My life through a lens

Celebrities share the stories behind their favourite photographs. This week, it’s the turn of actress Sylvia Syms, 84

1959 I had to learn to play the bongos for this scene in the film Expresso Bongo, with Cliff Richard on guitar and Laurence Harvey on the big drums. Cliff was absolutely adorable, the most beautifully behaved young man I’ve ever met. He must have been very well brought up by his mother. Larry was sharp and witty, and married to a very grand actress called Margaret Leighton. I didn’t see Larry again for many years until we bumped into each other when he was desperately ill, so it was a sad reunion.

1991 Although I wasn’t a great fan of Margaret Thatcher when she was in office, it’s no good taking your prejudices with you if you’re going to get inside a character’s head. Playing her in the television film Thatcher: The Final Days made me realise what terrible disloyalty her Cabinet showed to her in the end. They’d all been leaping on her bandwagon when she was a success, so I did feel rather sorry for her, not in a sentimental way, but because I was so shocked at what happened to her.

1964 My daughter Beatie was born a year after I adopted my son, Ben, because I thought I couldn’t have any more children after a miscarriage and the death of my two-day-old daughter, Jessica. Ben is a teacher now but he played Sophia Loren’s son in the 1974 film remake of Brief Encounter. I wasn’t desperately glad that Beatie followed me into acting because she’s so remarkable and clever that she could do anything. But she’s done well, especially in Poldark, in which she plays Ross’s servant Prudie (inset).

1939 I’m five here, in a Peace and Plenty dress decorated with fruit and veg for a fancy-dress contest in Eltham, south east London, where I grew up. It was made by my mother as a message of peace even though war was coming and we knew children like me would be evacuated. When I was sent away, parents couldn’t come on the station platform to say goodbye, they had to wave from afar. It was pretty awful.

1958 John Mills, Anthony Quayle, Harry Andrews and I are relaxing here on the set of the film Ice Cold In Alex. We were filming in Libya and it was a tough shoot, what with all the flies, the heat and the lavatories… which were quite an education. My co-stars were all proper grown-up men who had served in the war and were like uncles to me.

1985 This is me with Adam Ant in Joe Orton’s Entertaining Mr Sloane at the Manchester Royal Exchange. The play is about a hustler who lives with a middle-aged woman, played by me, and her gay brother, who are competing for his affections. Adam wanted a break from pop to develop his acting, and he was wonderful. We got to know each other travelling up and down from London together; and we still keep in touch a bit.

2007 The year before I received my OBE from the Queen, I had played her mother in the 2006 film The Queen. But you mustn’t embarrass the royals by saying, ‘What did you think of me in that?’ I was so thrilled it was Her Maj who presented it to me. I was at RADA when her father, George VI, passed away and I remember we all stood there crying our eyes out. She has been such an important part of our lives.

2018 I so loved doing my recent movie with Peter Bowles, called Together. The budget was small and we had to work very long hours but it was a beautiful film. Working with Peter was wonderful, and he said at the end of filming, ‘We weren’t acting at all, were we?’ I said, ‘No, we weren’t – we were just an elderly couple who loved one another.’