Thank you so much to the Daily Mail for putting my age in their headline! (for the sake of clarity, I am dripping with sarcasm). Of course they were always going to put my age in the article ( UK press obsessed with woman’s ages) but since I turned 40, my age has featured in umpteen headlines. The first time was when I did an interview for a local paper in Windsor about a play I was doing. I couldn’t quite believe it when the article came out and there, on the front page, in big bold type it said THIS WOMAN IS 40. There is no mystery left for women and in particular, actresses in this world. And this is a huge part of why I do this website. Let’s age with grace, dignity, optimum health and be the best we can be at whatever age we are.
Glynis, sitting pretty at 57: Actress credits yoga for her youthful looks
By Alasdair Glennie – © Daily Mail 11th February 20
Her blonde pin-up looks won her a legion of fans when she starred in Dempsey and Makepeace.
And looking at her now, it is hard to believe nearly three decades have passed since Glynis Barber appeared in the hit Eighties crime series.
At the age of 57, the actress credits years of yoga for helping her stay young and supple in body – and is showing off the incredible results in a new
fitness video.
Miss Barber starred as aristocratic police sergeant Lady Harriet Makepeace in the popular ITV drama alongside American Michael Brandon, 67, who played her streetwise sidekick Lt James Dempsey.
Known for their on-screen chemistry, the pair struck up a real life romance on set and are still married – even though she now admits he often ‘makes me want to scream.’
She laughs: ‘He drives me mad at times and 25 years on we still have a very volatile relationship, but all he has to do is agree with me, then we wouldn’t have any problems
‘But we are who we are, and at the end of the day it seems to work. The best thing about Michael and I is that we laugh a lot – it’s the mainstay in our relationship.’
Miss Barber said she started yoga when she was cast in Dempsey and Makepeace in 1984 because she had to look good and could not afford to miss filming sessions through illness.
And she revealed the habit has kept her looking young in the decades since, prompting her to launch her Yoga Secrets DVD which sees her collaborate with teacher Howard Napper.
She said: ‘It’s very strengthening and incredible for flexibility. There’s nothing more ageing than being stiff.
‘I’ve been in classes with women much younger than me who are creaking and moaning and they look 90 years old.
‘If you’re flexible and can move your joints freely, it’s very youth-making. Exercise is the closest thing to an anti-ageing pill. I put the way I look down to exercise – above nutrition and expensive creams.’
Far from worrying about ageing, Miss Barber claimed the best years of a woman’s life are in her 40s and 50s – and said men need to catch up or risk losing their wives.
She said: ‘I have never felt as energetic as I do now. ‘By the time we’ve come through the menopause, we emerge with so much creativity and energy – it’s amazing how so many women change their career after the menopause or even leave their husbands.
‘By our 50s we’ve reached a different stage and if our husbands aren’t keeping up with us then the marriage can’t survive.’
Miss Barber split from her first husband, Paul Barber, in 1979. She and Mr Brandon have a son, Alexander, 20.
The actress said she was an early convert to organic eating alongside Prince Charles, adding: ‘While everyone was chastising him for hugging a tree, I was his little supporter in the background yelling, ;Come on, let’s get this out there!’ Everyone thought I was nuts.
But she revealed her only child has not followed her healthy edicts, saying: Not only do I have no influence over him, he actually thinks I’m a hippy quack, which for some reason, to his generation, is the equivalent of being a Nazi.
‘To him, being a hippy is the lowest of the low and because I’ve subjected him to what he calls ‘quackery’ for his entire childhood, all he wants now is processed sausage rolls, pizzas, Coke and sweets.’
