http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v679/russy68/rank.jpg

 

Alexandra Bastedo is the beautiful cover star of the live Smiths album 'Rank'.

 

Born in Hove in East Sussex on March 9th 1946, she became best known for her part in late-60s espionage series The Champions playing Sharron Macready.

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v679/russy68/smithscoverschampions.jpg

 

She is fluent in French, German, Spanish and Italian and acted as co-presenter of the Miss World contest in the 80s.

 

In the 90s, she starred in Absolutely Fabulous as Penny Caspar-Morse in the episode entitled 'Fat', but did very little screen acting work.

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v679/russy68/smithscoversalexandrabastedo.jpg

 

Throughout her career, she made over 20 films (including a small part as Meg in the original film version of Casino Royale), many of these films were made in other languages, but she remains best known for her role in The Champions.

 

She currently devotes much of her time to animals and is president of her local RSPCA, however, she still acts, and was most recently in a production of Beyond Reasonable Doubt, alongside ex-Esastender Leslie Grantham.

 

She has also written several books on caring for cats and dogs, as well as her autobiography entitled 'Beware Dobermanns, Donkeys and Ducks'.

 

 

 

(shall we do one of these every week?)

 

She's still quite a lovely lady, even at the tender age of 60.

she certainly is... I couldn't find any new photos of her, though.

 

I think, as the Smiths record covers were so iconic, it's nice to know a little bit about the actual stars of them, and maybe realise why Morrissey chose them (as he, personally, chose every single one).