Former Carry On star Joan Sims has told how she fractured her spine while filming a new TV comedy-drama but kept her injury secret to avoid losing out on her role.

The 70-year-old actress fell out of her caravan on location during the making of The Last of the Blonde Bombshells, in which she stars with Dame Judi Dench, June Whitfield and Cleo Laine.

She was so desperate to keep her part in the new BBC1 film that she soldiered on without letting anyone know until production ended 11 days later.

Sims, who plays the pianist in an all-girl Second World War swing band which re-forms for one last concert, said her accident left her in agony by causing an earlier spinal fracture to resurface.

She said: "I kept absolutely schtum about it and I was in agony and I thought I had pleurisy. I couldn't sleep in my bed. I got up at 3am one morning and had to sit up the rest of the night in a chair."

She added: "After I finished my 11 days which I was scheduled for I went to the hospital because I couldn't stand it any longer and I had also gone down with a chest infection. They said: 'You've re-fractured your spine.'"

Sims also revealed how, unlike Dame Judi, who learnt the saxophone especially for her role in The Last of the Blonde Bombshells, she already had enough experience to be able to tinkle the ivories convincingly.

She said: "I used to play the piano, so I wasn't exactly a novice when it came to playing the keys. I learnt when I was a child but, like a lot of people, I didn't carry on with lessons."

Sims, who had a hip replaced earlier this year and is still using a walking stick because of her spinal injury, added: "Obviously the work, from necessity, couldn't really be accepted of late, and it's taken me all this time to get fit enough again. I don't consider this to be a comeback, because I've never really been away, although I was obviously very thrilled to do it."

Thank you to Mike Kennedy for sending this article from the Annanova News Service (UK).

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