Joanna Lumley has dashed hopes of an Absolutely Fabulous revival, insisting the cult BBC comedy is over for good.
The actress, who played champagne-swilling Patsy Stone opposite Jennifer Saunders’ Edina Monsoon, made the revelation as she fronted woman&home‘s coveted Christmas issue.
Dazzling in a series of fun, festive photographs, the telly and film star said, “The answer’s no. [Jennifer would] say no, so I’m saying no for her. It’s over. I never think about Absolutely Fabulous.
Joanna’s comments come just months after she reunited with Jennifer, who created and starred in the sitcom, and fellow co-stars Julia Sawalha and Jane Horrocks, for Absolutely Fabulous: Inside Out, a one-off Gold documentary in 2024.
It celebrated the sitcom’s 30-year legacy and paid tribute to June Whitfield, the actress who played Edina’s mother, who died in 2018, two years after Jennifer declared she was ‘done’ with Ab Fab.
“Some people might imagine me as Patsy on Christmas Day, rising with three cigarettes going simultaneously and a bottle of Bolly open beside the bed.”
At home in Stockwell, south London, with her conductor husband of 39 years, Stephen Barlow, 71, Joanna’s own festive rituals are more restrained. She admitted, “I try not to pop the first bottle of Champagne until after midday. I don’t always succeed.
“When I take it out of the fridge, it’s got my fingerprints on it, I think, ‘How much harm could one small glass do?’”
Subscribe to woman&home: £6 for 6 issues
(Image credit: David Venni)
In the exclusive interview ahead of the publication of My Book of Treasures – a compilation of her favourite quotes, trivia and collected wisdom – Joanna also spoke about festive childhood memories living in India and Malaysia as the daughter of a major in the 6th Gurkha Rifles.
Sharing details of her most memorable Christmases, Joanna recalled “an ice-bound, snow-bound, blizzard-bound Christmas in New York” in 2010 while making her Broadway debut at the age of 64 in 17th-century French-set comedy La Bête. Playing Princess Conti alongside David Hyde Pierce and Mark Rylance earned Joanna a Tony nomination.
(Image credit: David Venni)
She said, “One afternoon, I went in to do the matinee, then came out, and the snow was about two feet thick. People couldn’t get home. I brought my dresser back to my apartment to spend the night because she couldn’t get across to Queens.
“The snow was so bad that when they were scooping up to throw in the Hudson River, they accidentally scooped up a couple of small cars and threw them in. It was extraordinary.
“I was 30 when I went to New York for the first time, when I was doing The Avengers, I couldn’t believe my eyes. The first time you see it, everything they say in the movies is true. Now, New York is a friend.”
She also told us her ultimate Christmas bugbear – hunger.
“A Christmas disaster is arriving at someone’s house at 11 o’clock and they haven’t put the turkey in the oven yet. Your heart begins to sink when you realise you won’t eat until 6pm.”
You can read Joanna’s full exclusive interview with woman&home in the Christmas issue of the magazine, on shelves now.
