Linda Christian

Of Spanish, French, German, and Dutch descent, actress Linda Christian spent her childhood moving from place to place across the globe; her father was a petroleum engineer, a profession that precluded a permanent address. After working as a clerk in the British government office in Palestine, Christian relocated to Acapulco, where she was discovered by film star Errol Flynn. Signed to an RKO contract in 1944, she languished in bit roles for a year or so. She was better served at MGM, where she was stuck with the publicity-flack designation "the Copper Girl." Her best-known assignment during her MGM years was as a loan-out to her old studio of RKO to appear in the Mexico-filmed Tarzan and the Mermaids. Christian married Tyrone Power in 1949 and had two daughters by Power before their 1956 divorce, which garnered international headlines due to Christian's then-enormous one-million-dollar cash settlement. Having no problem whatsoever attracting press attention wherever she went, Christian still could not parlay her off-camera fame into movie stardom: Her film appearances of the 1950s were generally unsuccessful. She did, however, have the distinction of being the very first "Bond Girl" when she co-starred with Barry Nelson (as American secret agent "Jimmy" Bond) in a 1954 TV adaptation of Ian Fleming's Casino Royale. Squired by European nobility after her breakup with Power, Christian opted to become an actor's wife for a second time when she married Edmond Purdom in 1962, and later married a third time into an aristocratic European family. Linda Christian's daughter, Romina Power, launched her own film career in the 1960s.

~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide