Britt Ekland (born Britt-Marie Eklund, 6 October 1942) is a Swedish actress who rose from modest Stockholm beginnings to become one of the most photographed and talked-about screen sirens of the 1960s and 1970s; the daughter of a shopkeeper and a noted Swedish curling champion.
She left school as a teenager to work with a travelling theatre company after attending drama training in Stockholm, and within a few years was appearing in Swedish films and then in Italian and British productions, her combination of blonde looks and large, expressive eyes quickly marking her out as a sex symbol.
Movies
- 1962 Short Is the Summer
- 1963 It’s With Me He’s Been
- 1963 To Bed or Not to Bed
- 1963 The Commandant
- 1963 The Prize
- 1964 Advance to the Rear
- 1964 A Carol for Another Christmas
- 1964 Four Bullets for Joe
- 1965 Do Not Disturb
- 1966 After the Fox
- 1967 Too Many Thieves
- 1967 The Bobo
- 1967 The Double Man
- 1968 The Night They Raided Minsky’s
- 1969 Stiletto
- 1969 Machine Gun McCain
- 1969 The Conspirators
- 1969 The Year of the Cannibals
- 1970 Tintomara
- 1971 Percy
- 1971 Get Carter
- 1972 A Time for Loving
- 1972 Night Hair Child
- 1972 Endless Night
- 1972 Asylum
- 1973 Baxter!
- 1973 The Wicker Man
- 1973 The Six Million Dollar Man: Wine, Women and War
- 1974 The Ultimate Thrill
- 1974 The Man with the Golden Gun
- 1975 Royal Flash
- 1976 High Velocity
- 1977 Casanova & Co.
- 1978 Slavers
- 1979 King Solomon’s Treasure
- 1980 The Hostage Tower
- 1981 The Monster Club
- 1982 Satan’s Mistress
- 1983 Dead Wrong
- 1983 Erotic Images
- 1983 Dr. Yes: The Hyannis Affair
- 1984 Love Scenes
- 1985 Fraternity Vacation
- 1985 Marbella
- 1987 Moon in Scorpio
- 1989 Scandal
- 1989 Beverly Hills Vamp
- 1989 Cold Heat
- 1990 The Children
- 2006 Search
- 2020 Jeepers Creepers
Her early screen work included supporting roles that led to bigger parts in films such as Get Carter (1971), which helped cement her public image, and the cult horror The Wicker Man (1973), while mainstream international exposure followed with her casting as Bond girl Mary Goodnight in The Man with the Golden Gun (1974).
Ekland’s private life—most famously her whirlwind marriage to and subsequent divorce from Peter Sellers in the 1960s, her later high-profile relationships with music figures like Lou Adler and Rod Stewart, and her three children—was tabloid fodder and helped sustain her celebrity as much as her film work did.
TV
- 1965 Armchair Theatre
- 1966 The Trials of O’Brien (2 episodes)
- 1971 Aquarius
- 1972-1977 McCloud (2 episodes)
- 1978 Ring of Passion
- 1978 The Great Wallendas
- 1978 Battlestar Galactica (2 episodes)
- 1979 Return of the Saint
- 1979 Skeppsredaren (All 6 episodes)
- 1980-1983 Fantasy Island (4 episodes)
- 1980-1982 The Love Boat (2 episodes)
- 1981 Charlotte Löwensköld and Anna Svärd
- 1981 Valley of the Dolls (Both episodes)
- 1981 Matt Houston
- 1984 The Fall Guy
- 1985 Simon & Simon
- 1985 The Golden Boy
- 1990 Superboy (2 episodes)
- 1990 Grand
- 1994 Absolutely Fabulous
- 2002 Lexx
As_Herself
- 1970 The Dean Martin Show
- 1981 Barbara Woodhouse Goes to Beverly Hills
- 1982 Electric Blue 3
- 1984 The Fall Guy
- 1992 Bara med Britt (Host)
- 1997 Brass Eye
- 2007–2008 Stjärnorna på slottet (5 episodes)
- 2008–2021 Loose Women (Presenter 5 episodes)
- 2010 I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here! (Contestant 20 episodes)
- 2011 Celebrity Antiques Road Trip
- 2013 Astrid in Wonderland
- 2013–2015 Svenska Hollywoodfruar
- 2018 Let’s Dance (Contestant 2 episodes)
- 2020 The Real Marigold Hotel (4 episodes)
She became widely associated with sensuality on screen; notable examples include publicity and fashion photography and roles in films that emphasized her sex appeal, and while one of the most infamous nude sequences associated with her screen persona is the “pantsless” dance sequence in The Wicker Man, the filmed scene used a body double for parts of the choreography
(Ekland was also pregnant during production), a fact that has been discussed by cast and crew and by Ekland herself in interviews. Over the decades she published an autobiography, continued to take occasional film, stage, and television roles, and remained a recognizable cultural figure—frequently
recalled in articles and retrospectives about Bond girls, 1970s film icons, and the era’s celebrity culture—while continuing to speak openly in later interviews about the emotional cost of fame and about episodes from her life in show business.
Britt Ekland released a novelty pop single in 1979 titled “Do It to Me,” produced by her then-partner Lou Adler, which featured disco-inspired instrumentation and playful, seductive vocals; despite considerable publicity surrounding her celebrity, the record received little airplay and failed to chart, remaining more a curiosity in her career than a musical breakthrough.
Further Reading
Sources
- 007James “List of All James Bond Girls” https://www.007james.com/articles/list_of_james_bond_girls.php
- TVInsider “Britt Ekland” https://www.tvinsider.com/people/britt-ekland/
- Wikipedia “Britt Ekland” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Britt_Ekland
- Instagram “brittekland” https://www.instagram.com/brittekland/
- IMDB “Britt Ekland” https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001180/
- 45 Cat https://www.45cat.com/
