60, sexy and successful

There’s a lot of talk about being “60 years young” or expressions such as “60 going on 40”, “60 is the new 50” and “age is only a number”. Such stupid things to say. People tell you, “I still feel young at heart” or “You are only as old as you feel”. They may be young at heart, but they’re still old. The fact we’re all living a bit longer doesn’t make a lot of difference. The argument is that we live 10 years longer and are therefore 10 years younger. I won’t have that. I’d rather be a glamorous old person and interesting than a curling-at-the-edges young person, because I do think we can all look great in our sixties. One just looks better and better and one can stand out as a striking individual. One’s friends, though, are dropping by the wayside, getting into trackie bottoms and trainers – beige ones. Trousers? No, thanks. I wear skirts (never short ones) and black stockings. That’s more feminine.

I still apply my stylish and beautiful mum’s rules for the over-60s, such as “never wear white, it makes yellow teeth look yellower”; “always keep your upper arms covered”; “don’t disguise a lizardy neck with a scarf or polo-neck”; “keep your bra hitched up and buy a new one every six months”. And, of course, “never go out without make-up”.

You should invest in the most glamorous dressing-gown in the world because you’re going to be spending a lot of time in it. And don’t wear your glasses on a string – you never see Kate Moss with glasses on a string.

Looks are important. Even if you’re fat and haven’t got a figure, you can wear fabulous tents. Everybody I know says, “Now I’m old I feel so invisible.” To which I say, “Wear purple, you old misery, go out and get a gold hat, pin a pigeon on it.”

I am lucky – I don’t look 65. I had a facelift about 15 years ago and you would think it might have collapsed by now, but it hasn’t.

As for being sexy, there’s a big fashion for anyone over 60 to claim they have just as much sex as they ever did. Really? There’s a plus side to giving sex up or at least cutting down. None of that desperate craving. When Sophocles was asked, at a great age, whether he missed sex, he replied, “Heaven forbid. I was only too glad to escape from all that, as though from a boorish and insane master.” I agree. No sex means you can flirt more without the risk of it all going too far. And if, occasionally, you do have sex, well, what a treat. Even if you have to live on cranberry juice for two months afterwards.

I’ve always been driven to be successful. I published my first book in 1964 when I was 20 and I’ve written many more. I’m always saying I’m done with all that ambitious stuff, that the world is not my oyster now, yet here I am getting up on a stage and performing a show at the Fringe for the first time at 65. Which obviously means there are still opportunities out there for old people like me.

My only regret is that I’m away from my garden. It’s funny how it creeps up on you. I used to regard gardening as a chore, but now it is my greatest pleasure. Is it because we have nothing left to nurture but our geraniums? Or because nature is calling us, saying, “Yoo-hoo! You’re going to be part of all this mush and earth soon. Better get acquainted.”

Death, like grandchildren, is one of the perks of old age. No use dreading it or being frightened by it. I’ve always regarded life rather like one of those ghastly nine-hour jobs at the National Theatre. I’m jolly pleased when I look at my watch to see the end is nigh – only another couple of hours to go. It’s an adventure.

The Virginia Monologues: Why It’s Great

to Be 60 runs until August 31 at the Gilded Balloon Teviot, Edinburgh. Visit www.gilded balloon.co.uk. The Virginia Monologues:

20 Reasons Why Growing Old Is Great by Virginia Ironside is published by Fig Tree

on September 3, priced £12.99.

LINDA MARLOWE (68), award-winning actress and director: Hitting 60 was horrific and frightening. I remember thinking on my 60th birthday, “I can’t be that old.” Now I’m well past 60 I don’t even think about my age.

The older I’ve got the more empowered I have become in this business. I started doing one-woman shows at 58 because, unless you are one of the chosen few, the Denches, the Redgraves, the Mirrens, the roles evaporate. At 60, actresses are meant to disappear – that’s why Glenda Jackson left the profession – and although we all look younger nowadays, it doesn’t make it easier to get cast – although I’ve done two tellies this year: a Foyle’s War and Katy Brand’s Big Ass Show.

When I started out as a dancer and an actress I had long blonde hair, blue eyes and an innocent face. My son, Ben, looked at pictures of me from that time and said, “Mum, you looked lovely,” yet I thought I was overweight. I was victimised in a profession that was always saying if you were pretty you couldn’t act. The English didn’t like glamour or beauty in those days. Steven Berkoff says they were afraid of it – they thought only plain people could act.

When Steven told me, “I want to work with you because you’re sexy and glamorous, and a good actress,” it changed my life. He gave me permission to put my sexuality into my work and that’s what I still try to do.

My life has been full of adventures. I did a solo show about it, No Fear!, which I’m still touring all over the world. I still perform some of it on a trapeze, even at my great age.

In the seventies, as well as acting, I was in an all-female punk rock band, the Sadista Sisters. I wore a green wig, fishnet tights and had plastic rats strapped to my waist. We sang strangely witty, dirty songs about whores having nervous breakdowns.

I’ve been married and divorced four times and had two abortions, but I’m blessed to have two beautiful sons. I once had a lesbian lover, I met Marilyn Monroe, and was a hash smuggler and an impoverished single parent. I took nine kilos of best Moroccan black, strapped to my body, across the Atlantic for somebody I met at a party. I never thought about the consequences, although I sweated my way through customs. I’ve never done drugs myself, though. I got paid $500, hardly a fortune, but it was for my elder son’s school fees. He’s a Baptist minister now and my younger son, Sam, is a documentary filmmaker. I’m so proud of them both.

I’m not going to deny my age, although for years I used to lie about it. I was cagey because I thought it was going to stop me getting work. Now I don’t care any more. If I was in America I’d have had a couple of facelifts by now, which I totally disagree with. I’ll never have plastic surgery or Botox. I’m proud of the lines on my face – I’ve earned them.

I’ve had a hell of a life. I look at my face in the mirror and I see my life. I know my face is old but I’m used to it. I’m fit, but then I’ve always been a maverick. People don’t think I am as old as I am and when I tell them I’m 68 they look quite shocked.

My sexuality has always been important to me. Now, though, I look at older men and think, “I wouldn’t fancy a single one of you.” If you have someone you can grow old with, that’s fine, but I don’t want to be going round with younger men any more. Men my age? I wouldn’t pass the time of day with them. They are not nearly fit enough for me, so I’d rather do without the sex. Anyway, I’ve had my fair share, so I don’t feel cheated and I don’t miss it . Now I put my sex drive into my work.

Looking the way I did when I was young I could have had a much more commercial career in films, but I chose not to. I haven’t earned a fortune, but I’ve been very, very successful with my solo shows. I go on working because I need the money. I hope I’ll still be doing solo shows when I’m 90, though maybe not on a trapeze.

The worst thing about being my age is I’ve got that childlike thing of not being able to imagine there will be a world without me in it. That depresses me because I know I am going to have to go – and I don’t want to. It’s not that I fear death. One just hopes it’s not too prolonged, with an illness that might go on far too long for your loved ones and for oneself.

After Edinburgh I am planning to direct my first film, The Plant Man, based on a true story written by an actress friend, Linda Partridge, about her childhood. I’ve raised some of the money and the brilliant actor Marc Warren is attached to it. I’m so excited. I hope I’ll never stop working, thinking, learning to do new things. It all helps to keep one’s marbles.

Linda Marlowe performs The World’s Wife, at Assembly @ George Street, Edinburgh, until August 31. Visit www.assemblyfestival.com.

MURIEL ROMANES (62), actress and artistic director of Stellar Quines Theatre Company: The other day I went to the hairdresser and asked for a curly perm. They said, “Are you mad? With your white hair and gold trainers, the last thing you need is a perm. Only old women do that.” It was funny that they thought I was demeaning myself by saying that.

I’ve never felt glamorous, despite the famous platinum blonde hair. Oddly enough, when you are working as a theatre director, which I’ve done for 16 years, you kind of lose your sexuality. You no longer have to flirt to get what you want, so I don’t know whether I’m sexy any more, or if I ever was. I feel I’m this thing who tells everyone what to do.

I’m quite a sad specimen of humanity. My job is my whole life. It can’t be healthy, but I adore it so much and get so much joy out of it. It defines me.

When I was still acting, I played a lot of countesses on stage. On TV, I was Alice Taylor in Take the High Road for nine long years – this big, fat thing suffering in an anorak, but my ill-gotten gains bought me my own home and we had a lot of fun filming.

I never wanted a husband, a family or even children. All my life I’ve been hooked on theatre. I have three younger sisters so I looked after them and I’ve two nieces and two nephews. If I’d had children, they’d all be dead now anyway because I’d have neglected them so badly. I’m a gipsy – with a name like Romanes, I’m sure of it – and a gardener, but my life in theatre has been all-consuming.

I’ve been in love, but every time someone has started to tell me what to do, or how to live my life, I’ve walked away. I did once come close to marrying but it would have ended badly because I’m so dedicated to my work.

My father [George Romanes, former professor of anatomy at the University of Edinburgh] is 92. He’s amazing and it’s wonderful the way he still holds it together. Nonetheless, it does feel as if a lot of things are coming to an end now I’m in my sixties. There’s so much uncertainty in the world, it’s making me feel quite rocky personally and professionally. It’s hard not to get depressed about the future.

Whatever our age, I think many of us now find it harder and harder to cope, so we get more and more internalised. You should be able to embrace life, but given the way things are it is f—ing terrifying; there are times when I worry I’m bipolar. But I have hope for the future. I’m building international alliances with other theatre companies and we’re making a piece about women’s mental health with a Canadian company, Imago, that I’m excited about.

My work is joyous when it goes well and, at the moment, my peony flowers in my front garden fill me with joy, as does the sweet smell of my roses. That makes me feel quite euphoric. Now I’m 62, I want to get rid of all the things I have, the stuff that fills my house. I want to live more simply because I think I’ve become terribly bogged down with chattering things in my head. My grandmother threw all her valuable antique furniture over a dyke and burned it. I understand that.

Getting older gets me het up about all sorts of things, like constantly losing my keys, having to have a tooth extracted or even falling on the ice, which I did last winter. I don’t look in the mirror much nowadays – I don’t like what I see. I don’t know who the hell that woman is.

Two years ago I gave up smoking, and now I try to get on my bike every day and try to walk everywhere. Ageing is quite depressing yet there’s a lot of comfort in it too. I have no pension, no money in the bank, but you can’t take it with you. If I’ve missed out on anything in my life, it’s time to reflect.

If I died tomorrow I’d be sad because I haven’t done enough good in the world. I haven’t been that generous with other people. I wish I’d done more with the Children First charity, for instance, because although I don’t have children, I love them. I’ve been a bit mean with my time, I think, rather selfish.

I never seem to have time to think and use my brain. I do feel successful, though, because I believe it’s a real achievement to have kept a women’s theatre company going in Scotland for 16 years. I’ve done good work and I’ve done stuff that was crap, but I’ve loved it all. I just truck on, although I do think maybe I should have screamed a bit more.

Muriel Romanes directs The Girls of Slender Means at Assembly @ George Street, Edinburgh, until August 31. Visit www.assemblyfestival.com.