Felicity Kendal Quotes

After making my stage debut aged nine as Macduff's small son in 'Macbeth,' I had played a number of parts, from 'Twelfth Night's Viola to 'The Merchant Of Venice's Portia'.

- Felicity Kendal

Every time we moved on, I joined a different class in a different school with different girls until, aged 13, my father had taken the decision to pull me out of school altogether. Everything I needed, he reasoned, could be found within the rich language of Shakespeare's plays at which, by then, I was something of an old hand.

- Felicity Kendal

I really do believe there are things passed down. Behaviour, not just DNA. Psychological make-up. You can see it in dogs. If you want to breed a calm dog, don't get two fighters.

- Felicity Kendal

As we have more women in power, so the plays and the TV dramas are reflecting what's happening.

- Felicity Kendal

I haven't done fillers or Botox for ages. There comes a point where you have to match bits of you with the other bits; otherwise, you get a terribly random situation.

- Felicity Kendal

So many roles for women demand that you make the audience fall in love with you or sympathise with you.

- Felicity Kendal

It's difficult to say what attracts one person to another. It's always a combination, isn't it? I've always found people interesting because of the way they think, and a sense of humour is irresistible.

- Felicity Kendal

When I was little I always thought I was marked out, special, on the verge of something momentous. I used to tingle with anticipation.

- Felicity Kendal

I love gentle, gorgeous classical music such as Mozart.

- Felicity Kendal

I have to say I am a 'Strictly' fan, which is why I am in it. I've always watched it for years. I am not an 'X Factor' fan, and I just think it is a different show. One is about learning something new and having a great time, and the other is rather desperate.

- Felicity Kendal

The problem men seem to have, and women, too, is that they have this very structured idea that we should find a partner and settle down and be, you know, faithful. And yet clearly this is really, really hard for anybody to do!

- Felicity Kendal

I think in the acting world you either manage that transition to older roles, or you stick with what you've always done and then discover nobody can bear you doing it as an older person.

- Felicity Kendal

Every woman feels she is too old and has missed the boat.

- Felicity Kendal

I wouldn't trade anything for family time. To me, it is more important than everything else, and I have a very deep-rooted belief in it, which is influenced by my Jewish faith. That's a very great source of who I am and what I believe in.

- Felicity Kendal

I do still get the odd fan letter about The Good Life, clearly written by somebody aged 18, who says: Will you send a photograph? And I think: Maybe it's kinder not to. I'm deeply into my 50s now.

- Felicity Kendal

I'm not very much of a foodie; I like small amounts of delicious things, but I've never overeaten - I'd much rather have a glass of wine.

- Felicity Kendal

I'm lucky in that I don't like sweet things at all. My father loved cakes to such a degree that he kept forcing them down my throat when I was little, and it put me off for life. He had terrible cholesterol, poor thing.

- Felicity Kendal

There is the most wonderful thing called Polaris: it's a very high frequency laser treatment that lifts and tightens the skin.

- Felicity Kendal

The gym is where I get my chill-out time. I try to go six days a week, but when I'm working, that goes down to about three.

- Felicity Kendal

In a play, the director is God, and I'm a great arguer. Rather boringly so, I think, about trying different things.

- Felicity Kendal

From the early days of the Raj, Shakespeare had been woven into the fabric of India's education, and my father understood that in a culture rich with storytelling and fantastical tales, Shakespeare's characters and storylines resonated in a powerful way.

- Felicity Kendal

I love a mask. It's why I've got a thing about good writing. When you're acting, you're going into someone else's work. You're behind his words; it's not you.

- Felicity Kendal

It was in India that I started my acting career, courtesy of my parents, long before I set foot on stage in England. They headed a company of travelling players performing Shakespeare up and down the land.

- Felicity Kendal

When I was much younger, I sometimes felt rejected by feminists because of an image that I sold because it paid the bills. Any fool could tell my hair is dyed.

- Felicity Kendal

Looking back, I got the bed I wanted and I lay in it. I didn't want to go to America. If you want to join that world, you have to go and live there, and that was something I could not have done. I am very much about family. It doesn't matter where I live, but I feel very needful of my people around me. Besides, theatre is my first love.

- Felicity Kendal

I am used to looking good. In a way, if I thought I looked like the back end of a bus, I probably wouldn't have done 'Strictly Come Dancing' and gone out there in public.

- Felicity Kendal

I think you have to relax about aging. What else can you do?

- Felicity Kendal

I think very few people do find a relationship where, every moment of every day, everything they do comes together. That's why, in a nutshell, everyone loved Barbara in 'The Good Life.' She was the perfect partner. It was a formula. She wasn't glamorous. She wasn't clever. But she was a good partner. That's too easy, too perfect.

- Felicity Kendal

It's nice not to have lines when you frown, especially on TV. I don't know why people make such a fuss about it. No one is interested if a woman has her teeth capped or her hair dyed.

- Felicity Kendal

I did try fillers once. Don't ever have fillers because when your cheekbones are high, it's chipmunk time.

- Felicity Kendal

My father was my trainer, my teacher. He was closer to my sister in the sense that she adored him and he adored her. He was more like my pal. Because of the 13-year gap, I think by the time I came along, it wasn't a big deal. I wasn't spoilt or cherished, I was just put to work.

- Felicity Kendal

Success breeds success, and failure leads to a sort of fallow period.

- Felicity Kendal

The girl-next-door image is a sort of joke; for years, I couldn't get any roles other than as somebody dark.

- Felicity Kendal

A lot of my close friends are nothing to do with show business. But the people I've had relationships with, invariably, I've worked with. I think that's probably because I grew up in a family where we all worked together, so it's something I feel comfortable with.

- Felicity Kendal

My parents were very volatile but very loving. My father would get jealous if my mother looked at somebody. I used to be insanely jealous. It comes out of insecurity. It can come and go, but you get to the point in life where you don't have this raging jealousy and protectiveness about your world.

- Felicity Kendal

We take ourselves so seriously moment by moment, but India shows you a sense of eternity. You're one little ant on a hill. You're part of life, but you're not the whole thing.

- Felicity Kendal

I hope to start enjoying flirting again when I'm 70, like my mother did.

- Felicity Kendal

I don't think I've ever not had a dark side. But one of the wonderful reasons why you go into this business is that half your life you live in a fantasy, which is somebody else's life. It's actually a great release because you're not having to deal with the itty-bitty bits of life.

- Felicity Kendal

For me, compatibility is a sense of humour, being able to laugh together; that is very important.

- Felicity Kendal

I'm sure people in the business have said: She's too old for that part. I don't hear about it because your agent protects you from those negative things.

- Felicity Kendal

I don't think, until you've actually lost somebody you really love, that you can go through that door that allows you to be grown-up.

- Felicity Kendal

I don't treasure things much - just people. And pets.

- Felicity Kendal

I can be very difficult if people are not professional, or lazy - or the opposite, which is take themselves too seriously.

- Felicity Kendal