EARLIER this week, I had the honour of interviewing an honor - the ever lovely and wonderfully glamorous Honor Blackman, who is, and always will be, one of the most beautiful Bond girls.
EARLIER this week, I had the honour of interviewing an honor - the ever lovely and wonderfully glamorous Honor Blackman, who is, and always will be, one of the most beautiful Bond girls.
For the benefit of younger readers, she starred as Pussy Galore alongside Sean Connery in 1964's Goldfinger, the third of 007's big screen outings, but the first to achieve worldwide blockbuster status.
What an interesting lady she is - she's had two marriages, two kids and two shots at fame in her 80-odd years (nobody's quite sure how old she is and I was too chicken to ask, as she's a formidable character!) After a brief career as a civil servant, Honor became a motorcycle dispatch rider during the Second World War, before signing on with the Rank Organisation in the late 1940s to be groomed for movie stardom.
What followed was a decade of roles as "an English Rose type" in a succession of good but unremarkable movies, punctuated by one unsuccessful shot at Hollywood in a film called Conspirator, alongside Elizabeth Taylor.
Overwhelmed by the stress of juggling her career and her failing first marriage, Honor had what we'd now call a nervous breakdown and steered clear of showbiz, until she'd regained her health.
Back with a vengeance in the late 1950s/early 1960s, Honor's star began to shine brightly, thanks initially, to the small screen.
As Patrick Macnee's beautiful, leather-clad, judo-kicking partner in The Avengers, she pulled in massive TV ratings and helped inspire the feminist movement.
She also caught the attention of American film producer Cubby Broccoli who, impressed with her high-kicking antics, cast her as Auric Goldfinger's personal pilot in the 007 classic.
"They were great days," said Blackman. "Working with Sean Connery was such a wonderful experience.
"I got the part as Pussy Galore because of the way I looked - I was hot at that point in history, coupled with the fact that I was the only actress who was also an expert in judo."
Hailed by readers of Empire magazine as one of the sexiest stars in movie history (she ranks 51st in their 'Hot 100 of all time' list), Honor has more recently been seen in shows like The Upper Hand and the highly popular Hotel Babylon.
And, 45 years after recording her debut single Kinky Boots, alongside Patrick Macnee, she's back in the studio recording a new CD called The Star Who Fell From Grace.
"Who'd have believed they'd let me make another record after my last effort? To be honest, I only agreed to do the song because the contract stated that I would be backed by the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra and rather naively assumed I'd be off on a jolly to the Czech Republic. Oh well, maybe if it's a hit we'll record the video there," she said.
Will the single be a hit? Who knows? It's a mean and moody half-sung, half-spoken ballad about a talented but self destructive, female celebrity.
Far be it from me to suggest it's overly dramatic but Honor could, if she didn't already have one, qualify for her actor's Equity Card purely on the strength of this alone.
