Jane Seymour explains why she has resisted cosmetic surgery

However, the British actress, 73, said nothing could be done about the issue because it was down to a muscle.

Seymour told People magazine: “To set the record straight — because people were getting it wrong — they attempted to do something to my under-eyes when I was 40 because photographers kept saying that I had bulgy eyes.

“The doctor told me it’s actually a muscle, so there’s nothing I can do about it.”

The actress, best known for roles in James Bond film Live And Let Die and TV series Doctor Quinn, Medicine Woman, joked she has had “quite a good career considering the bulgy eye”, adding she never wants to “do anything permanent”.

She added: “I’ve been playing a lot of amazing roles, recently two women with Alzheimer’s with very emotional scenes, and if you’re going to be that emotional, you need every muscle in your face.

“So I have nothing against people doing anything they want to do, but for me personally, it is not helping me in my craft, unless I’m playing somebody who’s had Botox, in which case, I would be all over it.”

Seymour said she has a different secret to maintaining a youthful appearance, adding: “The best facelift is a smile. If you want to look young, just smile from ear to ear.”

She added she approaches exercise “very carefully so I don’t hurt my back or my legs,” saying: “I incorporate weights into whatever I’m doing because I think a lot of women think that if they go for a run or do a booty burn or something, that that’s enough. I think at our age, it’s proven that bone loss is what you have to be careful of.

“I’ll never be Arnold Schwarzenegger or a bodybuilder, but I’m now an 8-to-10-lbs person.”

Seymour said her approach to her health changed after she had a near-death experience on a set in Spain in 1988, when she came down with bronchitis while filming and a nurse injected an antibiotic into her vein rather than a muscle.

She said: “When I nearly died and I saw the white light, a couple of really big things happened there. I remember looking down at me and I was just right there in the corner of the room, looking down at this guy screaming and yelling and trying to inject me with things and we can’t find an ambulance.

“I didn’t connect emotionally at all, but I did intellectually. It occurred to me that this (body) was like a car and it wasn’t running, so when I did get back in my body, I just valued the car. Your car is only as good as you keep it, if you can do something to keep it good, keep it running, then yes.”