Joanna Lumley

Joanna Lamond Lumley, OBE, FRGS is a British actress, presenter, former model, author, television producer, and activist. She won two BAFTA TV Awards for her role as Patsy Stone in the BBC sitcom Absolutely Fabulous. Lumley is an advocate and human rights activist for Survival International and the Gurkha Justice Campaign.

About Joanna Lumley in brief

Summary Joanna LumleyJoanna Lamond Lumley, OBE, FRGS is a British actress, presenter, former model, author, television producer, and activist. She won two BAFTA TV Awards for her role as Patsy Stone in the BBC sitcom Absolutely Fabulous. Her film appearances include On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Trail of the Pink Panther, Shirley Valentine, James and the Giant Peach, Ella Enchanted and Corpse Bride. Lumley is an advocate and human rights activist for Survival International and the Gurkha Justice Campaign. In 2013 she received the Special Recognition Award at the National Television Awards, and in 2017 she was honoured with the BAFTA Fellowship award. She has appeared twice as Mrs Dolly Bantry in Agatha Christie’s The Body in the Library, in the episodes ‘The Body in The Library’ and ‘The Mirror Crack’d From Side to Side’ In 2013, she appeared in a 4-episode guest arc on the BBC crime drama Mistresses as Vivienne Roden. She is a patron of Roald Dahl’s Marvellous Children’s Charity and the Farm Animal Sanctuary. Her grandfather Lieutenant Colonel Leslie Weir had been born in Ghazipur and served as an army officer in Kashmir; he was a close friend to the 13th Dalai Lama. Her father, Major James Rutherford Lumley, was born in Lahore with Scottish and English roots. He served in the British Indian Army’s 6th Queen Elizabeth’s Own GurKha Rifles in Burma during World War II, most notably at the Battle of Mogaung.

Her mother, Thyra Beatrice Rose , was English. She attended the Lucie Clayton Finishing School in London, after being turned down by the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art at the age of 16. She appeared in an early episode of the Bruce Forsyth Show in 1966. She had a cameo role in several episodes of Are You Being Served?, written by Jeremy Lloyd, whom she had both married and divorced three years previously. In 1973, she made another big screen appearance as Jessica Van Helsing in The Satanic Rites of Dracula, the last Hammer film to star Christopher Lee. She also appeared alongside Hugh Laurie in the romantic comedy Maybe Baby Baby and alongside Anne Hathaway in Scorsese’s Scorses. Her last marriage was to star to Christopher Lee in The Corpse Bride. She has also worked with Tim Burton on two film projects, in James and The Giant Peach and The Wolf of Wall Street. She spent three years as a photographic model, notably for Brian Duffy, who photographed her with her son, born in 1967, Also that year she appeared on BBC Two programme The Impresarios: For Appearance’s Sake, explaining Duffy’s studio process and her joy in working with him. Her acting career began in 1969 with a small, uncredited role in the film Some Girls Do, and as a Bond girl in On Her majesty’s Secret service, in which she had two lines as a British girl.