What’s happened to Judi Dench?

Dame Judi Dench, a British actress, widely recognized for her prolific career in theatre, film, and television, recently revealed that her eyesight is getting so bad that she is struggling to continue acting.

Speaking on The Graham Norton Show Friday, 17 February 2023, Dame Judi Dench said an age-related degenerative eye condition is affecting her ability to remember lines.

“It has become impossible and because I have a photographic memory, I need to find a machine that not only teaches me my lines but also tells me where they appear on the page,” Dench said.

“I used to find it very easy to learn lines and remember them. I could do the whole of Twelfth Night right now.”

“You find a way of just getting about and getting over the things that you find very difficult,” she said. Judi Dench has had macular degeneration for more than a decade now.

Despite the difficulties, Dench is still working and appears in the film Allelujah, which is based on a 2018 Alan Bennett play set in a geriatric ward.

In January 2023 she appeared in the BBC concert, Stephen Sondheim’s Old Friends where she sang “Send in the Clowns” from A Little Night Music