|
|
|
|
| Birth Name(s) : Enid Diana Elizabeth Rigg |
Date of Birth: N/A |
| Status:
Single
|
Partner:
Archibald Stirling 1982-1990 |
| Profession:
N/A |
| << Add Diana Rigg To Your Favorites |
|
Full Diana Rigg Biography
Dame Enid Diana Elizabeth Rigg DBE (born 20 July 1938) is an English actress. She is probably best known for her portrayals of Emma Peel in The Avengers and Tracy Bond in the 1969 James Bond film On Her Majesty's Secret Service.
Rigg was born in the South Yorkshire town of Doncaster, to Louis Rigg and Beryl Helliwell; her father was a railway engineer who had been born in Yorkshire. She lived in India between the ages of two and eight and then attended the Moravian school in Fulneck, near Pudsey. Rigg spent many years of her childhood in Bikaner, India, where her father was employed as a Railroad Executive. Rigg still speaks fluent Hindi.
Rigg tried out for the role of Emma Peel on a whim, without ever having seen the programme. Although she was hugely successful in the role, she did not like the lack of privacy that television brought. She also did not like the way that she was treated by ABC Weekend TV; after a dozen episodes she discovered that she was being paid less than the cameraman.
For the second series she held out for a raise in pay (from GB£90 to GB£180 weekly), but there was still no question of her staying for a third year. Patrick Macnee, her co-star in the series, noted that Rigg had later told him that she considered Macnee and her driver to be her only friends on the set. After leaving The Avengers she appeared as the title character in the telemovie The Marquise, which was based on a play by Noel Coward.
She also returned to the stage, including playing two Tom Stoppard leads, Ruth Carson in Night and Day and Dorothy Moore in Jumpers. A nude scene with Keith Michell in Abelard and Heloise led to a notorious description of her as 'built like a brick mausoleum with insufficient flying buttresses', by the crude and acerbic critic John Simon.
In 1982, she appeared in a musical called Colette, based on the life of the French writer and created by Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt, but it closed during an American tour en route to Broadway. In 1986, she took a leading role in the West End production of Stephen Sondheim's musical Follies.
On the big screen she became a Bond girl in On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969), playing Tracy Bond, James Bond's only wife. Throughout the filming of the movie, there were rumors that the experience was not a happy one, owing to a personality clash with Bond actor George Lazenby. The rumors may have arisen from a reporter witnessing her say "I'm having Garlic for lunch George I hope you are!" before a love scene between the two; however, both Diana and Lazenby have denied the claims, and both wrote off the garlic comment as a joke. Her other films include The Assassination Bureau (1969), The Hospital (1971), Theatre of Blood (a film she considers to contain her best work) (1973), and A Little Night Music (1977). She also appeared as Lady Holiday in the 1981 film The Great Muppet Caper.
In 1986, she presented the Scottish Television series Held in Trust, which focused on the work of the National Trust for Scotland and some of its most famous treasures.
In this series, first aired in 2000, she played Gladys Mitchell's detective, Dame Beatrice Adela Le Strange Bradley, an eccentric old woman who worked for Scotland Yard as a pathologist. The series was not a critical success and did not return for a second season.
From 1989 until 2003, she hosted the PBS television series Mystery!, taking over from Vincent Price, her co-star from Theatre of Blood. Her TV career in America has been varied; most famously she starred in her own series Diana, but it was not successful.
Rigg has continued to perform on stage in London, the latest play being a drama entitled Honour which had a limited but successful run in 2006.
Although she does not consider herself a singer, her performances in A Little Night Music, Follies and other stage musicals have been well received by audiences and critics alike. She made a highly memorable appearance with Morecambe and Wise in 1976, in which she played Nell Gwynne in a musical pastiche, joining Eric and Ernie to sing “How Could You Believe Me When I Said I Loved You When You Know I've Been A Liar All My Life?”.
She also appeared in the second season of Ricky Gervais' hit comedy, Extras, alongside Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe.
She is currently appearing as Huma Rojo in the Old Vic's production of All About My Mother, adapted by Samuel Adamson and based on the film of the same title directed by Pedro Almodóvar. |
|
|
| Add Diana Rigg Biography (SuperUSERS) + |
| Add Diana Rigg Review/Comment
|
HQ Diana Rigg Pictures (120) | Random Diana Rigg Picture
|
| << Back to the Diana Rigg Homepage |
|
