Shirley Eaton

Shirley Eaton
Born	Shirley Jean Eaton (1937-01-12) 12 January 1937 Edgware, Middlesex, England
Occupation(s)	Actress, author
Years active	1951–1969, 2001 (actress) 1999–present (author)
Spouse	Colin Rowe ​ ​ (m. 1957; died 1994)​
Children	2

Shirley Eaton (born 12 January 1937) is an English actress, author and model. Eaton appeared regularly in British films throughout the 1950s and 1960s, and gained her highest profile for her iconic appearance as Bond Girl Jill Masterson in the James Bond film Goldfinger (1964), which gained her bombshell status. Eaton also had roles in the early Carry On films.

Preferring to devote herself to bringing up a family, she retired from acting in 1969. Eaton came out of retirement in 1999 to release her autobiography titled Golden Girl, which was a bestseller, and has released three more books throughout the 2000s.

Early life

Eaton was born on 12 January 1937 in Edgware General Hospital, Middlesex, and brought up in the suburb of Kingsbury. She attended Roe Green Primary School on Princes Avenue, and although living close to both w:Kingsbury County Grammar School and Tylers Croft Secondary Modern School, won a place at the w:Aida Foster Theatre School, a specialist drama school, and remained there until she was sixteen. Her stage debut was in Benjamin Britten's Let's Make an Opera! and her West End debut was in 1954 in Going to Town.

Career

All through the 1950s, Eaton was a singing star, both on the stage and on television, appearing with her own act in variety shows throughout the country and starring at the Prince of Wales Theatre in London in her own solo singing act, as well as appearing in many films. Eaton participated in the British heat of the 1957 Eurovision Song Contest.

Throughout her career, Eaton appeared with many of the top British male comedy stars of the period, including Jimmy Edwards, Max Bygraves, Bob Monkhouse, and Arthur Askey. Eaton's female co-stars included Peggy Mount, Thora Hird, and Dora Bryan among others. Her early roles include Three Men in a Boat (1956) and Date with Disaster (1957), in which she co-starred with Tom Drake. She appeared in The Belles of St Trinian's (1954), two of the "Doctor" film series, three early Carry On films and worked with the Crazy Gang in Life Is a Circus (1958).

Eaton left comedy roles by appearing opposite Mickey Spillane in The Girl Hunters (1963) in which Spillane played his own literary creation Mike Hammer. During the 1962 London shoot she appeared on stage in Come Blow Your Horn. She made three episodes of The Saint, starring Roger Moore, including the pilot. She was in a 1962 episode of the British television series Man of the World that was the pilot for the TV series The Sentimental Agent. Her episode was included in a 1963 feature film of the series entitled Our Man in the Caribbean.

Eaton achieved the most recognition for her performance as Jill Masterson in the 1964 James Bond film Goldfinger (1964). She appeared on the cover of Life magazine in her gold-painted persona. Her character's death, being painted head to toe in gold paint and suffering "skin suffocation", led to an urban myth that Eaton had died during filming. She appeared in a 2003 episode of the series MythBusters to dispel the rumour.

After Goldfinger, Eaton made only a few more films, including a pair of films for Ivan Tors, Rhino! (1964) and Around the World Under the Sea (1966), a Harry Alan Towers version of the Agatha Christie mystery Ten Little Indians (1965) co-starring Hugh O'Brian and a Bob Hope comedy, Eight on the Lam (1967), plus the title role of Sax Rohmer's Sumuru in Towers' The Million Eyes of Sumuru (1967) and The Girl from Rio (1969), Everdream (2001) In a 2014 interview, she explained]: "After I finished The Million Eyes of Sumuru and was coming home in the plane was when I made the decision to quit. I hated being away from my baby Jason and his brother Grant. However, I did enjoy being the wicked lady Sumuru in two rather bad films, which I had not had the chance to be before. I do believe they have become cult films now."

Personal life

Eaton was married to Colin Lenton Rowe from 1957 until his death in 1994. The couple had two children, Grant and Jason. Eaton retired from acting to bring up her family and later commented in a 1999 interview with Steve Swires of Starlog magazine, "A career is a career, but you're a mother until you die". She repeated this statement in an interview with the journalist James Davies on 18 June 2008, adding, "The most important thing for me was being a woman and having a family more than being a very famous glamorous actress".

Eaton published an autobiography in 1999 titled Golden Girl. Her later book (Golden Girl Shirley Eaton: Her Reflections) is a picture book of all her film photos from throughout her career and the second book (Shirley Eaton, Bond's Golden Girl; her own ART Gallery) is full of her paintings and sculptures made over a lifetime and, more recently, her art and photography. She also has an official website.

In popular culture

The main character in Jonathan Coe's novel What a Carve Up! is obsessed with Eaton in her role in the film of the same name.

Filmography

Film

Year	Film	Role	Notes
1953	Personal Affair	Schoolgirl	Uncredited
	A Day to Remember	Young Woman on Ferry	Uncredited
1954	You Know What Sailors Are	Palace Girl	Uncredited
	Doctor in the House	Milly Groaker
	The Belles of St. Trinian's	Sixth Former	Uncredited
1955	The Love Match	Rose Brown
1956	Charley Moon	Angel Dream
	Sailor Beware!	Shirley Hornett
	Three Men in a Boat	Sophie Clutterbuck
1957	Doctor at Large	Nan
	Date with Disaster	Sue
	The Naked Truth	Melissa Right
1958	Carry On Sergeant	Mary Sage
	Further Up the Creek	Jane
1959	Carry On Nurse	Staff Nurse Dorothy Denton
	In the Wake of a Stranger	Joyce Edwards
1960	Life Is a Circus	Shirley Winter
	Carry On Constable	Sally Barry
1961	Nearly a Nasty Accident	Cpl. Jean Briggs
	Dentist on the Job	Jill Venner
	A Weekend with Lulu	Deirdre Proudfoot
	What a Carve Up!	Linda Dickson
1962	Our Man in the Caribbean	Lee
1963	The Girl Hunters	Laura Knapp
1964	Rhino!	Miss Arleigh
	Goldfinger	Jill Masterson
1965	The Naked Brigade	Diana Forsythe
	Ten Little Indians	Ann Clyde
1966	Around the World Under the Sea	Dr. Margaret Hanford
1967	Eight on the Lam	Ellie Barton
	The Million Eyes of Sumuru	Sumuru
1967	The Scorpio Letters	Phoebe Stewart
1968	The Blood of Fu Manchu	Black Widow
1969	The Girl from Rio	Sumuru/Sumitra
2001	Everdream	Talent scout	short

Television

Year	Film	Role	Notes
1950	For the Children	Tina Crome	Episode: "Let's Make an Opera!"
1951	Parent-Craft	Anne Pebble	All 6 episodes
1954	And So to Bentley	Girl	Episode: #1.5
1955	The Dance Dress	Fay	TV film
1957	Mostly Maynard	Various	Episode: #1.3
	BBC Sunday-Night Theatre	Peggy Harrison	Episode: "His Excellency"
1962	The Saint	Adrienne Halberd	Episode: "The Talented Husband"
	Man of the World	Lee	Episode: "The Sentimental Agent"
	The Saint	Gloria Uckrose	Episode: "The Effete Angler"
1968	The Saint	Reb Denning	Episode: "Invitation to Danger"

External links

• Shirley Eaton at IMDb
• Article debunking the "skin suffocation" urban legend from Snopes.com
• James Davies Interview with Shirley Eaton, 18 June 2008.
• Shirley Eaton interview at Classic Film & TV Cafe