Vanessa Redgrave speaks of grief over death of daughter Natasha Richardson

Vanessa Redgrave has spoken about dealing with grief following the death of her daughter Natasha Richardson.

Redgrave, who will receive an Academy Fellowship at Sunday's film Baftas, told how appearing in The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion's play about mourning the deaths of her husband and daughter, helped her own bereavement.

A benefit performance of the play took place in New York at the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine last October.

The 73-year-old's actress daughter died following a skiing accident last spring.

Asked if art could help in coping with grief and loss, Redgrave said in a TV interview with the BBC: "When I did the final performance in New York in The Cathedral of St John the Divine this October, it helped me.

"But help is a funny word. It turns out to mean so much more and so many things differently than what we think of when we hear the word 'help', you know?

"This is where the magic of an extraordinary writer comes in. Because nothing can help - absolutely nothing.

"On the other hand, we all of us learn about terrible grief, all of us go through it at some point in our lives or another.

"And if someone can throw some light on what we have gone through or are going through or will go through always, you can call that, yeah, it's a big help."

Sources have said Redgrave will receive her award from Prince William at the Orange British Academy Film Awards.

She earned an Oscar nomination for her 1967 film Morgan: A Suitable Case For Treatment and collected the best supporting actress Oscar in 1977 for Julia, in which she portrayed a Jewish woman murdered by the Nazis.