lauded by The Atlantic Magazine and the BBC World Service. His memoir, Homeless: A Picaresque Memoir from Our Times, is awaiting publication.