Joanna Lumley - biography

“We transported eight giraffes, and there are now nine because one gave birth to a male shortly afterwards.  They carry their pregnancies very well-they all looked the same.”

“In Kenya you’ve got the great birds and monkeys leaping through the trees overhead.  It’s a chance to remember what the world is really like.”

“You have to feel more involved than just writing out a cheque.  Charity is almost the wrong word - I think people are beginning to feel more responsible for the world.”

“We met and married when both of us knew exactly what our jobs were.  He was only 32, but he’d been all over the place.  I’d been working on films and television shows all over the world.”

“Hundreds of political prisoners still suffer in Tibetan prisons.  Freedom of speech is not allowed in any sense.  It is illegal to possess a photo of the Dalai Lama.”

“I’ve got lots of good friends.  I could have affairs.  I can read a book all night, put the cat on the end of the bed.  I can pick up my passport and go to France.  I don’t have to ask anybody.”

“If you’re an enthusiast and you love the world like I do, it comes naturally.  But I think charity must become more fun to give, more interactive and imaginative.”

“Though I was a mother at 21, being a grandmother makes the whole thing absolutely normal and gorgeous.  The relief, the joy of being a grandmother is wonderful.”

“I never mind scrubbing floors, vacuuming or bending and carrying stuff.  Each time I do it I think, this is instead of going to the gym.”

“I find it a great antidote...  lipstick and mirrors and hairspray.”

“I have a toy giraffe on my bed.  I’ve got photographs over my desk as well as a mask of a giraffe in my kitchen.  I am totally hooked.”

“I would do anything to keep looking the job.  I think you make an extra effort if you’re on show.”

“I’m aware of my body.”

“I’ve never felt the constraints of social acceptability.”

“It’s an incredibly difficult thing to bring a giraffe down.  They can kill a lion with a single blow from their feet.”

“NASA space scientists have been studying giraffe skin so they can apply what they learn from it to the construction of spacesuits.”

Joanna Lumley has appeared in the following films:
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969)
Some Girls Do (1969)
Games That Lovers Play (1970)
Tam Lin (1970)
The Ballad of Tam Lin (1970)
The House That Dripped Blood (1971)
Don’t Just Lie There, Say Something! (1973)
The Satanic Rites of Dracula (1973)
Trail of the Pink Panther (1982)
Curse of the Pink Panther (1983)
Shirley Valentine (1989)
Innocent Lies (1995)
James and the Giant Peach (1996)
Parting Shots (1998)
Mad Cows (1999)
Maybe Baby (2000)
The Cat’s Meow (2001)
EuroTrip (2004)
Ella Enchanted (2004)
Corpse Bride (2005)
The Magic Roundabout (2005)
Stories of Lost Souls (2006)
Boogie Woogie (2009)
Late Bloomers (2011)