11 October 2026<\/time>\n <\/p>\nDame Judi Dench drove without a licence for 30 years.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Dame Judi Dench drove for years without a licence<\/p>\n
\nThe 91-year-old actress used to get behind the wheel of a sports car, even though she only had a provisional licence – which is used by learner drivers while under supervision – and even after she had to go to court after being stopped by police, she still continued to drive for many years afterwards without having taken a test.<\/p>\n
\nIn an extract shared by The Times magazine from her memoir Is It Too Late to Make a Run for It?, which she has written with Brendan O’Hea, Judi admitted: “[I drove] in my black open-top MG sports car with red seats. I really loved that car. It had a retractable roof, which wouldn\u2019t close, and so I always drove round with a couple of handy sou\u2019westers in the glove compartment in case it rained. And then I got caught going round Parliament Square.<\/p>\n
\n“The policeman asked me if I had a licence and I said, ‘I have a provisional licence.’<\/p>\n
\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n“So he said, ‘Right, I\u2019m going to put you down for not having a proper licence. And also no L-plates and a broken sidelight.’<\/p>\n
\n“I think I was called to appear at Bow Street magistrates\u2019 court \u2014 it was as serious as that. Anyway, I tried my luck and I wrote a letter. ‘Dear Sir,’ I said, ‘on such-and-such a date I was stopped by the police and accused of not having L-plates. I did have L-plates \u2014 they were adhesive, but you know what the weather\u2019s been like these days, my lord.’ I actually wrote that. I was still fined \u00a32, which was a lot of money back then.”<\/p>\n
\nWhen Brendan pointed out she had then driven “another 10 years without a licence”, she added: “Don\u2019t be ridiculous. It wasn\u2019t ten; it was 30. I was 50 when I passed my test.<\/p>\n
\n“I\u2019m a good driver, though.”<\/p>\n
\nHer co-writer insisted the Skyfall actress is “not” a good driver, and urged Judi to tell the story about when her late husband Michael Williams had a panic attack as a result of her antics behind the wheel.<\/p>\n
\nShe said: “‘Bum-clenching Bridge’ \u2014 that\u2019s what he christened it afterwards. It\u2019s just up the road. It\u2019s a single-lane bridge and no two cars had ever passed on it.<\/p>\n
\n“Well, they hadn\u2019t before I came along. As I approached it, I saw another car heading towards us from the opposite direction.<\/p>\n
\n“The other driver and I obviously had the same idea \u2014 that if we upped our speed we\u2019d be able to cross the bridge in time and arrive safely on the other side.<\/p>\n
\n“All I heard as I hit the accelerator was Mikey shouting, ‘Jude! Jude! JUDE!’ He just closed his eyes. But we made it. Didn\u2019t even take off a wing mirror.”<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"11 October 2026 Dame Judi Dench drove without a licence for 30 years. Dame Judi Dench drove for years without a licence The 91-year-old actress used to get behind the wheel of a sports car, even though she only had a provisional licence – which is used by learner drivers while under supervision – and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":268102,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[17099,7912],"class_list":{"0":"post-268101","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-make-up","8":"tag-brendan-o","9":"tag-judi-dench"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=268101"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268101\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/268102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=268101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=268101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=268101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}