11 times Hollywood landed at the Hay Festival

Star of Private Benjamin and Death Becomes Her, actor Goldie Hawn wooed the Hay Festival crowd on 28th May 2005 to promote her memoirs A Lotus Grows in the Mud.

It was a stormy day and the wind rattled around the marquee, howling as she was being interviewed by journalist for The Independent, John Walsh, who wrote that "Ms Hawn was clearly unused to such conditions, or to meeting the public close-up." Nonetheless, the public adored her.

Walsh also described how, after Ms Hawn enquired as to the whereabouts of a powder room, the Hay Festival bookshop manager said: "you could go in that hedge over there."

Star of the 1950s and 60s, Tony Curtis is best known as the cross-dressing leading man opposite Marilyn Monroe in the comedy classic Some Like It Hot. But on 25 May 2009 the 83-year-old Curtis had a starring role at the Hay Festival when he appeared, cowboy-hatted on stage with Francine Stock to talk about his autobiography, American Prince.

It's possible he was used to slightly more glamorous surroundings than a rainy tent in Wales with not one but two electrical mishaps during his talk which plunged he and his interviewer into silence and darkness.

The technical hiccups didn't stop the veteran actor dishing the dirt on some of his co-stars however recounting, to a delighted audience, that he had once called Joan Collins a four-letter-word to her face.

Appearing the same year as Goldie Hawn, the Oscar-winning star of Klute and Barbarella, Jane Fonda stole the show that year with a packed out audience of 1,300 people on the festival's last day.

Discussing her autobiography, My Life So Far, Fonda was direct and honest with the audience, revealing some painful home-truths about growing up with Henry Fonda as a father:

"My father always made me know I was fat. I could never make him love me. I decided nobody would love me unless I was perfect. I felt ugly, as if I was falling down a dark hole."

They don't come much more Hollywood than Lauren Bacall who knew it was hip to visit the little Welsh book festival as far back as 1991 when, in what might be the least timely promotional tour ever, she arrived to promote her 1978 autobiography, By Myself.

According to the Sunday Times journalist Penny Perrick, who joined Bacall for part of her trip, the megastar was met by a series of unfortunate blunders which included, but were not limited to; a delayed flight, a chauffeur who couldn't find her hotel and the failure of her own books to arrive from her publisher in time for the signing at Hay.

Twice Oscar nominated Jude Law may hail from Lewisham but his glittering career has seen him rise to become a well known face in Hollywood and he still successfully bags some of the highest profile roles: his latest being one of the bookworld's most popular characters - a young Albus Dumbledore.

In 2015 Law joined a notable cast of performers for the hugely popular Letters Live event which had a 1,700-strong audience. Law performed extracts from, among others, letters from Evelyn Waugh to his wife Laura alongside Sherlock’s Louise Brealey, Sarah Lancashire, Sandi Toksvig and Stephen Fry. He described Hay Fetsival as "inspirational" and "stimulating".

In 2014, the 57-year-old star Carrie Fisher appeared on stage at Hay and not only to talk about reprising her role as Princess Leia, saying that she "can get Princess Leia right this time" but also to discuss her acclaimed writing career.

Among her sardonic reposts to questions about playing Princess Leia she replied "I would rather have played Han Solo."

Promoting his memoir, Stories I Only Tell My Friends, in 2011, Rob Lowe appeared opposite interviewer Mariella Frostrup who apparently didn't shy away from the actor's turbulent past when she quizzed him on what she called ""Icarus-like" fall from grace.

According to the Telegraph he was "mobbed by female fans" on arrival by helicopter.

Lowe, who is perhaps best-loved for his role on The West Wing told the audience how the cast and crew of the famous Washington drama were much admired by real US politicians in Capitol Hill, recounting that he was once in the Oval Office with none other than Bill Clinton when the president started pitching him and Aaron Sorkin storylines.

The eccentric Kathleen Turner appeared at Hay in 2008 to promote her memoirs, Send Yourself Roses. She tickled her Hay audience by telling them how she had decided to hitch-hike for the first time in her life during her stay there.

On her way to fetch some breakfast for her and her daughter she thumbed a ride from an unsuspected and kindly driver who was somewhat flabbergasted when she confessed who she was. As a reward she gave him front row seats to the packed event.

Her interview took more serious turn when she opened up about following her acting dream against her father's wishes, who died when she was 17.

One of the most upbeat guests the festival has ever received was Henry Winkler, the artist formerly known as 'The Fonz', who visited the Hay Festival in 2014 to talk about his second career as a highly successful children's author.

Since 2003, Winkler has collaborated with Lin Oliver on 19 children's books about a boy called Hank Zipzer who is dyslexic.

The twice-Golden-Globe-winning Happy Days actor was himself diagnosed when he was a 31 and by opening up about his experiences with learning difficulties, both through his character and by speaking about it publically, he has become a hit with a whole new generation.

The actor had spent six years touring schools to talk about his learning difficulty.

Sometimes Hollywood can come out of somewhere closer to home. York for example, the hometown of actor, Judi Dench.

Looking effortlessly cool in a biker jacket, the Oscar-winning James Bond star, Dame Judi Dench appeared at the Hay Festival in 2014 talking to Sir Richard Eyre about her album of great speeches Exits and Entrances. At the end she was asked to recite some Shakespeare at which point another Hollywood actor leapt to the stage: Benedict Cumberbatch (Dr. Strange, The Imitation Game)

Cumberbatch offered to assist her with the lines to the rapture of the Hay crowd but he had a motive. Having helped her out he turned and asked: "Are you going to play my mother in Richard III?" to which she replied: "Yeah!"