Page 3 Profile: Felicity Kendall, actress

Felicity Kendal (Getty)

Still living the good life?

As her most famous incarnation, Kendal played Barbara Good in The Good Life with “husband” Tom, played by Richard Briers. From a rather sweary interview published this weekend, it seems that all that earthy domesticity was, well, an act. “I always did have affairs when I wanted,” she revealed. “Look, the aura of sweetness and light associated with Barbara Good has got b****r all to do with my life. The Good Life was... 40 years ago but it’s extended to now because it’s on all the f***ing time and it’s what people talk about.”

Death to the f***ing repeat!

We’re sure Kendal doesn’t mean it. The royalties for The Good Life, of which there were 30 episodes from 1975 to 1978, must be keeping her pockets well-lined. She seems to have spent the interim years gallivanting around the world with different men, getting tattoos and expensive cosmetic surgery. Now she’s back promoting her next turn on stage in Alan Ayckbourn’s West End show Relatively Speaking.

And those affairs?

Darling, it was different back then; they were all at it. Married to, then divorced from, actor Drewe Henley, with whom she had a son, she had a fling with Oscar-winning screenwriter Robert Bolt, married theatre director Michael Rudman, divorced him, had an affair with Tom Stoppard, and finally got back with Rudman.