Honor Blackman – setting a trend in sexy, bad-ass women

Honor Blackman has died, who played the iconic Pussy Galore in Goldfinger, the third Bond movie. Her status as innovator of tough feminine leads had been cemented in the television Avengers series as the leather-clad Cathy Gale. She regretted her typecasting from Pussy Galore, but it fitted her kick-ass character. She had had an abusive father and dispensed with husbands after two failed attempts saying they were a ‘hindrance.’

After TV and film she moved into the theatre and built a fresh reputation as a musical star in productions of Mother Goose, The Sound of Music and On Your Toes. She worked into her eighties, touring in My Fair Lady and in West End stint in Cabaret as well as appearing in a one-woman show.

Born 22 August 1925 6 am Plaistow, England she credited her father with instilling discipline despite his beatings. She took boxing lessons with her brother Ken and at one point knocked out two male bullies in the school playground. She thought about becoming a gym teacher but opted for acting instead. During the war she volunteered as a motorcycle dispatch rider, tearing around London at top speed, taking little notice of the falling bombs.

She had a filmic and entertaining Sun Neptune in Leo on her Ascendant; with a confident and tough Half Grand Sextile from a super-determined Pluto opposition a performing 5^th house Jupiter, sextile/trine Mars Mercury in Virgo and Saturn in Scorpio. Her Virgo Moon was conjunct Venus and both opposed Uranus. Her actors’ 15^th Harmonic was exceptionally strong; as was her creative 7H.

Patrick Macnee, whom she starred opposite in the Avengers, 6 February 1922 1 am London, had his Midheaven exactly on her Ascendant for a good career connection with his charming Sun Venus in Aquarius in her 6^th house of work; and his Taurus Moon in her 10^th conjunct her Midheaven. It wouldn’t all be sunshine and roses since his Mars in Scorpio (opposition his Moon) fell in her 4^th and his Saturn squared her Jupiter and Pluto. Their relationship chart mirrored the pluses and minuses with an easy-going composite Venus, Jupiter, Sun and a power-struggling Mars square Pluto.

Sean Connery, 25 August 1930 6.05 pm Edinburgh, had his Sun Neptune on her Ascendant for a high-profile connection; though with his Midheaven on her IC, reminding her perhaps of her father, with his Mars in Gemini in an irritating square to her Moon and Uranus. The irrelationship chart hints at a good deal of attraction with a composite Venus opposition Jupiter square Pluto; though with some aggro from a composite Mars trine Uranus trine Saturn. But it clearly sparked off a good deal of creative tension.

She didn’t have an uncomplicated life with a difficult father and abusive first husband who was a financial fraud, had a nervous breakdown; nursed her former second husband through stomach cancer; and lost a good deal of her savings in a pension fund collapse. But she made it to 94. Patrick Macnee died at 93 and Sean Connery is still golfing in the Bahamas at 90 – so hardy specimens all.