Joanna Page<\/strong> is opening up about a terrifying ordeal<\/a> she experienced while filming in South Africa nearly two decades ago.<\/p>\n The Love Actually<\/em> and Gavin & Stacey<\/em> star, 48, recalled the incident during the latest episode of English comedian Russell Howard\u2019s<\/strong> Five Brilliant Things<\/em> podcast<\/a>, released Wednesday, September 24. Page revealed she was held hostage by a taxi driver for around an hour and a half, during which he threatened to take her somewhere, force her to strip naked and pose for photos.<\/p>\n At the time, Page was filming the 2005 BBC miniseries To the Ends of the Earth<\/em>, which also starred Benedict Cumberbatch<\/strong> and Sam Neill<\/strong>. She explained that shortly after arriving in South Africa, she grew restless at her hotel. Against production\u2019s advice to always travel with a chaperone, Page insisted on venturing out alone.<\/p>\n \u201cI said, \u2018Can you just get me a taxi and just take me to a [mall] somewhere?\u2019\u201d she shared. \u201cThey said, \u2018We really don\u2019t think you should do this,\u2019 and I said, \u2018I want to do it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n While walking around the mall, Page noticed the atmosphere change<\/a> in the late afternoon. \u201cIt just started feeling really menacing. I had no way of getting back to the hotel, I didn\u2019t have a car, I didn\u2019t really know where I was going,\u201d she recalled.<\/p>\n After approaching a man in a car for help, Page quickly realized she was in danger. \u201cHe drove me around for about an hour and [30 minutes] telling me that he was going to take me somewhere, I was going to take off all of my clothes and he was going to take photos of me,\u201d she remembered.<\/p>\n Page described feeling truly helpless throughout the ordeal. \u201cIt was the only situation I think I\u2019ve ever been in in my life where I thought, \u2018You\u2019re in the s\u2013t. This is serious. You can\u2019t get yourself out of this. I don\u2019t know what I\u2019m going to do.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Thinking fast, the actress decided to keep the driver talking. \u201cMy plan was just to laugh with him, make him laugh, tell some jokes, be quite saucy back to him. If he\u2019s saying he\u2019s going to do this, laugh back, be really, really cheeky,\u201d Page explained. \u201cSo I did that for about an hour and a half as he just drove me around and around and eventually he took me back to the hotel.\u201d<\/p>\n Page said she immediately ran to hotel staff in tears, who told her she was \u201cincredibly lucky\u201d to escape unharmed and warned her never to go out alone again.<\/p>\n Shockingly, Page revealed that just weeks later, her costar Cumberbatch was also abducted<\/a> and held for hours during the same production.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/staging.nationalenquirer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Joanna-Page-2.jpg\")