We meet Lesley Joseph star of Birds of a Feather who has been treading the boards for more than 70 years

Joseph believes that her lifestyle is the key to her good health. “I walk everywhere,” she says, “and we do warm-ups before every show, both vocal and physical. So that keeps you in pretty good shape.” But, she reflects, you take every day as it comes. “There are times when you do think ‘Ah well, I could do with a little more time in bed!”

Her extraordinary career on stage has encompassed being with the Royal Shakespeare Company (she played Titania in A Midsummer Night’s Dream) to playing the key role of Chris in Calendar Girls; from being Olivier-nominated for appearing as Frau Blucher in the West End production of Young Frankenstein, and delivering a truly scary Miss Hannigan in Annie. Not to mention dozens of pantomimes. Her panto appearance this year is in Wales, at the New Theatre in Cardiff, where she’ll be seen as the Fairy Godmother in Jac and the Beanstalk. She chuckles: “Now that is going to be really exciting, because, for the first time ever, I’ll be working opposite a proper pantomime cow. I’ve never done that before.”

On TV, she has been equally as prolific. She first appeared as Queen Catherine of Braganza in a costume drama called The Bastard King back in 1969, and there’s hardly been a year since when she hasn’t popped up delivering memorable performances in everything from Big Brother’s Bit on the Side to Strictly Come Dancing and Come Dine with Me. She is definitely a “go to” celebrity name. Oh, and there was also that little series called Birds of a Feather, which first ran from 1989 until 1998, and then again for another six years from 2014 until 2020. Joseph was the man-hungry next-door-neighbour Dorien Green who was constantly having liaisons with young men. At its peak, it was being watched by 23 million people, and it ran for an incredible 130 episodes.

But, she reveals, if she is pushed to recall one series to single out, it would be Pilgrimage, which followed well-known personalities of different faiths (and none) trekking together as a group, along an ancient route to a holy destination. Joseph featured in The Road to Rome, and represented her Jewish faith. Her companions included the Anglican Les Dennis, Greg Rutherford (a lapsed Jehovah’s Witness) the Muslim Mehreen Baig, and Strictly Come Dancing’s Brendan Cole, an atheist. No-nonsense Joseph confidently walked 100 km, all the way to Rome, and the Vatican – and an audience with Pope Francis. She happily admits that “when I was asked to take part, I was so excited that I couldn’t sleep for two nights. It was,” she says, “possibly the most exciting thing I have ever done, such a privilege to be included, and to discover the views of my fellow travellers was simply fascinating. It was hard going, but we did it together, and it was something I shall never forget. The great thing is that none of us had ever really met before, we had (and have) such very different backgrounds, but we all got on famously, and we all became fast friends. We still are, we’re still very much in touch. The best moment? Oh, meeting the Pope, of course. We were taken ‘backstage’ at the Vatican, and we all received a testimonial, which I have framed at my home in London. Then His Holiness came in, and we were all introduced, and he very graciously talked to each of us – I think that we took up rather too much of his time. Well, I did, I was slightly over-awed, and I gave him a sort of monologue….’I’m Lesley Joseph, I’m an actress and I’m 72, and….’ He looked at me and laughed and said ‘Well, you certainly don’t look 72’, which was very kind. Then he chatted to the others, and he came back down the line, and gave us each a medal as a commemoration of our visit. And then he looked at me again, took my hand in his, and said with a laugh, ‘You know, you still don’t look 72!’ I then kissed his hand, and said ‘Bless you!’ I mean me, a Jewish lady, blessing the Pope! Afterwards, one of our little group said ‘He’s clearly a Birds of a Feather fan, then!’” She admits that there is a certain irony that her own faith is very different from that of the Pope, and that she is now playing a Mother Superior. “I think, in a lot of ways, it has informed my performance, given me insights that I would not otherwise have had. I truly believe that.” That pilgrimage seems a very long way to being a stalwart of so many annual pantomimes, a leap, perhaps from the sublime to the slightly ridiculous, but Joseph isn’t a performer who will ever give a performance which hasn’t got a depth to it, or play a character without a background. One of the best examples was that barnstorming performance in Annie, where she was the truly nasty woman in charge of the orphanage. “But why was it that she’s so disagreeable, so nasty to the children in her care? She’s never married. What’s her background? You do have to think about that. She’s not just a cardboard cut-out, is she? Something must have happened to make her as she was, and that informs how she is now. That’s not to say that I didn’t love doing it – which I did, massively - but something has to give the character an edge, even the Fairy Godmother, and that’s what I love about acting.” She clearly values trust, and friendship, very highly – Joseph and Yorkshire’s own Maureen Lipman have been best chums since they were at drama school together, and they are constantly texting each other with news and thoughts. “She said to me that she couldn’t believe that we were so lucky to be doing what we were doing, and still getting work at the ages we are. She is, of course, absolutely right!” It might appear that Lesley Joseph never ever stops, but she is careful to take time out from her many tours, there are specified weeks where she can re-charge her batteries, and get back to home comforts. She keeps her private life very much to herself, loves cooking and entertaining, and believes – with some justification – that Birds of a Feather, hugely popular for over 30 years, is something of an achievement. “That, and making the Pope laugh. That’s not bad, is it?”

Sister Act, Leeds Grand, March 21 – April 1; Sheffield Lyceum, April 4 – 15; Hull New Theatre, September 18 – 23;Bradford Alhambra, November 20 – 25.