The Avengers and Bond babe took time out from singing and acting to chat to DVD & Blu-ray Review. Read more in Issue 134, which is out in shops tomorrow...
Is it strange to be talking about something that must seem like such a long time ago?
It is. It’s so far back.
It’s a shame that so many episodes from the first series of The Avengers are now lost...
I’m surprised that some of them are still knocking about. What is astonishing is that anybody cares about the first ones. It was black and white and it was on tape. But there are thousands of people who know all about it and care, which is nice.
There was a public outcry after you left the Avengers...
Two years was long enough. After that the emphasis was quite a lot more on sex and naughtiness.
You’ve recorded some extras for the DVDs. What was that like?
I recorded something when it went onto video. And I’ve recorded something now it’s gone onto DVD. So it’s all fascinating and yes that was fun.
Was there a difference between the two experiences?
The only real difference was that I had seen two of the episodes they’re going to put out this time. Whereas when I did the interview for video I was in the make-up chair and the interviewer started asking me a question about a particular episode that was really testing me and I said, “For God’s sakes I don’t remember.” And he was horrified. So for the rest of my make-up session he put bits of two episodes up on the screen for me to watch. And I have to say it’s the first time I’d seen anything since those days, because I’m not somebody who sits and watches myself in anything. I must say I was extraordinarily surprised that it was so good and in such good nick. This was when they’d tidied them all up – now they’ve tidied them up even more.
Do people collect memorabilia from The Avengers?
There are people who’ve got yards and yards of stuff. And there are people who’ve got yards and yards of stuff of me. But everybody’s got so much more than I have because I don’t keep anything - otherwise you’d be overrun. But it is astonishing. And there are people who are such fans of things that it’s amazing.
You went from Mrs Gale in The Avengers to Pussy Galore in Goldfinger. She really stood up to Bond and I think it took a long time to get back to that...
Yes, well it’s taken them 30 years or so to get back to that. Mind you, in the book she’s supposed to be a lesbian and then Bond changes her. I mean Ian Fleming was such a misogynist. There was no way that anybody should be able to stay as a lesbian when they’d met Bond. Whether Bond was Ian Fleming or Ian Fleming was Bond is purely academic.
You recently released a single, ‘The Star Who Fell from Grace’...
I was surprised to be asked to do any such thing. But they asked if I’d like to do this with the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra. And I haven’t been to Prague and I want to go there and I thought, ‘Oh won’t that be exciting.’ And of course I’m an idiot because I never went to Prague! The conductor goes to Prague, he lays it down over there and comes back with this recording and I have that to work on. And I record in some grotty studio in London. It’s a very, very sad song about someone who’s drunk too much or taken too many drugs and has fallen down and lost favour. It’s a song of desperate regret.
Who was the best Bond?
It’s true to say that Sean was and is still the best Bond and he has the advantage of being the first in any case. But he is the nearest thing to the character that Ian Fleming wrote.
The Avengers Series 1 & 2 Boxset will be released on DVD on 5 October and is reviewed in Issue 134 of DVD & Blu-ray Review. The later series of the Avengers will follow in 2010.
