BRING BACK SILENT MOVIES FOR IMELDA
Praise for celebs ending cancer stigma
ACTRESS Imelda Staunton is a woman after my own heart – a cinema etiquette vigilante.
The pint-sized Harry Potter star gets so incensed by fellow audience members munching through packets kets of crisps or rustling sweetie bags that she gives them a piece of her mind.
“A bloke came in with a big packet of Doritos,” she revealed “so I said to him ‘What are you doing? Either eat them before the film or afterwards.’”
Quite right. And while you’re at it, stop messaging on your phone, putting your feet up on the seats, belching, farting or giving a running commentary to the deaf/thick companion who’s lost the plot. And if you can’t, stay at home and
TWO of our national treasures have been speaking openly about their cancer battles.
Veteran comic Jimmy Tarbuck went on ITV’S Good Morning Britain to reveal he has prostate cancer.
Tarbie, 80, said his old pal Tom Jones had persuaded him to get checked out after they had a chat about his symptoms.
And, vowing to beat the disease, he urged other blokes to ignore their fears and get tested.
The following day Julie Walters spoke to Victoria Derbyshire, herself a breast cancer survivor, to reveal she has beaten stage four bowel cancer after catching the symptoms early.
And Dame Julie, a former nurse, assured viewers there is no reason to feel embarrassed about talking to a GP. “Doctors are used to watch Netflix. I’ve started going to the pictures on midweek afternoons to avoid people slurping bottomless buckets of cola and rummaging in popcorn cartons.
I know, I’m becoming a grumpy old codger. But then I remember waiting for an usherette to come round with ice cream tubs during the interval.
And the clip around the ear I’d get for slurping my carton of Kia-ora. bottoms… they’ve got one themselves,” she laughed. Back in the 80s when my mum was diagnosed with cancer, the stigma around the disease was huge.
People spoke in whispers about “the Big C” and preferred not to think about it, let alone find out what the symptoms were.
And, ridiculous as it sounds now, an uncle even stopped visiting my mum because he was frightened of CATCHING cancer.
Medicine has advanced dramatically in the past four decades and we, the public, are far better informed about it.
Yet going to the doctor and facing the fear is still a huge step for many to take.
So well done to Tarbie and Julie for sharing their
journeys so openly.