Sexiest Villainesses of Television's Avengers 1966-69

British actress Dame Diana Rigg was born on July 20, 1938 in Doncaster, Yorkshire, England. She has had an extensive career in film and theatre, including playing the title role in "Medea," both in London and New York, for which she won the 1994 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play.

Rigg made her professional stage debut in 1957 in the Caucasian Chalk Circle, and joined the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1959. She made her Broadway debut in the 1971 production of "Abelard & Heloise." Her film roles include Helena in A Midsummer Night's Dream (1968); Lady Holiday in The Great Muppet Caper (1981); and Arlene Marshall in Evil Under the Sun (1982). She won the BAFTA TV Award for Best Actress for the BBC miniseries Mother Love (1989), and an Emmy Award for her role as Mrs. Danvers in the adaptation of Rebecca (1997). In 2013, she appeared with her daughter Rachael Stirling on the BBC series Doctor Who (2005) in an episode titled "The Crimson Horror" and plays Olenna Tyrell on the HBO series Game of Thrones (2011).

From 1965 to 1968, Rigg appeared on the British television series The Avengers (1961) playing the secret agent Mrs. Emma Peel. She became a Bond girl in On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969), playing Tracy Bond, James Bond's only wife, opposite George Lazenby. She was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) at the 1988 Queen's New Years Honours for her services to drama. She was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) at the 1994 Queen's Birthday Honours for her services to drama.

Dame Diana Rigg died of lung cancer on September 10, 2020, she was 82 years old.

Pamela Ann Davy was born on 7 September 1933 in Australia. She was an actress, known for Doctor Who (1963), The Avengers (1961) and Department S (1969). She was married to Geoffrey Lyndon Archer. She died on 3 June 2018 in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia.

Yolande Turner was born on 12 December 1935 in South Africa. She was an actress and writer, known for The Avengers (1961), Bad Girls (1994) and Department S (1969). She was married to Peter Finch. She died on 6 November 2003 in London, England, UK.

Isla Blair was born in Bangalore, British India, to Scottish expat tea planter Ian Baxter Blair-Hill and his wife Violet Barbara (née Skeoch). After graduating from RADA, Blair made her stage debut at London's Strand Theatre as Philia in a 1963 production of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. She joined the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-Upon-Avon for a year in 1971 and then embarked on a tour of the Middle East as Viola in Twelfth Night with the Prospect Theatre Company.

Her career on the screen commenced in 1964 with a bit part in the Beatles' musical A Hard Day's Night (1964). A highly versatile actress, Blair has since appeared in films of diverse genres, including Battle of Britain (1969), Taste the Blood of Dracula (1970) (as an unwilling blood donor), Alien Attack (1976) (a spliced-together prequel for the TV series Space: 1999 (1975), as a bulbous-headed alien), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) (as the wife of the main antagonist, played by her real-life husband Julian Glover) and Johnny English Reborn (2011).

On television, she was one of the stars of Granada's highly rated episodic series The Liars (1966). Other roles included the star's on-screen wife in the sitcom The Dickie Henderson Show (1960), titled Lady Caroline in the period drama When the Boat Comes In (1976), manipulative behavioral psychologist Flora Beniform in The History Man (1981), neighbour Laura Miles in The Bounder (1982) and (as co-star) lawyer Katherine Dunbar in The Advocates (1991), a legal drama series set in Scotland. Blair has guest-starred in episodes of The Avengers (1961) (as a foreign agent), Department S (1969), Fall of Eagles (1974) (as Grand Duchess Elizabeth Fyodorovna of Russia), Blake's 7 (1978), Taggart (1983), A Touch of Frost (1992), Dalziel and Pascoe (1996) and Midsomer Murders (1997) (as a psychological profiler). A prolific voice actress, she has also narrated audio books and provided voices for audio adaptations of Doctor Who spin-off novels.

Blair has been married to the actor Julian Glover since 1968. Their son Jamie Glover is also an actor. As a family, they have appeared together on stage in Hamlet, with Jamie in the title role, Julian as King Claudius of Denmark and Isla as his wife Gertrude.

Joanna Vogel was born in 1940 in Worthing, Sussex, England, UK. She is an actress, known for The Avengers (1961), Department S (1969) and Jason King (1971). She was previously married to 'Jones, Evan (II)' .

Kate O'Mara was born Frances Meredith Carroll on August 10, 1939 in Leicester, Leicestershire, England. A hard-looking brunette with high cheekbones, Kate was the daughter of actress Hazel Bainbridge and John Carroll and prodded into performing as a child. Educated at the Aida Foster School, she began an early career as a speech therapist at a Sussex Girls' School, but her attraction to acting got the best of her and she switched gears, making her debut in a stage production of "The Merchant of Venice" in 1963 at age 24. She continued to appear in classical works throughout the next two seasons until television series spots started coming her way. Kate attracted gothic notice in Hammer Studio horror films as tawdry, darkly alluring femmes in both The Horror of Frankenstein (1970) and The Vampire Lovers (1970), but her film load over the years would remain sporadic.

She had remained focused on stage endeavours in the ensuing years and had appeared in many British television series as well as various femme fatales or shady ladies. She made little leeway in America but did appear as Joan Collins equally bitchy sister for one season of Dynasty (1981) in 1986. She was also delightfully vindictive in episodes of Doctor Who (1963) and Absolutely Fabulous (1992) in England. She relished a standout role in the long-running British soap opera Crossroads (2001). In the 1980s, she founded and toured in a theatre company (The British Actor's Theatre Company), which had continued running into the millennium. She had since published two books: "When She Was Bad" in 1991 and "Good Time Girl" in 1993. Kate O'Mara died at age 74 on March 30, 2014 after a short illness in a nursing home in Sussex, England.

Patricia Haines was born on 3 February 1932 in Sheffield, Yorkshire, England, UK. She was an actress, known for The Avengers (1961), The Last Shot You Hear (1969) and Blood Beast from Outer Space (1965). She was married to Bernard Kay and Michael Caine. She died on 25 February 1977 in Northampton, Northamptonshire, England, UK.

Suzanne Lloyd was born on 11 November 1934 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. She is an actress, known for The Return of Mr. Moto (1965), The Saint (1962) and The Avengers (1961).

English-born actress, Juliet Harmer was born on 11 May, 1941, as Juliet Linda Harmer. She's appeared in several well-known British series, as well as working with several well-known actors. Amongst the shows and episodes Ms Harmer's appeared on, are: Adam Adamant Lives! (1966), Sting in the Tail (1965), The Avengers (1961) and Department S (1969). Some of the actors with whom she's appeared are: Patrick McGoohan, in Secret Agent (1964), Diana Rigg and Patrick Macnee. Ms Harmer's been married to Bill Alexander since June 1977. They've 2 children. Previously, Ms Harmer was married to William Squire.

Angela Browne was infatuated with cinema from early childhood, imagining herself in the the part of the screen heroine during her frequent visits to the pictures. Aged thirteen, she left her Catholic convent school to study at the Cone-Ripman Drama Academy in London. After four years, she earned herself a scholarship to RADA. She then joined repertory companies in Worthing, York and Scarborough, eventually making her West End debut as an uninhibited Swedish girl in the 1959 comedy, "The Marriage Go-Round", alongside John Clements and Kay Hammond. She was serious enough about her newly acquired craft to study the films of Ingmar Bergman in order to appear as 'authentically Swedish' as possible. By 1960, after further theatrical success in both comedy and drama, Angela came to be regarded as one of the most promising up-and-coming actresses of the stage.

A vivacious blonde of uncommon and exquisite beauty, Angela inevitably attracted the attention of television producers. After a few early bit parts she co-starred with Patrick McGoohan as the titular "Girl in Pink Pajamas" in the The Girl in Pink Pajamas (1960) episode of the cult series, Danger Man (1960). She got on extremely well with McGoohan who proved very supportive on the set. Years later, Angela jumped at the chance -- when offered -- to appear with him again in the aptly-titled A Change of Mind (1967) episode of The Prisoner (1967). Her role as "No. 86", a mind-control specialist tasked with 'rehabilitating' "No. 6" (McGoohan) by means of a pre-frontal lobotomy, has become the one for which she is best-remembered. In a later interview, Angela confessed that she never quite understood the intricacies of the plot and simply 'got on with it' by following an old axiom she had learned from Noël Coward: "learn your lines and don't bump into the furniture".

Gainfully employed within Britain's ITV network, Angela had a recurring part in the crime series Ghost Squad (1961) and made appearances in The Saint (1962) and The Avengers (1961). She was also the obligatory romantic interest in the Norman Wisdom farce Press for Time (1966), a rare role in a feature film. Guesting on television -- which meant a less rigorous schedule than either films or the stage -- became, for several years, her preferred means of deriving a living from her profession. After her marriage to actor Francis Matthews (best known as the urbane lead of Paul Temple (1969)), Angela took a step back from performing to raise a family, in essence eschewing any further chance of stardom. By the early 1970s, she had eased into character roles, turning up at auditions in deliberately un-glamorous attire in order to snare more interesting assignments. While her screen appearances became fewer, she remained active on the stage in plays by Noël Coward, Henrik Ibsen and Alan Ayckbourn. She retired from acting altogether in 1990 and devoted her sadly few remaining years to her family and to charity work.

Gabrielle Drake was born March 30, 1944 in Lahore, Pakistan. Her father worked in an import/export company or as an engineer and she spent her first 8 years travelling around Burma, India, and the Orient. The family returned to England when Gabrielle was eight years old, after which they moved back near Stratford-upon-Avon. She was educated at Wycombe Abbey School for Girls in High Wycombe. After leaving school, she spent some time in Paris as an au pair girl looking after a family with four children. She then trained for several years at the Royal Academy for Dramatic Arts, then she joined a group of other recently graduated students to form the Everyman Theatre in Liverpool.

Gabrielle stayed at the Everyman for three years and then became the youngest acting member during the reopening season of the famed Malvern Theatre Company. Afterwards she joined the Birmingham Repertory Company and perfected her craft at Manchester's Royal Exchange, the Bristol Old Vic, the New Shakespeare Company and The Young Vic in productions as diverse as "The Cherry Orchard", "Titus Andronicus", "A Phoenix Too Frequent" and "Comedy of Errors".

Gabrielle made her television debut in Intrigue (1966) and then guested in "The Hidden Tiger", an episode of The Avengers (1961). She went on to appear in guest roles on Coronation Street (1960), The Saint (1962), The Champions (1968), Journey to the Unknown (1968), and Virgin of the Secret Service (1968) before landing the role of Lt. Gay Ellis in Gerry Anderson's UFO (1970). Then she made her feature film debut co-starring in Crossplot (1969), and also appeared in Connecting Rooms (1970).

After completing work on UFO, she appeared in a series of sex comedy films such as There's a Girl in My Soup (1970), Suburban Wives (1972), Au Pair Girls (1972) and Commuter Husbands (1972), but was also much seen on television, in particular as Jill Hammond in The Brothers (1972) which made her a household name.

Veronica Strong was born in 1938 in Eastry, Kent, England, UK. She is an actress, known for The Avengers (1961), Harpers West One (1961) and An Enemy of the State (1965). She was previously married to Jeremy Burnham.

Hilary Pritchard was born on 16 April 1942 in Isle of Man, UK. She was an actress and costume designer, known for The Thief and the Cobbler (1993), The Avengers (1961) and Department S (1969). She died on 29 July 1996 in Isle of Man, UK.

Anne Cunningham was born on 10 April 1937 in Leeds, Yorkshire, England, UK. She is an actress, known for The Avengers (1961), Coronation Street (1960) and Theatre 625 (1964). She has been married to Darrol Blake since 1965. They have three children.

Susan Travers was born on 18 February 1939 in Chelsea, London, England, UK. She is an actress, known for Fog for a Killer (1962), The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971) and The Avengers (1961). She was previously married to Cornel Lucas.

Maria Machado was born on 16 October 1937 in Karlsruhe, Germany. She is an actress, known for An American Werewolf in Paris (1997), One Deadly Summer (1983) and The Avengers (1961). She was previously married to Roland Dubillard.

Lucy Fleming was born on 15 May 1947 in Nettlebed, Oxfordshire, England, UK. She is an actress, known for Survivors (1975), The Boat That Rocked (2009) and Mystery and Imagination (1966). She has been married to Simon Williams since April 1986. She was previously married to Joseph William Peter Laycock.

Katherine Schofield was born on 16 March 1939 in Yorkshire, England, UK. She was an actress, known for Lifeforce (1985), The Deep Concern (1979) and Doctor Who (1963). She died on 6 August 2002 in Glamorgan, Wales, UK.

Joanna Wake was born on 8 May 1940 in Crowborough, Sussex, England, UK. She is an actress, known for The Avengers (1961), BBC Play of the Month (1965) and Omnibus (1967). She was previously married to Peter West.

Eunice Gayson was an English actress best known for playing Sylvia Trench, James Bond's girlfriend in the first two Bond films (Dr. No and From Russia with Love). Originally, Gayson was to be cast as Miss Moneypenny, but that part went to Lois Maxwell instead.

Gayson was originally to have been a regular in the Bond film series, but her character was dropped. Gayson's voice in Dr. No and From Russia with Love was overdubbed by voice actress Nikki van der Zyl, as were the voices of nearly all the actresses appearing in the first two Bond films, though Gayson's real voice can still be heard in original trailers for Dr. No.

As the first female to be seen in Dr. No together with James Bond (Sean Connery), she is officially the very first actress to play a Bond girl.

Decades later, Gayson's daughter appeared in a casino scene in the 1995 Bond film GoldenEye.

She also starred in the Hammer horror film The Revenge of Frankenstein (1958).

Gayson died on 8 June 2018, aged 90.

Jan Holden was a stage actress with a reputation for light comedy, who also appeared in several popular television series during the 1950s and 1960s.

She was elegant and pretty, with pale blue eyes. She grew up in Cawnpore in India and was educated at a school in the hills near Simla.

On the outbreak of the Second World War, she and her mother returned to England, where she boarded at Lowther College in North Wales. She holidayed with her schoolfriends.

When she was 18, she was offered places at RADA, the Old Vic School and at Bristol Old Vic; but her father declined his permission. He disapproved of his daughter's theatrical ambitions.

He eventually relented and allowed her to take a directors' course at the Old Vic. She was one of two pupils selected to become assistant stage managers at the Old Vic upon its reopening in 1951.

Jan Holden appeared in repertory, where she met her first husband, actor Edwin Richfield. They were married in 1952, when they were appearing together in Blackpool in a stage version of "The Blue Lamp".

She entered television during the fifties, in series such as Patrol Car (1954), Rheingold Theatre (1953), The Vise (1954), Harpers West One (1961) and The Avengers (1961). She later appeared in Agony (1979) and Oh Happy Band! (1980).

She made several film appearances in pictures, such as: The Best House in London (1969), The Stranglers of Bombay (1959) and Work Is a Four Letter Word (1968).

She endured heartbreak as her twin brother, Geoffrey, drowned in the early 1960s and her marriage broke down in 1973, leaving her with three teenage children. One of her twin daughters died from a brain tumour in 1999. She endured poor health, herself, during her final two decades, but remained cheerful.

She remarried in 1988 to Louis Manson, solicitor and business executive who survived her, with a son and a daughter from her first marriage and two stepsons and two stepdaughters.

Moira Lister was born in South Africa and made her stage debut at age 6 with the University Players of Johannesburg in "The Vikings of Helgeland." She appeared on the London stage at age 14 and started working in films in 1943. She was always popular, and she was usually cast as 'posh' ladies.

Katya Wyeth was the daughter of an English solicitor, Rex Wyeth and German mother who was a ballerina. As a child, she was educated in Essex, England and Hamburg, West Germany. Influenced by her mother, Katya originally trained as a ballet dancer at the Theatre Royal, Windsor. But when her height of 5'9" became detrimental to that career, she turned to modeling and acting.

She spent several years in repertory theatre, playing with the National Youth Theatre, and was featured in productions in the late 1960s, including Dear Charles and Rebelais at London's Round House in 1971. She also worked for a time as an assistant stage manager and understudy and acted in a German film and on German television.

Although she had been briefly seen on BBC Television in 1964 in a play televised from the Ashcroft Theatre, Julius Caesar (1964), Katya's British screen career truly commenced in the late 1960s. Before then, she was working as Katherina Wyeth then settled on Katya Wyeth in 1969 and employed this stage name for the rest of her acting career. She acted on television series such as Monty Python's Flying Circus (1969), The Avengers (1961), The Goodies (1970), The Sweeney (1975) and Space: 1999 (1975). She was also hostess of the game show The Sky's the Limit (1971), which was presented by Hughie Green.

Katya's feature film contributions include the horror films Hands of the Ripper (1971), Twins of Evil (1971) featuring Peter Cushing, and Burke & Hare (1972). Her role in Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange (1971) witnessed her with Malcolm McDowell in the 'Ascot fantasy' sequence that closes the film.

As the 1970s progressed and the British Film Industry fell into a decline, many projects available to British-based actors were low-brow exploitation films, and Katya was featured in two of them; Confessions of a Window Cleaner (1974) and I'm Not Feeling Myself Tonight (1976). Her last screen credit was in the film No. 1 of the Secret Service (1977), a James Bond spoof directed by Lindsay Shonteff which inexplicably led to two sequel films.

In her personal life, Katya was married to actor Michael Bangerter from 1971 until his death in 2016. They had two children; a son and daughter.

Sally Nesbitt was born on 1 October 1938 in Darjeeling, Bengal Presidency, British India. She is an actress, known for The Avengers (1961), The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby (1982) and Theatre Night (1957). She has been married to Richard Nigel Spink since 2000. She was previously married to Robert Nisbet and Peter Crouch.