Dame Judi refuses to take only safe roles

The esteemed actress says her 'Riddick' role suits her self image.
By JOE NEUMAIER
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
NEW YORK -- These days, matriarchs are Dame Judi Dench's specialty: royal, familial, even official, like her spymistress M in the James Bond films.
But the esteemed British actress sees herself in a different light. Dench likens her ethereal space diplomat in the sci-fi flick "The Chronicles of Riddick" (opening today) not to her aging Virgin Queen in "Shakespeare in Love," but to that film's star and fellow Oscar-winner, Gwyneth Paltrow.
"Perhaps after 'Riddick,' audiences will think I'm this thing I've always longed to be: the tall, willowy blond," says Dench. "In fact, I act that all the time, until I catch myself in a mirror. Inside, I am absolutely that!"
In "Riddick," Dench, 69, sports cascading locks and floats on air. Audiences who know her from "Shakespeare in Love" and her other Oscar-nominated performances in "Mrs. Brown," "Chocolat" and "Iris" may be surprised to see Dench sharing the screen with Vin Diesel.
"It is a complete departure," she admits. "But I've never wanted to take the safe option -- never. It's a new challenge. I think it's very boring to do the same thing all the time."
Charming Vin
Dench says Diesel charmed her when he visited her during her run in David Hare's play "The Breath of Life."
"Vin was chivalrous. He came to London and gave me flowers I couldn't take upstairs, they were so large. I never read the script, since I never got over the asking. I was excited about being wooed to do this film."
Dench has acted professionally since 1957. Although she's always dabbled in films, she is generally regarded as the greatest British stage actress of the last half-century -- and one who has moved seamlessly between TV dramas and comedies.
Her movie career gathered momentum when she played M for the first time in the 1995 Bond entry "GoldenEye." She then starred as Queen Victoria, grief-stricken by the death of her husband, Prince Albert, in 1997's "Mrs. Brown."
"Nobody (in America) knew I'd done anything else besides M -- all of 38 years, gone in a flash!" she says, chuckling. "Almost all of Shakespeare's plays, a lot of Ibsen and Chekhov -- gone. Suddenly I had to learn how to act for films.
"It was very nice to be discovered, and a bit funny at that age. It felt like a new door opening. I was well known in England, and not known in the U.S. at all."