Rachel Roberts - any stories?

Her photographs helped her to pass the time.

Yikes. That's a horrible way to go. I thought she was a lot older.

What a horrible way to die!

She was someone's wife. Never saw her in anything. I also thought she was much older

"Saturday Night and Sunday Morning," with Albert Finney.

Roberts was a member of the Great British Actors of the "Angry Young Men" Drama Revolution.

Burton writes about her drunkenness at various splendid glitterati affairs in his diaries.

I loved her as Miss Casswell/Delia Darrow in "Foul Play."

[quote]We were attacked, laughed at, and finally imprisoned. But it was there, in those hellholes, where the mind is bound and the spirit is shackled, that we realized that the single most effective way to bring about radical change is the historically proven path of violence.

Tragic life, though. She was married to Rex Harrison and once said, "It is very difficult to be taken seriously when you're introduced at a party to somebody as the fourth Mrs Rex Harrison." She deserved a lot better.

No Bells on Sunday is a terrific read. I highly recommend it.

And let us not forget, she was brilliant in "Murder on the Orient Express!"

She was one tough Mama!

R8, agreed. Great read. I’m not sure she loved Rex H so much as the life she had with him, and she never recovered from losing that.

r9 see r1

Stories? Stories? Just ask Liz Taylor, if she was still alive. Liz remembered the night she and Richard Burton went out for night on the town with Rachel when she was married to Rex Harrison. Well, Rachel, in the throes of alcoholism or dementia, got on her hind legs and barked like a dog in some nightclub. Well, Liz was having none of it and gave her a good lecture, but to no avail, she kept barking like a dog.

You know you hit low when Liz Taylor and Richard Burton lecture you on drunkeness

Rex Harrison was a piece of shit, wasn't he?

Let's not forget the tawdry Doctors' Wives......

She was great is everything, but I loved her best in Picnic at Hanging Rock. I read somewhere that she never really got over Rex Harrison.

From one of David Niven 's books: She and Rex were once at the café de Paris with Vivien Leigh and David Niven, when without warning she proceeded to disrobe and started hitting Rex accross the face with a wet napkin, then she started yelling at Rex ' why don't you fuck me anymore, you are a shit, you are a big piece of shit" and she sat naked on the lap of random customers and tried to fuck them. Well, Vivien was having none of it and gave her a good lecture, but to no avail, she continued screaming lines from her parts and trying to fuck all the men present.

She bit Burgess Meredith's ankles like a dog in Foul Play.

She used to keep a journal which, among other things, detailed her sexual fantasies. One of them was being abducted by men and having them ravish her, making her breasts grow larger by roughly fondling them.

I saw an interview of Faye Dunaway from the time she was doing 'the wicked lady ' in England. She and Rachel were pals and were regulars at the old videotape renter at the corner of the Mall and Shaftesbury av. Once she drove there to bring back a stack of tapes with Faye and instead of going into the store, she just threw them by the window in the face of the assistant and drove away. Well, Faye was not having it and gave her a good scolding but she didn't care. She just laughed and kept driving.

I do love her in Murder on the Orient Express. Great German accent. I quote her all the time with my partner.

Yes, I'm gay.

I remember her from childhood, especially from Murder on the Orient Express. I used to think of her as being an old woman, or at least much older than 50 something. And now I'm older than she was when she passed. Now I'm the old geezer. I'm sad that she died so horribly.

In Monroe's drafts for her autobio, she reminisces of all the moments when she saw Rex and Rachel in London during the filming of 'the prince and the showgirl'. Rachel would spend HOURS in the bathroom, arrive late everywhere, unkempt, smelly. Once she locked herself in the loo and declared that she was afraid of the aliens. Marilyn wouldn't have it, and told Roberts off, but she didn't care a bit and continued poping pills.

She was good in S1mone, but her work in Rhianna's Bitch Better Have My Money will always be my favorite.

Is she related to Emma Roberts?

[quote] Well, Vivien was having none of it

[quote] Well, Faye was not having it

[quote] Marilyn wouldn't have it,

I sense a theme here.

What would have been the appeal of Rex Harrison?

I once came across her when she and I were both invited to a state dinner for the President of Malaysia at Buckingham Palace in the late 1970s. Unfortunately she seemed to have had a past with the Duke of Edinburgh, and as the night wore on she became more and more agitated he was paying attention to her, and also more drunken (on ice wine). Finally, she stood up at the dinner, ripped open her gown to expose her bare breasts, stood up on the table, and shouted, "Look at me, look at me, Philip! You could never give me what I really wanted!" Well, Her Majesty the Queen was having none of it, and rang for the equerries to place Rachel in chains and march her off to the Tower of London to cool her heels as soon as possible. Everyone was incredibly embarrassed, and worried what the President and First Lady of Malaysia must be thinking.

My first trip to Cardiff in the 1970s and I was sitting my first morning at a lovely and typical outdoor restaurant on Chippy Lane having Welsh rarebit and who strolled by?

Rachel Roberts, wearing a traditional Welsh woman's stovepipe hat and absolutely nothing else. It couldn't have been a more appropriate welcome to the city. But Dame Shirley Bassey was having none of it, and raced after Rachel with a cloak to try to cover her up.

She was a notorious lesbian . She was Robert Wagner 's guest on his yacht once, in the early eighties, and Robert walked in on her and Natalie in a compromising situation. Christopher Walken was there too, and Rachel suggested they join them. But Natalie wasn't having it and lectured her on her promiscuity.Rachel didn't care and continued her move toward the men...

Loving these juicy stories!

She was very funny in a small role, as a housekeeper, in "The Tony Randall Show,"( a very underrated and largely forgotten sitcom from the 70's)

This thread is a satire I suppose, but I keep reading ... and cringing...

[quote] I saw an interview of Faye Dunaway from the time she was doing 'the wicked lady ' in England. She and Rachel were pals and were regulars at the old videotape renter at the corner of the Mall and Shaftesbury av. Once she drove there to bring back a stack of tapes with Faye and instead of going into the store, she just threw them by the window in the face of the assistant and drove away. Well, Faye was not having it and gave her a good scolding but she didn't care. She just laughed and kept driving.

There's a different version of this story I learned on here. I've always thought it Faye Dunaway who used to do that with DVD's at Blockbusters by the corner of LaCienega and Beverly. She supposedly had a bungalow a few blocks east from that Blockbusters.

The Tony Randall Show was great, R32. Thank you for the memory.

She was the terror of every Bond st. shop assistant back in the day. An absolute cunt. The story is she and Bacall went to Hermès together once, and a young newbie rushed to Rachel and asked if he could offer his help 'ma'am'. Rachel gave him an icy look, uttered coldly 'This is Hermès, you should call me maDame', and demanded to see the manager about it, and be served by him. She eventually ordered a scarf, asked it to be DELIVERED., and left without paying. Bacall had none of it, and lectured her at length about common politeness and niceness to the people in service, but Rachel ignored her and proceeded to the pub.

I'm pretty sure her tombstone says, "I'm not having it!"

She could be a real mischief-maker. During the shoots for "Murder on the Orient Express" she would come in with a snootful and start cruelly imitating the other actresses. It would horrify most of the other performers, but Sidney Lumet would be doubled over laughing, because who can resist a really hilarious Genevieve Bujold imitation? But Wendy Hiller wouldn't have it, and when Rachel finally started prancing around saying, "My ROOSH-ian nem ees NATALYA," Wendy finally smacked her upside the head with her character's walking stick and shouted, "Shut the fuck up, Welsh trash!" That indeed shut Rachel up for the rest of the shoot.

My Rachel Roberts story. In the 60's, she was very good friends with Mia Farrow, who is in fact, mostly british, and was raised in England. Mia always got along with older people. This was pre-Sinatra. So the two of them were using Marlene Dietrich 's appartment in NYC, when they wanted to hang out, and in one of the bathrooms, they stumbled upon Dietrich 's old beauty products from the 30's. Reading the labels, they discovered that some of the old squeezed tubes contained cocaïne, which was used frequently in medicine and beauty products then. ( after my grand mother died, same happened to us, we found a small vintage tin boxes of tablets for headaches that contained cocaïne. We were shocked) Rachel spent the entire day trying to get high. She tried sniffing them, eating them, and finally she put them into her rollies and smoked them. that infuriated Mia who was not having it and berated Roberts at length, but to no avail. Rachel continued smoking her cocaïne rollies, and told Mia to go fuck herself. So Mia rushed to the st regis hôtel to fetch Dalí, and they tried to reason with Roberts who argued that telling someone to fuck was actually doing them a favor, and passed out in Dietrich's bedroom. Dalí and Mia went back to the st Regis and finished the evening going up and down in the elevator, because they didn't know better.

[quote] There's a different version of this story I learned on here. I've always thought it Faye Dunaway who used to do that with DVD's at Blockbusters by the corner of LaCienega and Beverly. She supposedly had a bungalow a few blocks east from that Blockbusters.

I taught that crazy bitch everything she knows.

I watched the clip. R16. She was not very good. But it didn't matter.. Gene HACKMAN !!! Holy fuck !!! That man was SEX on LEGS ! Who knew ?

I knew, R41 - I worship Gene Hackman! Search for my old thread, "Gene Hackman, An Appreciation" - I was pleased to see he got a lot of love here. Meanwhile I caught Rachel Roberts on an old NIGHT GALLERY episode on MeTV last night, and I wasn't having it!!

Did anyone else read that story ? Apparently, Roberts was very suicidal, and once, as she was invited at Gene Tierney 's for high tea, while Gene was in the kitchen preparing cucumber sandwiches, Roberts climbed the window and started walking on the ledge, wich was over 10 stories high, until she reached the corner of the building, and stood there, theatening to jump. A crowd gathered in the stre and started screaming. Gene heard the noise, and opened the kitchen window, only to see Rachel a few steps away, ready to jump. She of course had none of it and gave Rachel a piece of her mind, but to no avail. Rachel stood there, lifting her skirt and swearing at the crowd, until the firemen got her back inside. Gene then showed her the door, and sat by herself with her cucumber sandwiches in front of the tv, to watch 'what's my line'.

I think she was a man. I really do think so.

The Tony Randall Show was great, and she was great in it.

OP, corgis don't act like that. The story does sound just like Robert Mitchum, though -- he was good with animals.

[quote] Rex Harrison was a piece of shit, wasn't he?

Two of his women killed themselves. He had a butler that he treated so badly, the butler pointed a shotgun at Rex

Here's everything you want to know about that bastard rex harrison

Rachel Roberts: About That Time She Masturbated A Dog

Didn't Glenn Close get her big break on Broadway after Roberts was fired from some play and Glennie took over her role?

Don't forget Picnic at Hanging Rock, her greatest movie.

It's true she was a notorious lush, and was thrown out of the best restaurants in LA.

It's possible she got the Lye mixed up with the Rye.

she.was.mentally.ill

R13, she had hind legs?

The "wasn't having it" troll is my new favorite DL meme. I hope you start other threads with these juicy true'ish stories!

Wow, she looks a lot like an older "P!nk" in some pics.

No, Pink looks like a younger RR.

R54 thanks but there are several of us, which is even funnier

A fellow Welsh actress called Helen Griffin took her one woman show Who's Afraid of Rachel Roberts? to the Edinburgh festival a few years ago and it was very good, excruciating at times thanks to the subject matter.

The drunken escapade she's most famous for in the UK is as below. Sadly not as famous as Grace Jones attacking Russell Harty (RIP from AIDS xx) or the incident with Rod Hull and Emu.

[quote]Her appearance on the Russell Harty chat show was so drunken the tapes had to be expunged. During recording she called Harty "a silly cunt", slagged off women's libbers (apparently all they needed was "a cock up their cunt or their arse") and proceeded to sing The Lady is a Tramp while the studio audience weren't having an of it and roundly booed her. The tapes of the recording were subsequently destroyed.

RR gives new meaning to the British term for "insane": barking mad.

I remember the story @R30. It was in every paper. Apparently Rachel wanted to get hammered and offered to fuck both Wagner and Walken. When they declined, she took the dinghy to sail to the Reef Harbour, the only restaurant this side of the island that served alcohol. Natalie wanted to follow suit, but she missed the step and hit the water. Roberts couldn't care less and started paddling to the shore. Wagner and Walken were having none of it, and lectured Roberts about carelessness, and not helping people in danger, but to no avail. Roberts flipped her finger and paddled away.

You don't have to make up 'to no avail' scenarios with our Rachel - her life was over the top fucked up in reality. Like Gloria Grahame or Vivien Leigh fucked up.

"...in 1980 - overdosing on Nembutals, Mogadons and an unidentified acid solution - her corpse was found covered in lacerations. In her suicidal state she had wandered through rose bushes in her garden before crashing through a glass screen in her kitchen. She was discovered dead on her kitchen floor with the kettle still boiling."

In the book "Did She or Didn't She?" (a gossipy book about different actresses' sex lives) they say Roberts once got miffed that photographers weren't paying attention to her at a party.

She reportedly jumped up on a table, hiked up her dress and demanded, [italic]"Why don't you take pictures of MY PUSSY?!" [/italic]

I suspect alcohol was involved...

I loved when she fought Burgess Meredith in "Foul Play" (1978).

R58, Harty is buried in the churchyard of St. Alkelda, Giggleswick.

Amazing actress, always elevated anything she appeared in. Definitely fucked up though.

R61, since you killed all the fun in this thread, she was not very good, nor well known, apart from yourself and 3 DL fossils, nobody knows or cares who she was, znd you are a humorless cunt.

If BURTON is writing about your drunkenness, you're a world-class drunk, darling.

I remember her performance in "This Sporting Life," as a life-denying woman involved with Richard Harris, as quite devastating.

Bitch sounds like my friend Julie. Such a cunt.