Joanna Page says she was kidnapped by taxi driver during South Africa shoot

Joanna Page has revealed she was kidnapped in South Africa by a taxi driver who held her in his car for about 90 minutes during filming for the BBC costume drama To the Ends of the Earth, and repeatedly threatened to strip her. She said she was incredibly lucky to escape and ran to hotel reception after finally being dropped off.

Page described the episode on the Five Brilliant Things podcast, saying she had gone to a shopping centre on her own because she was bored and did not want a chaperone. After a day at the mall, she said the atmosphere changed, and when she asked a man for a taxi back to the hotel, he trapped her in the car and began making threats, including that he would take off all of her clothes and take photos.

The 2005 production also involved Benedict Cumberbatch, who has said he was kidnapped at gunpoint during filming in South Africa a couple of weeks earlier. The details of both incidents were discussed after Cumberbatch spoke publicly in January to Variety.

Page, who trained at RADA, has long spoken about the on-set perils faced by actresses. She has described instances of being groped by a TV host and enduring unwanted sexual attention from predatory directors. She wrote about the groping incident in her memoir Lush: My Story — From Swansea To Stacey And Everything In Between, and said she fought back and was determined to call out colleagues when necessary. Lawyers reportedly warned her about naming individuals in the book, a point she acknowledged in recent interviews as she promotes the memoir ahead of its release.