It was pretty spectacular. While there's no decent footage yet of the Dame flipping her lid, there were so many people around that it's inevitable really.

Mirren is currently starring in The Audience in the West-End, where she once again is playing the part of Queen Elizabeth II, and usually things run pretty smoothly. However things took a turn for the bizarre on Saturday when protestors stopped outside the theatre and began drumming away to their hearts content, which sent the then performing Mirren into a 'steaming' rage. So what did she do? When the interval came rolling around, she stormed straight off stage, out the stage door and directly into the crowd to tell them what she thought of them, in no uncertain terms. Wig, pearls, costume and all.

A direct quote from a bystander 'She said people had paid ‘a lot of f***ing money’ to watch her show and that we were ‘f***ing ruining it’. We didn't think it was possible to like Helen Mirren anymore than we already did. We were wrong.

'I had just spent five or 10 minutes on stage trying to allow the audience to hear what I was saying, which was impossible' she told press afterwards. She did make amends though, meeting with the drummers and apologising for overreacting but insisting that she'd do it again. Such a little goer that Helen.