Dawn French has made a habit of making the nation laugh and while she has no intention of stopping any time soon, there is one thing she’s finally managed to quit. In an exclusive interview with Good Housekeeping to tie in with her new book, Enough, she opened up about the lifelong habit she’s finally given up at 68 – and it’s one that you might be guilty of doing, too.
The most British thing about her, she explained, is her people-pleasing attitude, her tendency to apologise - and it’s not something she’s proud of. “Why on earth are we always apologising? ‘Sorry, could you pass me the salt?’ Why is that such a tricky question that intrinsically demands an apology? I try not to do it so much now.”
The most underrated joy of getting older, she explained, is the ability to live life on her own terms – and not simply say yes to everything in a bid to keep everyone else happy. ”You learn to say no when you really need to say no,” she shared. “You don’t have to people-please quite so much anymore.”
On the subject of Britishness, Dawn explained that while she’s proud to be British, she means it only “in a European way”. “I’m not nationalistic. I’m ashamed of how Britain has behaved historically and how we continue to behave. I won’t be putting a Saint George’s flag in my garden anytime soon, put it that way.”
She wonders, she mused, “what kind of legacy” we’re leaving behind for our children. “It seems we’ve learned nothing about war and torture,” she said during the interview. “Nothing about being kind to each other. Nothing about saving the planet. If anything, we’ve gone backwards.”
She’s also concerned about the normalisation of porn. “The way sex is represented in porn is not attainable or attractive to me,” she mused. “Lovely, rather wobbly, sweaty, smelly, rather awkward stuff is what I’m attracted to. I love flawed things because we’re all flawed. There’s so much pressure on young people today, in every area.
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“It was so different when I was growing up. I didn’t have to learn to take a photo of myself from above so you can’t see my chin or so that you can see my tits… I feel really sad about it.”
For now, Dawn, who has been busy promoting her latest book, will be continuing to look on the funny side of life. She’s in talks about taking her podcast, French & Saunders: Titting About, on the road, as well as preparing for a stage reunion with Jennifer Saunders in a production of Cinderella at the London Palladium and working on a second series of her hit BBC sitcom, Can You Keep a Secret?
“I would be killed if I gave you a secret about the new series,” she said of the sitcom, before giving us a hint of what’s to come. “I can say there is more mayhem and Debbie returns to boss people about as the agent of chaos that she is, and William is still in the cupboard.”
Read the full interview in Good Housekeeping UK’s July issue, on sale now. Enough (Penguin Michael Joseph, RRP £22) by Dawn French is out now.
