Dame Judi Dench 'Presents'

As the song goes, there is nothing like a dame, especially when she's Dame Judi Dench. The celebrated British actress is creating Oscar buzz once more for her performance as a bored widow in "Mrs. Henderson Presents."

The movie, featuring an all-star British cast, tells the story of the cast and crew of a gutsy theater group who go on with the show, right through the blitz of World War II.

The best part of this story, Dench tells The Early Show, is that it's all true.

In the title role, Dench says she portrays an "extraordinary person who lost her husband and son in the first world war and, on some kind of whim one day, bought a theater not knowing anything about it."

Mrs. Henderson, however, quickly catches on to the way to pack a theater: "Let's have naked girls. Don't you think?" the neophyte producer suggests to her shocked advisers.

Mrs. Henderson's Windmill Theatre went on to considerable success through the World War II years and, Dench says, "the thing that's famous around the world is, this theater stayed open. It literally stayed open. It really only closed for a matter of a couple of days during the entire blitz."

The movie began as the brainchild of Dench and an old friend, actor Bob Hoskins, who portrays the irascible impresario who falls in with Mrs. Henderson's theatrical ambitions at The Windmill Theatre. The two actors became enthusiastic about the story and drew in another movie industry heavy-hitter, director Stephen Frears.

It was the story of courage in dark times that inspired them, Dench tells The Early Show.

"Not only Mrs. Henderson for doing something so absurd as to buy a theater, something she knew nothing about, but also those girls, they kept going," she says. "They were all very young girls. They kept going. The theater was underground, so it was quite a safe place for them to be. The young men who came back to see the show were coming back from the front, rather dangerous, into the middle of London, which was probably quite risky, too."

During her long career, Dench has moved easily from movies to television, theater and radio, from high-brow roles to action-adventure. She won an Academy Award for best supporting actress in 1999 for her role as Queen Elizabeth I in "Shakespeare in Love" and has received three additional nominations for "Mrs. Brown" in 1998, "Chocolat" in 2001, and "Iris" in 2002.

The actress was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1988. She was made a Companion of Honour this year.

Dench also appears in the current film adaptation of "Pride & Prejudice" and will continue her role as chief spy "M" in the next James Bond flick, to be released in February 2006.

She hasn't even met the new James Bond actor Daniel Craig, she tells The Early Show. But she's looking forward to "M's" next adventure. "I know I'm going to Prague and to the Bahamas" for filming, she said, "which is really good."