Stephanie
Beacham, who is in Marked Personal and Napoleon and
Love this week, takes her on-screen fashions into her private
life, buys clothes on impulse and uses make-up to suit her moods.
The result as you can see, is devastating - provided she's
happy...
A fur-caped
figure burst into the bar, looking more like an extra from King
Lear than Georgina Layton of Marked Personal. Then
Stephanie Beacham shed her fur to reveal the nicely-neat outfit
of the personnel officer she plays in the series - cream shirt,
grey skirt, cardi and a double row of pearls.
"This isn't
the real me," she said apologetically. "But I often
find myself swayed into the style of the character I'm playing."
Referring to her
role as Madame Duchatel in this week's episode of Napoleon
and Love, Stephanie says another week or two in the series
and she would probably have found herself swanning around in
pure silk satins.
Her taste in
clothes tends towards the theatrical; slightly fancy dress, but
in the smartest way. She once bought three lengths of chiffon,
cut a hole in it, belted it and looked sensational. She also had
the nerve to re-design a Bill Gibb dress. She cut a whole width
out of the full sleeves of one of his creations. and made a
turban from it.
"I never
actually look for clothes, they just happen." she said. "I
might be at a jumble sale or out to buy a teapot. I can be
penny-pinching one week and blow a thousand pounds the next."
That's how Stephanie came to own the fur cape. "I think
that if you're going to bother to change in the evenings there's
no sense in putting on a silly little nothing dress. I like to
look totally different, and wear something silly, even
outrageous."
Twenty
six-year-old Stephanie has the same decisive views on beauty and
make-up: "What I use depends on what happens to be left in
the bathroom cupboard by me or my male au pair's girlfriend."
Male au pair? Yes - a New Zealander named Andrew.
I asked her to
name each of the cosmetics she uses, and she had to keep rushing
away to find out. In moments of insecurity she buys lavish
creams in pretty boxes, and in moments of economy, the cheapest.
Stephanie manages
a face pack about once a fortnight (Firming Peel-Off Masque from
Ultima II
range. price £2.99). To
remove make-up she uses Max Factor's Satin Flow followed by an
astringent (Helena Rubenstein's Refining lotion, price 50p). The
rest of the time it's soap and water. "I always use
Valderma's medicated soap," she said.
Stephanie talks
nostalgically about her hair. A year ago she had a long blonde
mane. An Italian film director asked her to cut it and she spent
three hours in the hairdressers crying as she watched her hair
falling about her feet. And when she went back to the director?
He didn't like it - Stephanie had to wear a wig. "Men!"
How did her
husband, actor John McEnery, react? "He prefers my hair
short," said Stephanie. ''When it bounced about my
shoulders and looked sexy, I think it made him nervous. I don't
think he realises that in a year or so I'll be making him
nervous again.
"My husband
is fantastic at telling me I'm beautiful. The only trouble is,
he's fantastic at telling anybody they're beautiful He's very
complimentary, very flattering. He makes me feel beautiful when
I feel ugly.
"Beauty is
to do with happiness. If I'm not happy, I look dreadful. My skin
goes sallow, I look tired and puffy, and all the make-up in the
world won't make make much difference. But if I'm happy, I
really can look quite nice."
