Sir Michael Palin has admitted his body is getting “rusty”.
Sir Michael Palin has admitted his body is getting ‘rusty‘
The ‘Monty Python’ actor, who turned 80 in May – three days after the death of his wife Helen – is getting set to head to West Africa for another of his TV travel shows, and said he is glad he can get out of chairs at his age.
He told the ‘Headliners’ podcast: “Your body gets rusty like a piece of old machinery that’s done you quite well over the years but then a couple of screws fall off and a door falls off and that’s it.
“Fortunately, I don’t have any bits that have fallen off so far. I’m enjoying being 80, but at 80 you are old.
“When you get (to 80) you feel pleased you can still get out of a chair unaided.”
Michael also admitted he can still hear his wife’s voice urging him to stay on track with his career and life.
Helen died in May after she was stricken with kidney failure weeks after their 57th wedding anniversary.
Michael added: “I hear my wife’s voice going, ‘Get on with it, don’t mope around’.
“I’m doing what she would want me to do. It is a distraction and stops you from feeling suddenly bereft.”
The actor added about his travel show plans: “I’m fairly certain I’m going to be doing another travel series with the same team that sent me to North Korea and Iraq.”
And he said about his next series being based in West Africa: “I can’t say exactly where because it’s still being decided.”
Michael also told ITV’s ‘Lorraine’ show at the end of September about Helen: “She will always be on my mind and by my side all the time. After sharing six decades together, we knew each other so well and I can’t share that with anybody else.”
He added about Helen’s death, which came after she gave up dialysis following years of agony and illness: “She had lost her independence. She didn’t want to live being guided around every room.”
Michael and Helen met when they were 16, married in 1966 and had children Thomas, 54, William, 52, and Rachel, 48, as well as four grandchildren.
He described her as the “bedrock of my life” when he announced her death on his blog.