Miriam Margolyes reveals challenge of being away from partner during lockdown

Miriam Margolyes has spoken of the challenge of being separated from her partner of more than 50 years during lockdown.

The Call The Midwife actress, 78, has been apart from academic Heather Sutherland during the coronavirus crisis.

Asked how she would have fared had they been together, she told ITV’s This Morning: “I would’ve loved that actually. I don’t know whether she would because she’s an introvert.

“So she likes to be quiet and get on with her work, she’s writing a book about Indonesia.

“I’m not afraid of it and I think we really will try to be together from now on, because that’s what life is about, loving someone.

“I was lucky enough to find someone who was prepared to love me, I’m not that loveable – I’m smelly and noisy and all that sort of thing.

“But she loves me and I want to be with her for the rest of my life, that’s all I want.”

Discussing how she is coping in lockdown, she said: “Not very well actually, I don’t like it but I’m keeping all the rules and doing the right thing.

“It’s the only time I ever thought that I would agree with Mr (Boris) Johnson, but I do and we’ve all just got to stick it.

“I actually don’t give a stuff about the economy, I want people to survive. So I think Boris Johnson is completely right about that. He’s not right about anything else, but he is right about that.”

She added: “I’m old and I didn’t think that I was going to have to spend the rest of my life sitting in my kitchen. But I have got a garden and that’s lovely.

“I’ve been out in the garden a lot, but I won’t do housework. I won’t do exercises.

“I just really do Netflix and read books and chat to my friends. And I call out to the neighbours across the road, so I am rather noisy.”

Margolyes said she has become a ‘Zoomer’ in lockdown, using the video conferencing tool to stay in touch, and said she is getting better with technology.

She said: “I want to suggest, you know you got me my last job on Call the Midwife? Well, now I would like to suggest that I give computer advice to the over-80s.

“Because a lot of people my age don’t know how to connect. And they’re missing out. They can’t talk to their grandchildren, they can’t get messages They can’t, you know, book a takeaway.

“It’s important that people are not disenfranchised because they don’t know [how to use a] computer. So I’m really quite a good person to teach them.”