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Mon 4 August 2025 15:45, UK
Even though she’s become famous, or infamous, depending on who’s telling the story, for her wicked sense of humour, Judi Dench isn’t exactly synonymous with comedy.
The evidence is there that she’s hilarious, though, based on the number of co-stars and collaborators who’ve revealed the foul-mouthed and X-rated havoc she enjoys wreaking on set or behind the curtain, while she’s got a few of her own near-the-knuckle tales to tell.
Of course, she’s performed virtually all of William Shakespeare’s comedies at least once, which is par for the course when the diminutive dame owes her entire career to the playwright she called the man who paid the rent. Don’t expect her in a Judd Apatow movie, then, but she’s still willing to go out on a limb and name one actor as comedy’s greatest-ever performer.
Inevitably, it’s not one of the usual suspects. After all, would anyone realistically expect an actor born in Yorkshire in 1934 to single out Robin Williams, Richard Pryor, Jim Carrey, John Belushi, Bill Murray, or Will Ferrell? It’s none of the old guard either, with Laurel and Hardy, Charlie Chaplin, or Buster Keaton failing to get a look-in.
Instead, Dench opted for a former co-star and close friend, albeit one she had an awkward first meeting with. For nine seasons and two special episodes spanning 13 years, the Academy Award winner and Geoffrey Palmer led the cast of As Time Goes By, playing two former flames who renew acquaintances after almost four decades apart.
“We met for lunch to discuss the show,” she recalled. “He got us off to a good start when he informed me that they’d wanted Jean Simmons for the part, but she’d declined!”
Still, despite Palmer making it clear that Dench wasn’t the first choice, the two forged a strong connection onscreen and off that lasted until Palmer passed away in November 2020 at the age of 90.
Coming from someone with her reputation, Dench calling Palmer “the naughtiest man I ever worked with” was a supreme badge of honour. “Oh my goodness, how we laughed,” she recalled. “There were a lot of outtakes. He got me into endless trouble. I have admired him all my life. How lucky to have been in something with him for so long.”
Beyond that, Dench celebrated Palmer, or ‘Geoffers’ as she knew him, for being “so sure on comedy that you could be pretty secure in knowing he would get you through it and make it funny.” Doubling down on her utmost admiration for a longtime co-star and close friend, the veteran told the Radio Times, “He’s unsurpassed as far as comedy is concerned, aided by that lugubrious face and his amazing voice.”
Palmer’s name may not immediately come to mind when determining which actor mastered comedy better than any other, but Dench can’t see past her As Time Goes By colleague as the cream of the comedic crop. Having forgotten more about the craft than most thespians could ever hope to learn, though, she’s speaking from a place of knowledge and experience.
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