Dame once shouted an expletive at a total stranger after she was convinced they were actor Alistair McGowan.

The actress, 87, thought it would be amusing to blurt ‘w**ker’ at the impressionist while they were appearing in a show together.

However, Dame Judi yelled at an unknown person as she struggles to see well due to macular degeneration. 

She explained to : ‘I was driving along and saw who I thought was Alistair McGowan and I shouted ‘wr’… and it was a total stranger.’

The incident was not the first time Dame Judi landed herself in trouble with one of her famous friends.

She told how she was once performing at London’s Gielgud Theatre and thought she saw theatre director Howard Davies sitting in the stalls.

The star said: ‘So I got a piece of paper and folded it up and wrote on it “I suppose a shag is out of the question?”

‘I dropped the note and looked up and played the scene and I glanced back… and it was also a complete stranger.’

The screen star, who is known for her role in films including the Bond franchise, spoke candidly about her health battle to BBC’s Louis Theroux, according to .

The Academy Award winner refuses to give up and said she won’t be retiring anytime soon despite the condition – but admitted ‘it’s bad’.

‘I don’t want to retire. I’m not doing much at the moment because I can’t see. It’s bad,’ Dame Judi said.

She is now determined to ‘teach’ herself a new way of learning, explainging: ‘I have a photographic memory so a person saying to me, ”This is your line…” I can do that.  

Dame Judi revealed that while out for dinner recently with her partner David Mills, he had to cut up her food for her as she couldn’t see it on her plate.

‘He cut it up and handed something to me on a fork and that’s the way I ate it,’ she explained.

According to the NHS, ‘age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is a common condition that affects the middle part of your vision. It usually first affects people in their 50s and 60s’.