Judi Dench cannot act or read due to degenerative eye condition

Dame Judi Dench Confronts Age-Related Vision Loss After 7 Decades of Acting

“I can’t be on stage. I can’t do a play anymore. I can’t do a film anymore. I can’t read anymore.”

Dame Judi Dench has confirmed she can no longer act on stage or screen due to a degenerative eye condition, metro.co.uk reported. The 91-year-old Oscar-winning actress, who has lived with age-related macular degeneration since 2012, shared the update during an interview on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme with Emma Barnett.

Daily Struggles and Awkward Encounters With Strangers

The progressive sight loss has altered the veteran performer’s daily life, making it difficult to recognise faces. Dame Judi admitted that her failing vision occasionally leads to unintended social mix-ups when she cannot see a person’s features clearly.

“I often go to random people and give them an almost hug,” she said on the BBC Radio 4 programme. “Then I have to apologise because I don’t know them.”

Asked about her perspective on growing older, the actress offered a blunt assessment. “There’s nothing to say for it at all,” she said. “[I] don’t think about it too much.”

Memoir Release and Brendan O’Hea Reveal Creative Shift

The disclosures coincide with the release of a new book about her life, titled Is it too late to make a run for it?. Written by her friend and fellow actor Brendan O’Hea, the book explores her career and adaptation to physical limitations.

O’Hea addressed her inability to paint in the book, noting her resilience in the face of declining health. “You can’t paint anymore, and that did you so gladly,” O’Hea wrote. “I know that it makes you sad, but you don’t stay by the packages. You just searched for other ways to express yourself. You didn’t let it defeat you and that is really very beautiful.”

Reflecting on Seven Decades of Iconic Roles

Dame Judi’s career spans more than seven decades across British theatre, television, and film. She earned an Academy Award for best supporting actress playing Queen Elizabeth I in 1999’s Shakespeare in Love and cemented her cultural footprint as MI6 chief M in the James Bond franchise, starting with 1995’s GoldenEye.

Despite stepping away from visual mediums, she continues to make public appearances and relies heavily on audio formats. “The radio has always been important to me,” she noted.

The memoir also touches upon her regrets regarding specific projects, including Tom Hopper’s critically panned 2019 film adaptation of Cats, in which she played Old Deuteronomy. Writing in the book, she described the production as a “waste of goodwill and talent” and admitted she has never watched the final cut of the film.