Dame Judi Dench reveals emotional way she spent final day with late husband Michael Williams

Dame Judi Dench has recalled the special celebration she hosted at her home the day before her husband passed away.

Dame Judi Dench hosted her husband’s papal knighthood ceremony in their bedroom the day before he died.

The 91-year-old actress has reflected on her late husband Michael Williams’ final hours, when he was recognised for his commitment to Catholicism with an award from the Vatican as he became a Knight of St Gregory.

In her memoir Is It Too Late To Make A Run For It?, she told Brendan O’Hea: “The day before Mikey died, he was awarded a papal knighthood by the Vatican.

“His Catholicism was everything to him – he’d been the chairman of the British Catholic Stage Guild and went to Mass most Sundays.

“I wish he’d been able to receive his knighthood in the way that it was meant to happen – at Westminster Cathedral – but he wasn’t well enough to travel.”

Instead, the couple hosted the celebration at their house, and “made an occasion of it” with “so many people” turning up to their home.

Judi recalled that there were “too many to fit in the bedroom upstairs” where they held the ceremony, so their daughter Tara Cressida ‘Finty’ Williams set up a baby monitor so that people downstairs could listen too.

The knighthood celebration took place on January 10, 2001, just one day before Michael died aged 65 after being diagnosed with lung cancer.

The honour itself had been awarded in November 2000.

Michael and Judi first met on tour with the Royal Shakespeare company in the 1960s, and got married in 1971 before she gave birth to Finty in 1972.

As well as sharing their lives together, the couple also worked alongside one another, appearing in the television sitcom A Fine Romance and the 1999 film Tea with Mussolini.

She has previously spoken about the heartbreak of losing her husband and how much she continues to miss the late actor more than two decades later.

Judi has now opened up about their life together in her memoir, which she wrote with her close friend, actor and director Brendan O’Hea.

However, the Shakespeare in Love star admitted she had little idea that their conversations were being turned into a book.

She said: “He wrote it by stealth – we are such great friends that he sort of crept up on me. I have no idea how long it took to write. We would just chat and he would write.”