Scott Thomas: Fleabag is right, the menopause did liberate me

KRISTIN SCOTT THOMAS has said she was “so happy” to deliver her speech about the relief of menopause on Fleabag, as it reflects how she really feels.

Her character gives an impassioned speech on the hit BBC Three comedy, in which she describes the menopause as “the most wonderful thing in the world” which frees women from a “cycle of pain”.

Speaking on the Front Row podcast, the 60-year-old actor says that like a lot of women she struggled with feeling “invisible” as she has got older and hopes the speech shows a way through that.

In episode three of the second series of Fleabag, written by Phoebe WallerBridge, who also plays the eponymous main character, Scott Thomas’s character Belinda says: “We have pain on a cycle for years and years and then, just when you feel you are making peace with it all, what happens?

“The menopause comes. The Th menopause comes and it is the most wonderful thing in the world and, yes, y your entire pelvic floor crumbles, and an no one cares, but then – you’re free. It I is horrendous but then it’s magnificent.” magnifice

On her character’s speech, speec Scott Thomas said: “I do feel it, I just ju wish other people could understand – which is why I was so happy to be asked to give that speech. Because it is i what a lot of people feel, it’s just that it’s quite difficult to find something to replace that invisibility.”

The mother of three also spoke s of becoming more “invisible” as she sh grows older, and how she appreciates her success and acting prowess more n now than when she was younger.

She added: “To have success, succ for example, as an older woman: I appreciate it much more now than I did di when I was younger.

“I just feel like I’m better at what w I do now than I was when I was younger. you

“You notice it with shop doors do and things like that. When you try tr and go through a door and people just ju walk straight through you.

“It’s little things like that, that th I find really annoying.

“I know people are surprised surp by the fact that it happens [to me], m but it does.”

Scott Thomas has been nominated no for five Bafta Awards and a one

Academy Award.

‘I was happy to be asked to give that Fleabag speech because it is what a lot of people feel’