The Eastenders stalwart June Brown has admitted her hearing is failing just months after confirming she is losing her eyesight.
Brown, who has played the character of Dot Cotton in the soap for 30 years, made the admission after struggling to hear a question from her fellow Eastenders actress Barbara Windsor during a Q&A on Saturday, despite sitting on the front row.
The actress, 88, said: "Are you talking to me Babs? Tell me, because I am deaf you see and it is very hard for me to hear so I don’t know what you are talking about. What did you say to me? Sorry, I would like you all to shout because I can’t hear, you see. I am ever so sorry. I am straining here."
Brown told The Sun her hearing had suffered after she travelled on a plane to Scotland. "Unfortunately it happened when I was going up to Glasgow for a charity," said Brown. "My ears impacted and they haven’t come back since. I hope that they might do at some moment."
She told the Radio Times in May her eyes "are not very good" but that she was hopeful her sight would return at some stage.
A spokesman for Brown confirmed her hearing had been impacted, but said she would be continuing her acting work. He told The Independent: "I think a lot of people in their late 80s will suffer from a decline in various parts of the body so it's not really a shock but June is still very upbeat and continues to do and function easily at what she loves most, which is acting."
