She has entertained generations of New Zealanders on our TV screens, but after ditching her trademark look you may not recognise her.
The British actress has been a household name since the 1980s and has visited New Zealand a number of times.
She admits to being a “huge twat” and after making her name in edgy sketch comedy, became a sitcom fixture with her role as a straight-talking vicar in a little English village.
The comic, who used to be known for her brunette bob, recently shared video making light of the struggles of Brits overseas, playfully speaking in pidgin Spanish as she acted out an awkward restaurant scene on her sunny getaway.
Underneath the hat, it's same comic icon we all know.
Dawn French, who starred on TV in shows like The Comic Strip, French and Saunders and The Vicar of Dibley, and took on movie roles in Harry Potter and Death on the Nile, looked very different in the short clip.
The addition of a hat and the lack of a bold lip colour seemed to confuse some who saw the clip online with one person writing: “WTF? That’s Dawn French?”
In truth, 67-year-old French ditched the brunette bob years ago to embrace her natural grey.
She also lost a lot of the weight that led to her describing herself as “roly-poly 80s comedienne Dawn French”.
“When I was due to have my hysterectomy the doc told me that if I could lose some weight before the op, they would be able to do it via keyhole, and I would recover in three weeks or so.,” she told fans during her 30 Million Minutes tour in 2016.
“Otherwise it would be big open surgery, and three months to recover. So, I set about dropping a few stone.
Dawn French appearing on stage in Auckland in 2009. Photo / Glenn Jeffrey
“No magic wand, just tiny, joyless low-cal eating and lots more walking for weeks and weeks.
“It was grim. I lost seven-and-a-half stone (48kg). I could have the keyhole surgery. Great. That’s all it was, practical.”
French is soon to return to screens in BBC sitcom Can You Keep A Secret?, a six-part series about a widow dealing with the sudden death of her husband before a twist sees her facing a potential windfall.
Promotional material for the show promises it “places comedy icon Dawn French in the middle of some mischief we can all relate to”.
