Joanne Whalley was lost to the British cinema from circa 1990 when she went to Hollywood, married American star, Val Kilmer (1988-96) and changed her name to Whalley-Kilmer. She came to film through television, creating many a frisson as Nurse Mills in Dennis Potter's TV series The Singing Detective (BBC, 1986). Her short British film career was most notable for her playing of a part to die for, Christine Keeler, in Scandal (d. Michael Caton-Jones, 1989), the call girl romanticized into the vulnerable sensual fulcrum of swinging, boundary-eroding '60s London. It was a key part in a key British film. Her subsequent, mostly American films have never touched such heights; they include A Good Man in Africa (US/South Africa, d. Bruce Beresford, 1994), and in TV series the iconic figures of Scarlett O'Hara in Scarlett (d. John Erman, 1994) and Jackie Kennedy in Jackie Bouvier Kennedy Onassis (Pearson/CBS, 2000). Bruce Babington, Encyclopedia of British Film
|