My St Tropez summer with Christine Keeler
As the nation is gripped by the TV drama, former friend Hanja Kochansky recalls Keeler’s troubled soul and love of fame
When I first met Christine Keeler, she wasn’t long out of Holloway Prison. In common with just about everyone, I was instantly struck by her beauty, and intrigued by her obvious star quality.
My then husband, Hugh Bebb, and I had been living in South Africa when the Profumo affair rocked the British establishment, leaving ruined careers and lives in its wake. But the news had spread across continents. When, in 1965, I came face to face with the stunning young woman who had been at the centre of the sex scandal, I was already well aware of her fame.
We met through a friend called John Rudd, whom we’d known in South Africa. After serving half of her nine-month sentence for perjury, Christine had been freed and resumed her high life in London, taking pleasure and fun where she found it. For a few years, she found it with us, and spent much of her time at our flat in Marloes Road, near Earl’s Court. I was trying to be an actress, but without much conviction, and we hardly had any money. But this barely got in our way. Christine had plenty at the time.
She didn’t speak much of her time behind bars, saying only that it wasn’t too bad, and that she’d read Émile Zola while there. Other than this, she still seemed naive when I knew her, a quality deftly captured by the ongoing BBC drama retelling the notorious tale.
When I told Christine that Bob Dylan was coming to town and had said the only person he cared to meet was her, she looked blank and asked:
“Who’s Bob Dylan?” At one party she found herself dancing with Ken Kesey, author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, but had no idea who he was either.
On another occasion, I happened to share a ride home from the West End with Randolph Churchill, the former Conservative MP and son of Sir Winston. When I arrived back at the flat, Christine was present and scolded me for failing to invite him up. “You know how the likes of him love the likes of us,” she pointed out, as well she might, having inadvertently all but brought down Harold Macmillan’s Conservative government through her affair with war secretary John Profumo.
As for the other dramatis personae in the scandal, Christine had decided that Stephen Ward, the society osteopath through whom she had met both Profumo and the Russian military attaché Eugene Ivanov, had been a spy; and she no longer spent time with her former friend Mandy Rice-Davies.
By the time I met Christine, Ward had taken his own life on the last day of his trial for pimping, and RiceDavies had left the scene. What the former showgirl and model, then in her early 20s, had retained was her desire for thrills and, yes, a love of the limelight.
She was sad about Ward and felt a certain sense of guilt, but she wasn’t one to dwell on feelings like that. She said she’d never liked Profumo. He wasn’t her type at all. I imagine her head had been turned by his power and wealth, but Christine’s true sexual interest lay in naughty young men, as I was to witness first hand on our holiday together.
In 1965, flush with money and fame, she had taken a house in St Tropez for the summer season and asked if I would go with her. She was generous with her newfound wealth, and offered to pay for everything if I would drive her around. (She said she couldn’t get insurance after her criminal conviction.)
We came close to missing the ferry from Dover, as Christine had insisted on shopping for supplies before leaving. “You know what the food is like over there,” she explained as she rushed out of the supermarket, laden with tins of baked beans and Irish stew.
We made it on board, with other things besides these provisions: I’d stashed some weed in my bra and Christine had some speed in her bag. She was also very partial to booze.
Since our tank was empty on arrival in France, I set off on foot to find petrol. When I returned, Christine was cross-legged on the bonnet of her car, signing autographs for a crowd that had assembled. “They recognised me!” she beamed, flashing her impertinent smile.
“I thought you wanted to travel incognito,” I replied.
“Well, from now on I will,” she assured me. But stardom was far too much fun for her to stick to that plan.
Using some of the cash she had made from selling her story to the press, she checked us into the luxurious Hotel George V in Paris before we journeyed south to the French Riviera for a month. She was spotted and stopped many times by members of the public familiar with this very British scandal. And if anyone failed to recognise her, Christine would let them know who she was.
During our stay in St Tropez, we slept a lot during the day and went out to parties at night. I noticed how, in a crowd, people’s eyes would helplessly fall on her. You simply had to look at that face.
We smoked dope and Christine took uppers. One day, we attended a lunch full of socialites and aristocrats at the residence of one Gunter Sachs, the German multimillionaire playboy and soonto-be husband of Brigitte Bardot, the French screen idol and sex symbol. Christine wasn’t impressed by the hospitality on offer. “Blimey, is this all there is?” she exclaimed at the meagre buffet.
She was happier in France when she was picking up boys. I don’t remember her bringing them back to our holiday house – we shared a bedroom, so I probably would have noticed – but there were plenty of places to go and have sex. Gorgeous young men were her thing, the type who would inevitably take her money; she evidently couldn’t resist them. But she knew that she could trust no one. A young and uneducated girl, she’d been taken advantage of multiple times, and didn’t really know who she was.
Sometimes, her lovely lips would fall into a frown and, downcast, she’d confess as much to me when the two of us were alone. I’d tell her to look in the mirror and remind her she was a pretty girl. She’d do that and say: “Oh, yes, I feel much better now.”
But it was clear that for all of her fun-seeking ways, and her love of the fame and the glamour, she was struggling to know how to handle the situation she had found herself in. Any young girl who had been through a similar thing would no doubt have felt the same way. But Christine was particularly troubled and lost and sometimes just longed for stability.
When I had a child, she decided she wanted a husband and baby as well. And when I split up with my husband, she urged me to get back together with him.
Our friendship endured for about five years, and then we drifted apart. I moved to Italy in 1972 and we gradually fell out of touch.
Watching The Trial of Christine Keeler today does bring back something of her character. I think she would have liked the portrayal. And I’m happy for her that she’s achieved what I think she always wanted: to be as well known as Cleopatra. She truly wanted to be famous, and for that fame to go on and on.
Well, you would, wouldn’t you?
She’s achieved what I think she always wanted: to be as well known as Cleopatra