Jane Seymour is a beautiful woman. I remember being transfixed by her in Somewhere in Time and I’ve never stopped going all a-flutter every time I see her. She’s been able to break out of the “beautiful woman” role, especially headlining her tv show Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman. She’s also a decent comedic actress like her small turn in Austenland (highly underrated fluff film, if you ask me). Jane is still a world class beauty, something she prides herself on. It became an issue recently on her latest project, Glow and Darkness, in which Jane was cast as Eleanor of Aquitaine. The issue was that Jane, who is 69, was told she’d being playing the role from the ages of 25 to 80. A day before filming, she was informed they’d hired a younger actress, Anna Warke, to play the 25 year old Eleanor. Jane contends that she is perfectly capable of playing the part because she not only looks 25 “facially,” she has maintained the same figure since she was 17 through the “rigid self-discipline” of only eating one meal a day.
Jane Seymour is hitting back at producers of her new miniseries “Glow and Darkness” after they cast a younger star to portray her character in flashback scenes — even as she insists she could pass for 25-years-old.
“They told me that only I was going to play myself at 25, but before I even got round to doing it, the day before, without telling me, they found another actress to play me at 25,” she tells The Times. “It’s something I really don’t understand at all because believe it or not, and you can see on Instagram, they don’t even need to do the facial stuff on me. It works just fine.”
The actress further explains she weighs as much as she did at age 17 thanks to “rigid self-discipline” and consuming only one meal a day that consists of mainly “vegetables, lean fish or a small piece of chicken and, very occasionally, a thin slice of lean steak.”
I hate this whole conversation. Jane’s argument is they are letting the 87-year-old Dame Joan Collins play 40-year-old Adelaida de Saboya. First of all, Dame Joan Collins gets to play whatever she wants, those are the rules. Secondly, I don’t think Jane looks 25 and I do think they would have to do “the facial stuff,” but that is very expensive, and I would be surprised if they had that kind of budget. However, to be honest, I’ve seen plenty of 25-year-olds play 40-year-olds so I don’t know that I would care if they shook it up the other way. It’d be a hell of a challenge to see if Jane’s acting could take me past the 44-year age difference. But, if they hired her with the understanding that she would play the role covering those ages, this was a cruddy thing to do at the last minute. It is a very Hollywood thing to do and happens all the time so Jane shouldn’t be surprised in the slightest, but it’s still upsetting.
However, this ridiculous diet talk is dangerous, and I am upset that anyone would put this kind of nonsense into the ether. One meal a day is not sustainable for anyone and maintaining your 17-year-old figure is a terrible goal. Jane looks great. I wish we could leave it at that without qualifiers of her age or what asinine measures she uses to look like that. And I hope to Christ she’s flat out lying about her diet because if not, her senior citizen bones are going to crack under the weight of those medieval costumes she’s wearing as Eleanor.
Photo credit: Instagram
Austenland is such a great film to perk up a mood!
I looove Austenland! Glad I ain’t alone in that 🙂
Love me some Henry Nobley
What kind of a miserable bloody existence is that? And what kind of a message to put out there? What a total ass.
Vegetables and a small piece of fish every 24 hours is NOT a healthy or sustainable way to survive.
This woman can go stick a thin slice of lean steak up her butt!
I wonder what her physician is saying about this? Do they not know about her diet, or are they even encouraging this or is she not listening to them when they tell her this diet is not healthy?!
I used to eat once a day but it was a huge meal and I had a little break in between. It wasn’t due to some kind of weird diet but because I was only hungry around lunch time. What she’s doing is a full blown eating disorder disguised as “self-control”
And very thinly disguised. When I was anorexic, I was also very proud of my discipline and self-control in eating once every other day.
Life is short. Food is a wonderful part of life, you need to eat to live. Why deprive yourself that much?
I mean, she’s 69. So obviously it is healthy and sustainable for her.
That means it is sustainable for her. Doesn’t mean it is healthy.
I would seriously doubt this is ALL she eats. Or perhaps she doesn’t count a kale smoothie or a protein shake as “food” as it’s a drink? Either way, so few calories would be doing a lot of damage to her heart, brain, and muscles as they need a lot more to stay healthy. Still, not a good message to send out.
And Jane, I love ya…but there is NO WAY in hell you look 25 in these pics. A very well preserved 45/50 perhaps…but 25? Nope.
@ (TheOG) Jan90067K yup. Sorry Jane, you cannot pass for 25, 50 probably. But one meal a day is dangerous! No one should be eating one meal a day!! But yes, she probably consumes shakes during the day. So what if she is the same weight. Once you have children, your body changes permanently. If she ate or consumed the calories of a one meal a day, yes, then she probably is the same weight because she is starving herself!!
Well said. Neither of them look 25 or 40 in those pictures (sorry Hecate). They are beautiful ladies and I am happy that they got to play younger ladies on tv (finally) but also one needs to take a long critical look in the mirror every morning. The funny thing about getting old it’s not always the wrinkles that give away the age but the loss of firmness of the skin. I am 40. I have no wrinkles. I have very fine lines at the corner of my eyes when I laugh but I can tell my skin is sagging. I can still make people believe I am 30 but can’t make them believe I am 25. Not even with make up and stuff. Really I need a filter over my face.
And that “diet”. Oh my G. That is not healthy and helpful. Unless she omitted other stuff with that food alone the first to go are muscle mass, good skin, hair, bones and so on. Acceptance of the reality it’s a good way to live a healthy fulfilling life. The delusion is big with this one.
She’s pulling a Joan Crawford…
She likely supplements with a bunch of products. Des O”Çonnor and Cliff Richard are several others who are fans of the one meal a day diet. Most supermodels eat one meal a day if that. I do fast but I can’t fit it all into one meal. I eat fruit starting from around 1 or 2 PM and sometimes have a small carb meal at 3 or 4PM before eating my main meal of the day at around 6PM.
Most of my friends only eat one meal per day and I only eat 2. Of the people I know who only eat 1, every one has some kind of–if not several disordered eating habits. I think this is definitely a new form of disordered eating–done with the goal of being skinny– and is definitely worth a larger conversation. And yes, those who doubt she really only eats one with no smoothies or anything else it’s really not that unbelievable. Healthy? No. But those that do it as a way to stay thin absolutely know what they’re doing and are certainly not eating snacks or smoothies on top of it.
Exactly! I love food way too much to suffer an existence like that. Tonight – date night with Mr Redgrl so: raclette and then beef, shrimp and chicken fondue with garlic, chili and mustard sauces, roasted potatoes and a salad. Can’t wait. Sorry Jane…
Yikes, this is so sad – who cares if you look like you did at 17, or 25??? What a sad thing to focus all your energy on
that was my take away too…how self obsessed are you, and delusional, to think a women in her 60s looks 25…?
ps
she doesn’t…she could pass for a good 50 though
Agree completely. Each of the woman can believably play 10 years younger. They are both delusional.
Caloric restriction is actually healthy for you. The only thing is at her age I would get bone density tests and supplement as necessary.
Yeah there are so many data evidenced reports about the benefits of caloric restriction especially as you get older.
I can see it works for her as she really looks amazing but sadly she is delusional about still looking 25.
I do feel a smidge sorry for people who’s whole life AND employment have revolved around their looks.
It must really mess with their self-worth are they inevitably age.
I would be careful with diet at a more mature age, but eating one meal a day is feasible! I do! And it doesn’t seem like a challenge, it just happens that i’m not hungry in the morning and at noonish, I’ll maybe be hungry 1 out of 3 or 4 days, but I never skip dinner and I eat very well. It’s just my normal. Im not skinny, just healthy weight for my height. Hmmmm? Am i normal?
I think you fall into a range of typical hunger cycles from what you’ve described, Bibi. Not everyone has the same daily hunger cues, especially as we age, and it seems like you’re not obsessively restricting aspects of your diet. If you’re eating what you want when you’re hungry (and if what you want is generally nutritionally balanced) you’re probably fine.
What JS describes sounds like self-imposed restriction, and while that might not feel like she’s missing out on the emotional aspect of food, that quote made her meal plan sound unsustainable and concerning. It could just be a very badly worded statement — a meal full of veggies, legumes, and tubers cooked in different ways with various plant-based fats, and including meat/tofu or without it can be very nutritionally dense, and maybe she works with a licensed nutritionist to find what works. It’s also possible that she’s neglecting to include meal replacing shakes and smoothies, etc. But as it is, that quote carries a strong sense of disordered eating.
she looks great, but you can’t convince me she’s younger than in her 40s. which is still really impressive for someone who’s 69! but no 69-year-old can look like they’re 25. and I’m sorry, that’s not rigid self-discipline, that’s an eating disorder.
Agree.
I’m usually hesitant about labeling other people, but having a family member suffering from eating disorders this definitely raises some red flags.
I agree – she looks amazing and much younger than her 69 years, but she does not look 25, and needs to let go of that.
That definitely sounds like an eating disorder to me too, and a really sad and strict way to live.
She looks amazing for her age, and much younger than 69, but she cannot pass for a 25 yo. Frankly, not 35 either. Maybe 45 on film with great lighting, and I’ve no idea if that would hold up in person. She’s always been a very beautiful woman who has aged really fantastically and this just makes her sad. Stop this Jane.
She sounds unhinged. Twenty five, I don’t think so.
Elle McPherson ´s diet during 30 years.
Claudia Cardinale ´se diet
The diet of 99% of models
Is she insane? She does not look 25. At.All. And it’s ridiculous to focus youth on weight… someone with an eating disorder might be able to wear the same size all their lives but that won’t reverse the process of ageing. What a stupid thing to say.
Actors should act within their range and focus on text, elocution, character building. Not impossible standards of appearance.
I’ve always said that a small part of the « there are no characters for older women » comes from actresses whose main gig was to be desirable. It’s not the whole story by any stretch of the imagination but it’s a bit of that. Juliette Binoche, Catherine Deneuve, Isabelle Huppert, Helen Mirren, they’ve always had roles… the real problem is across all ages that no one seemed to think that women’s lives in general were interesting or that you needed more than one woman in a film…
+1. She doesn’t look 25, and that’s okay. She still looks good. That info about her diet is a little alarming.
@Slowdown I think you hit the nail on the head. Older actresses don’t get cast as much because they mostly relied solely on their looks in the past. Doesn’t mean it’s their fault necessarily but it is what they capitalized on and what made them popular. And when you gain fame and money for looks then it becomes a problem once the looks clearly go away. Hence sad botox-filled faces with way too much makeup. But actresses who cement their reputation for their acting do get roles once they age because people don’t associate them with a great face/body rather they associate them with a great performance. Hence why Meryl Streep, Hellen Mirren, Judy Dench always get roles. Because they never put importance on being the most beautiful woman in the shot.
No. She cannot pass for 25. She’s a beautiful woman with a great figure and if OMAD is worth it to her, that’s fine. But the goal at 69 shouldn’t be looking 25. I’m 36 and can pass for 30 but no lighting in the world will make me look 20 and that is FINE. We all like to look our best and possibly a bit younger that we are but reaching a certain age is a privilege. Being healthy at 69 or 36 for that matter is a privilege. This discussion is ridiculous. 2020 is not the year to complain about this.
BTW, “the facial stuff” looks bonkers most of the time and there are other factors that make you look your age. Body language and voice for example.
“consuming only one meal a day that consists of mainly “vegetables, lean fish or a small piece of chicken and, very occasionally, a thin slice of lean steak.”
Yikes! I’ll stay plump (and relatively healthy). Her bones ARE going to turn to dust.
Bless her heart, she doesn’t look 25. She’s stunning and marvelous, but, no.
I think she’s not into exercise and workouts. Otherwise, you see with people like Jen Aniston, Jennifer Garner, etc, they eat a bit more than that.
I’m told I look younger (most of the time) and I have really great skin. But I don’t think I could “pass” for more than maybe my 40’s. And on some days, I struggle to look 60 (and I’m 56).
I’ve always had a really young face and looked younger than my age. Life, apparently, has caught up with me. Someone guessed my age the other day – and they were right! I was outraged. 😉 I may, in fact, have called the guesser a hag.
Ha. reminds me of weight. Back in the day, I used to get weighed at the doctor and the nurse would say something along the lines of “oh! you don’t look like you weigh that much!” (eek. I’m 5’11”.)
Haven’t gotten that type of comment in QUITE A FEW YEARS.
LOl Guestwho! You made me laugh with that comment. It would have slipped out of my mouth too. 🙄😉
I knew I’d “grown up” when I no longer needed to look younger than my age.
I’m in my late 30’s but look younger. But I’m not afraid of aging and I hate how our culture shames aging. Especially women. Now women in their 40’s are seen as old and useless. I’ve lived in other parts of the world where aging is wisdom, and the elderly are respected and turned to for guidance. We have it so backwards here with the blind adoration of young celebrities who have nothing to offer but butt selfies.
Same here, everything you just said. (Except I’m 32!)
Agreed. Older people aren’t useless. Aging is just something that needs to be done without becoming cruelly dismissive of the struggles of others. That applies equally to both sexes and all cultures. There’s a real danger of conflating wisdom with punching down, or supporting certain forms of abuse and discrimination just because they’ve been normalized for a long time. That affects the quality of the guidance one has to offer, whether a person is young or old. These past four years have shown what can happen when that goes unchecked, and hopefully we can begin to heal from that.
She’s delusional. All the movie magic in the world isn’t going to make her look 25. Maybe 50. She comes off as vain and not too bright.
She really does not seem all there, does she? How can she possibly think she looks 25 with all the pleats on either side of her cheeks? Does she not see them or is it just scary, maybe keep your distance denial?
When you see her next to the 25-year-old, she certainly does not look 25. And he is looking at her like a mom, not like a contemporary in the picture.
You say “rigid self discipline,” I say “anorexia.” I wonder what her bone density scan looks like?
“The actress further explains she weighs as much as she did at age 17 thanks to ‘rigid self-discipline’ ” That’s exactly what someone with an eating disorder would say that still can’t admit they have an eating disorder.
And no, she can’t pass for 25. She needs a reality check.
That typical dinner she’s described has maybe 400-500 calories. So she’s either lying (my top guess) or she’s supplementing her calorie intake with a lot of wine and snacks. She has to at least be eating 1400-1500 calories a day just to maintain her weight and her exercise regime, even with a slower aging metabolism.
I’ve done the one meal a day fasting plan, with light snacking for lunch. It’s doable, but you have to work hard to make sure you’re eating healthy
Eating one meal a day (OMAD) is very popular within intermittent fasting circle where you leave a only short window (1-2 hours) for eating as opposed to so-called regular intermittent fasting routine of 16:8 or 18:6.
However as many of you have pointed out, it is extremely difficult to get all the necessary nutrients in and it is not sustainable in a long run. Maybe if you have a personal nutritionist and a chef you can pull it off.
Not so much disciplined as disordered eating.
God bless any of you who can do one meal a day I guess. I just finished off two cherry flavored frosted pop tarts. I usually eat healthier (but I do eat, every day, rarely skip a meal, sometimes have a protein shake for lunch), but I am so off the charts stressed this week. It’s work sure, I have a huge project I am trying to finish, I’m under the gun and shouldn’t be posting here! but it’s also this slow-motion coup attempt.
I will probably have choc kisses for lunch, the little huggie ones, with the white chocolate covering? yeah.
Darla, do you have any more Pop Tarts? I’m coming over!
LOL they were so good!
I recommend a Chicken McMuffin. SO GOOD.
They make dark chocolate kisses…………..can pretend to justify them as more heart healthy! LOL
Geez, this is just sad.
Her talking about playing a 25 year old made me LOL. There is a silly movie called Walk Hard, it’s a spoof biopic of a musician. The same actor plays the character from like age 14 or 15, and he is very obviously an adult man, and Kristin Wiig is in it, playing a 13-year-old or something, and they just continue to talk about how old they are to set the scene, and it’s so funny.
I think that’s something that could maybe be done seriously in theater, but not on tv or movies. It’s too bad that it is that way, because in theory at least, as long as the story establishes what we need to know, we shouldn’t need the actor portraying the part to physically adhere to it.
Walk Hard is the best. “Ain’t nothing horrible going to happen today” and “I’ve been cut in half real bad.” Another pandemic mood lifter movie, if you haven’t seen it.
“I think I’m doing pretty good for a 15 year old with a wife and a baby!” I love that movie. Jack White’s Elvis impersonation is hilarious
Hee. Yeah, Walk Hard nails just about every musical biopic cliche in the book—it’s a mini-Movie Tropes.
Save us from the beautiful aging woman. Such desperation to still be the hottest chick in the room. What’s left when your entire life is focused on how you look. What a sad life that is doomed to always be chasing youth. Give me someone who’s lived a full life and is happy with themself at any age.
I agree.
When we glorify thin and young and tell women their value is in adhering to those ideals – this is the end result, i guess.
The best advice on this I ever hear is this:
You are NOT a better woman because you were hungry and didn’t eat.
Love that quote so much.
There is so much more to life than being thin and beautiful. It’s hard to get older. But there is also joy and and a sense of relief and confidence.
You are so right. I call my sixties my IDGAF decade and it’s been the best decade of my life.
A big AMEN to that, @Jaded! One of the most delightful things about getting older, and wiser, for me is that I no longer give two F**Ks what anyone else thinks of my physical appearance! I please myself, and only myself! I will confess to caring more when I was younger, and I still pay attention to taking care of myself for health’s sake, but the idea of appealing to the male/anybody else’s gaze is anathema to me now, and it is such a wonderful freedom. I am also proud to say that I buzzed all my hair off at the beginning of the pandemic, and am maintaining that proudly…I love it!
Me too, Jaded. Here’s to life!
I don’t believe that’s all she eats. She would be a rake. Just as I don’t believe her no surgery claims. She has had her nose thinned. You can tell from photos from when she was young. And def Botox in her forehead. I wonder who they are trying to fool. Us or themselves.
Looks like some filler action, too.
I’m pretty sure an almost 70 year old woman eating one meal a day is an eating disorder.
This makes me feel bad for her, that she is delusional enough to think she still looks 25. I mean, she is a world class beauty. But she’s not an immortal.
And I shudder to think the lessons her daughters learned at her feet about “rigid self discipline”.
She’s clinging to her younger years and that’s just sad. Society doesn’t allow women to age, so I see why she talks about her diet so casually, but it should be a cause for concern to listen to yourself saying things like these.
She’s exactly the kind of older woman I would never want to be. She always seems soooo shallow and trapped in the past.
I’m here for the period-correct makeup on Dame Joan, her repurposed ‘80’s bridal belt, bodice, and gloves, the repurposed “Dynasty” earrings and necklace, and Jane’s repurposed Princess Merida wig.
LOL me, too—Eeeeuck! Ghoulish and ghastly.
That’s highkey delusion if she thinks she could play a 25 year old….she doesn’t look younger than 50. Maybe she could get away with 45. But she does look like a senior. That plus an eating disorder, sounds like she hates being over 30 & refuses to accept it. Sad.
It’s certainly not healthy but at least she’s telling it as it is. No « I eat everything in moderation and do yoga 3 times a week » from all the others 100 pounds celebrity. It tells you that you have to be that harsh with your body to look like that. At least it started an open conversation about how it’s not healthy and how we can be more kind with ourselves and have others goals than be young and thin.
I appreciate her self-confidence and she does look beautiful and if I could look that good at 70 I’d be thrilled but camera magic would need to be involved for her face to pass as 25. That said, one meal a day and still doing it at her age sounds sad and deprived to me. You can eat 3 squares and snacks and still be healthy and satiated. I eat WFPB about 90% of the time and after struggling with my weight, a couple health issues, binge eating, over eating, I finally feel well and satisfied after eating instead of all the other mind chucks I dealt with. The other 1% is if I have oil or sugar in something. I always think, you do you, so if she is actually happy and healthy this way and its something that works for her? To each their own.
What’s WFPB?
What a miserable existence.
My mom, 56, likes to eat well at lunch and then has a very light dinner (what I would consider a snack). However, her meals are well-balanced with hunger satisfying carbs and proteins that sustain her. Somehow, I just can’t imagine Jane Seymour eating the same meals as my mother, especially when she talks about lean fish and a small piece of chicken.
This honestly sounds about right.
She’s a former dancer and to be honest, we will all have body dismorphia till the day we die.
She came into my dance class one year in college and was rail thin, although you could see the aging in her face (pre-botox rage, sculpting, etc etc)
Either way, the stigma to always keep your body as thin as possible is something that sticks in the minds of former ballerinas (I was one for 20 yrs) and it, frankly, blows.
I’m not a dancer, but I’ve been close with dancers, and… yeah. My sympathies.
I recently read about something called ARFID which stands for ‘avoidant restrictive food intake disorder’. It’s basically a step down from anorexia and it sounds like what Jane has. Mr. Jaded’s ex-wife suffered from borderline personality disorder and ARFID was one of the symptoms until she got some therapy. She had food phobias – meat and fish made her gag, she wouldn’t even touch them, anything with a peel made her gag, everything had to be peeled, even stuff that didn’t need peeling like apples or green peppers. She literally lived on canned beans, eggs, cheese, bagged salads and occasionally instant mashed potatoes or rice and ate only once a day. Eventually she developed some health problems (vitamin D deficiency and osteopenia), and while I think Jane may be stretching the truth somewhat, restrictive eating like that simply isn’t sustainable.
This is ridiculous. Not her diet….her. I’ve grown up loving her, I have. Somewhere in Time was like a girl’s rite of passage. But a lifetime of being praised for her beauty has left an ugly mark. She looks like that dude’s mother in the pic. She doesn’t look 25 by any stretch of imagination and why would she? It’s ludicrous. Makes me sad. It’s always been about superficiality, only now, she can’t ignore it anymore because she’s young, she has to shout to remind us.
Yeah, no. I ate one meal a day for a lot of my teenage years and early twenties… it’s called disordered eating, not rigid self-discipline. I was also a huge bitch who lashed out on people because I was constantly hungry, so she is full of shit and she can fuck off with this toxic crap. I’ve had some unhealthy issues with body image over the years, and what really helped me was realizing that there’s more to life than being beautiful. And personally, I think beautiful is one of the most boring things you can be if that’s all that you are. Jane a good example of this… a 70 year old woman starving and deluding herself that she can pass for 25. Does she look good for her age? Absolutely. But she is desperate to be young and beautiful and that’s a vapid, lame existence.
As another commenter wrote, this is what happens when we celebrate women for nothing other than their appearances and they begin to age.
Whateverrrrr – she looks great yes but she looks her age. Sorry girl. OMAD is a diet trend now- I do it a few times a week and it has helped massively w my autoimmune issues and inflammation in general. I agree w previous posters- at 500 est calories a day she would look like a skeleton- not buying it
Same here. I have only eaten one meal per day for 6 weeks now and this is actually a huge relief for my body!
For me, this requires a lot LESS self-discipline than the previous 2 meals per day- my sugar cravings are almost gone.
Being overweight, I also like the 4 kg weight loss without doing any exercise.
I’ve been OMAD(ish) for 2.5 years now, it’s been a life saver. My thyroid is so happy. When I’m hungry, I eat more, and I usually have a snack before my big dinner. I can see how people do it in a harmful way, but it has been a loving, easy way to heal my body.
Lucy, lots of people with your experience, and that’s why I don’t agree with all the posters who are saying it’s definitely disordered eating. Some people have ultra-slow metabolisms and are really sedentary, so they can’t eat that much. OMAD is actually very health promoting for many people, as far as the anecdotal evidence suggests. All these formally obese people who can finally maintain a healthy weight for years.
Also, note our current portion sizes have been pushed upon us by Big Food and Big Agriculture. People 40, 50 years ago did not eat that much. In Japan they eat far smaller portions.
Yes, she’s delusional but if she feels good, she should keep doing whatever she wants. And she hasn’t blown out her face like women half her age in Hollywood have. If she had told everyone she ate 3 “balanced” meals a day, no one would have suspected otherwise because she’s not skeletal or completely unhealthy looking, so we can’t be mad she told the truth about this. If she was 69 and said, “I deserve to eat a diet of KitKats and bourbon every day,” we’d all be like, you do you. But if she wants to stick with a way of restrictive eating that’s given her satisfaction her whole life, we shame her for that? It doesn’t make sense.
Who’s shaming her though? Saying that her eating habits sound disordered is not shaming. If there were snarky comments, I think it was more about her believing that she looks 25, rather than her diet.
At least she’s honest about starving herself.
Honestly? I’m glad she talked about what it takes for her to stay so slim. Maybe we would all have less unrealistic expectations for ourselves if famous people with unrealistically thin bodies would say openly what their starvation and exercise regimens were. Julianne Moore talked about this a few years back, and it was refreshing to hear a woman say, no I don’t eat three cheeseburgers a day and sit on my butt, I starve myself and exercise all the time to look like this!
No sis, you don’t look like you did in “Live and Let Die” and that’s okay.
IMO: You know with all that’s going on in the world with the pandemic, food is something I look forward to and am grateful for. She can have her one meal a day as long as I get to enjoy my three squares with a square of fudge at the end.
I think she is annoying no matter what she’s saying. And she just needs to accept her aging. .She looks good but not 25! Puh…leazeee…………
I remember she was on a BBC programme recently. It was a bunch of celebrities in an art competition. (I believe she is an artist in her spare time, and owns her own gallery.) Anyway, the contestants/participants were asked to paint a self portrait. She produced an unlined idea of herself, as if she were decades younger, and all without a hint of embarrassment. It was an amazing act of self deception. In real life, out in daylight, she looks her age. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/film-shoot-was-no-time-to-die-for-bond-girl-jane-seymour-x6l98gvpt This is no bad thing. She looks beautiful at and for her age.
She was so gorgeous so as with all these ladies, ageing is very hard on them
I don’t have a problem with intermittent fasting or eating lightly some or most days, but honestly? I’d be more impressed if she ate a normal amount of food (not like, 800 calories a day, and not junk food), worked out, and had the body she did.
I restricted my food intake heavily in my early 20s and developed osteopenia, which I reversed by changing my eating habits over time. If I, at 22, could be well on my way to being osteoporotic, she is definitely there. If she trips or has a bad fall, heaven forbid, it won’t be pretty. It’ll erase every illusion she has about looking or feeling 25.
She’s such a vain person. I find her highly annoying as it seems that for the last 15 years, almost every time she’s in the news, it’s about her looks and not her work. She really ought to just go full on diet guru as a side hustle because all she talks about is how little she eats.
Oh, and she looks every bit her age. A physically fit late 60-something. The delusion is unreal, almost Trumpian.
Lol, it’s anorexia guys. You can call a spade a spade. It’s a dead giveaway in how she discusses it, using terms like “rigid self control,” “discipline,” and her aesthetic idealization a transient body type as a long term goal (pro-ana has a creepy obsession with slim-hipped, small chested teenage girl bodies in particular). If you’ve ever been around somebody with ED (and I’ve known two), they all talk like this. For them, body weight isn’t merely a characteristic, it’s a reflection of character; the implication is that people who are heavier inherently lack discipline and self-control as a matter of quality of person. There’s an implied hypervigilance in everything they do. It reveals the obsessive relationship they have with food, which they project on everybody else whom they view as hedonistic and uncontrolled.
I mean, the woman is in her sixties and is in the industry. She’s not going to change. However, there are lots of people who will read this magazine and further internalize it as normal. That is where the irresponsibility lies in giving it a platform.
I’ve *been* that person, and you’re right. I think we’re all just afraid to come right out and say it for fear we’ll be taken to task for armchair diagnosing or shaming. The language here is pretty clear, even if you allow for some accidental overlap.
Reading this, I feel like her age kind of protects her from some of the side effects of disordered eating, like losing your period. When that happened to me, it was a sure sign that something was off, but do you know what I did? I came up with every other reason why. I even had myself thinking that I was showing symptoms of ovarian cancer. I just would not admit it to myself. Eventually, I did, but it took some mental cajoling.
Yeah, I don’t think it’s right to shame people who have it, mind. EDs are a legitimate psychological disease, and like most addictions, they’re easy to relapse into with the right triggers or environment. Both of the women I know who have it are good friends, but holy shit do their disorders cause them anxiety and misery that they’ve deluded themselves is “self regulation” when they flare up because that’s the deceit that protects them from the pain of it. It’s gross when people normalize or justify it. ED is more than physical damage – it’s the constant psychological toll of being constantly obsessed and aware of your body and its unhappy relationship to food.
I gained seventy pounds as a result of getting double whammied with a thyroid and GI autoimmune disorder within the span of two years. I went from being really physically fit to suffering from chronic fatigue and constant bloating and stomach pain. It sucks. I have to work twice as hard as I did before to lose weight, and severe calorie restrictions don’t work because they rely on a normal functioning metabolism. It’s triggered some pretty serious body dysmorphia and depression at times, so I absolutely get how people fall into the trap of ED, but it is definitely not a happy place to be despite the veneer of glamour we give thinness. The industry gives these people the pleasure of validation, but it’s a dark trade off.
@Veronica S: Oh, yeah, what I meant is that nobody wants to come across as shaming when all they’re doing is making an observation. It is one of those things that can linger. I’ve retained some of my old habits and ways of thinking, but I’m better able to recognize them for what they are and challenge my thinking so that I don’t act on them or don’t act as extremely as I once did.
I was so young and had so many misconceptions about the toll that it would take on my body. I thought that it would take years to get ~really sick and that I was in control anyway, so I didn’t have to worry. The effects were surprisingly rapid, and it was one of the scariest times of my life. One of the lessons that I learned was that you can feel validated all day long, but at night when you’re on your own, it’s just you, your mind, and your body. None of those words or looks mean a thing when you think you’re going to die. BDD sucks the big one, too; I hope you have more good days than bad. <3
I kept digging on this because it low key outraged me. Hello, poster child for disordered eating. How dare she be Eleanor of Aquitaine? With Alexis Carrington, I mean, Joan Collins. And I went to her instagram…also featuring Denise Richards. Real Housewives of Puivert. I want a real production on Eleanor, not botox cosplay.
Well, it sounds miserable, but not sure it’s unhealthy. There seems to be credible consensus among longevity researchers that we could all live much longer if we practiced rather severe “calorie restriction”. It sounds like her one miserly meal is a healthy one and she’s probably also taking expensive supplements. They realize most people could not handle such restriction. But if she’s used to it, I think she’s OK.
But I also agree with another poster who said she was glad that Jane let the public know what it takes to look this way. The price is too high for normal people . I’d rather die.
I don’t know, everyone’s different I guess, but when I cut a lot of calories last year ahead of my wedding, my B12 and iron levels tanked. I was doing intermittent fasting and eating a lot more protein than she says she eats, but it takes its toll after a while if you’re restricting too much. And when your stomach is always empty, it’s hard to take supplements – they don’t absorb as well and can cause nausea (or at least they did for me).
I have always wondered how people who are doing extreme diet and fitness things live in long term relationships. The skinniest I’ve ever been is when I’ve been single. Going out to dinner, for brunch etc is one of the great pleasures of living with a partner. I always figured that is why performers might want to date other performers.
She might be disciplined in her diet, but she really let herself go in terms of grace and wisdom. You can be as “pretty” and “skinny” as you want, desperation always paints you embarrassing.
I thought she could play 25 if I look at her picture there in the Instagram. But looking at the other photos, no, she looks 45. And that’s fantastic for a woman of 70 to be able to say. But my mom had the same luck at 70 and ate whatever the hell she wanted to.
Joan Collins looks great but she was smart and decades ago perfected her look of five pounds of makeup and wigs. At one time that made her look a bit old before her time, but decades later she just looks unchanged from the image we keep in our heads of what Joan Collins is supposed to look like. She looked this way when I was 15. She looked this way when I was 25, 35, 45 and now I’m almost 55 and she looks the same. So of course I’m going to think she’s ageless. But really I’ve just been looking at several layers of makeup and a wig for the past 40 years. And that’s awesome. She ain’t a Dame for nothing!
Perfectly articulated about Joan’s look over the decades. I wouldn’t have thought of it that way, but you’re so right.
As for Seymour playing young, I would have enjoyed from a technical special effects perspective and from an acting perspective watching her attempt that feat.
How I wish celebs would stop yammering about their dietary choices. Everyone is different, and what works for a naturally petite, wealthy person in the public eye won’t work for the vast majority of people who will now try to emulate her.
No, I don’t think she looks 25. Especially standing next to that young man. It’s not all about wrinkles and size, she lacks that plump, fresh, dewy look of young skin. Nothing will replicate that.
Gotta comment- Joan Collins when young was very beautiful. I remember her from Star Trek in ’67 rather than her Dynasty days. She was lovely. Great to see her still working.
She calls it ‘rigid self-discipline,’ I call it an eating disorder.
She cannot pass as 25 year old any more than she could pass as a 15 year old or 5 year old -and that’s not an insult. She looks great and younger than 70. She could totally be believable as an attractive 55-60 year old.
I love Joan collins!
Yeah I’m with the producers on this one. She’s obviously deluding herself and has issues with aging, which is clear for anyone to see. Sad because she is a beautiful woman and there is nothing shameful in getting older. No one can stop time! She definitely does not look 25, she looks 50 honestly, but that is still impressive for her age. However, sad that looking a certain way is supposed to be her greatest achievement at all.
She may call it ‘self discipline’ but I call it stupid and dangerous.
There is no way that she looks 25. She needs a stronger mirror. My mom used to eat as sparsely as Jane, and as she got older she became so frail that she was falling down a lot and injuring herself. No she is in a wheelchair and has dementia. Eat a piece of cake, enjoy food. Its part of the celebration of getting older and not worrying about that stuff.
If Luke Perry could play a teenager on 90210, I say go for it. He was not even slightly convincing as a teen but who cares? If we can suspend disbelief for men, why not women? Go for it, Jane. Bring that 25-year-old Eleanor angst.
Honestly, I’ve read a number of interviews with her and she has never talked about eating that restricted way. She has talked about fitting all of her food in an 8 hour period each day, which is a form of intermittent fasting that many people do now. She talked about raising chickens for eggs and her enormous vegetable garden, cooking, and how she likes wine and chocolate in the evening. It all sounded very normal, I don’t know where this quote came from, of the one tiny meal a day.
I love Jane, but she does not look 25. Maybe a decent 50-55 on a good day with makeup and lighting. Her body looks great.
Seymour was amazing as Cathy in the East Of Eden miniseries awhile back. Not an easy role, but she went from calculating innocent beauty to twisted-by-evil-secrets old age without a hitch. I’ve always wondered why she never got more dramatic parts.
I really hate that she is desperate to look 25. Can women look their age and beautiful?
I like how he’s doing the floaty-hand thing. That’s funny.