He was the King of Soho and she was the vicars daughter who became a porn
queen.During their seven-year affair in the 70s, Fiona Richmond and Paul Raymond
led a globe-trotting champagne lifestyle that was literally all fur coats
and no knickers.
Britains most scandalous celebrity couple, she became the star of his
saucy shows – the Queen of Smut to his King of Porn – and they remained
close friends until Raymonds death this week aged 82.
Since their split, just over 30 years ago, Fiona has regularly been asked
for interviews about her former lover and always refused to say anything.
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But now shes broken her silence and, in an exclusive interview with the
Daily Mirror, pays tribute to the man she once loved.
“He actually died on my birthday – just so I shall never forget him.
Its just typical of him,” says Fiona, from her home on the Caribbean
island of Grenada.
“Paul became very reclusive but we kept in touch. We last saw each other
four years ago when we went out for lunch. He was his usual self, but older
and wiser.
“After that he used to phone me from time to time and see how I was doing,
and Id phone him. After all these years we were still very good friends
which I think is an enormous achievement.
“He came to my wedding in 1983. He was late and arrived right behind me
just as I was about to go down the aisle. I said to him Paul, this is not
your show.”
During their torrid affair, Raymond showered her with expensive gifts as
she shared his decadent life from a luxury flat in Londons Portman Square.
There were dozens of fur coats – “I hate them now,” she says – the most
opulent jewellery and a notorious bright yellow E-type Jaguar with the
registration number FU2.
“It was great fun but you couldnt park it without everyone knowing where
you were and what you were doing,” she says.
“It was like having a flashing light on your head.”
Now 62, Fiona is more Volvo than E-type and divides her time between hotels
she owns with partner Peter Pilbrow in Hampshire and Grenada. “In those
days Paul and I never discussed money,” she says. “But we did stay in the
most wonderful places.
“And we had fabulous times touring the world looking for acts for the
Raymond Revuebar, going to extraordinary places across the continent, old
nightclubs where they had speciality acts and striptease.
“He had a boat which I lived on in the South of France called Veste
Demitte. The closest translation from the Latin is get em off!
“But I worked most of the time. I always have done. I didnt want to be a
rich mans bird who didnt do anything.” Eventually Raymonds wealth was
only matched by Fionas growing notoriety as a sex queen.
She continues: “We used to go for the evening to the Hilton on Park Lane
and we could never just sneak in.
“As I walked in with Paul the music would stop and the band would start
playing my signature tune – The Stripper.
“I remember getting on a plane to go to Los Angeles and Gregory Peck and
The Osmonds were on board.
When we got off in LA all the paparazzi ignored The Osmonds and Gregory
Peck and went straight for Paul and me. Donny Osmond asked me, Who exactly
are you?”
Fiona – who now lives under her real name of Julia Montgomery – first met
Raymond when she auditioned for the risque farce Pyjama Tops at the
Whitehall Theatre, part of his growing empire.
“It was a fairly innocent end-of-the-pier style show where Brian Rix lost
his trousers and the girls lost their clothes,” she says.
“I started as a naked swimmer in a tank on stage and progressed to leading
lady.” And for years, this daughter of a Norfolk vicar and headmistress of
a girls school worked in all Raymonds shows. Saucy productions like Yes,
We Have No Pyjamas, and Lets Get Laid – about a former soldier called
Gordon Laid.
“On my first night in Pyjama Tops Paul took all the cast out for a drink
and I just got to know him,” she says. “He was living apart from his wife
Jean at the time, despite what everyone says. It was his eighth separation
from her.
“So all this hoo-hah about me breaking up a happy marriage isnt strictly
true. She had the biggest divorce settlement ever at that time in the UK –
and yet they make him out to be so mean. The fact she spent it all was not
exactly his fault.”
Fiona and Raymond split in 1977 but they continued to share a flat with his
beloved daughter Debbie, who was later to die tragically from a drink and
drugs overdose.
Raymond made a £650million fortune from a string of top shelf magazines and
risque shows, but she is quick to defend him against any accusation that
his empire was built on the exploitation of women.
“He used to say that he couldnt make the girls do it if they didnt want
to,” she says.
“People wanted that entertainment and he did it as well as it could be
done. I never understood why people got upset about it. It was behind
closed doors and between consenting adults.”
What angers her most is when Raymond is belittled as a spiv who got lucky.
“I just hate the fact that people dismiss him,” she says. “He was so
bright, so intelligent. I know hed boast hed never read a book, but it
doesnt make you stupid.
He had a brilliant mind and I found him fascinating. “He had no
pretensions.
We were always going on at him that he should write a book but he wasnt
the slightest bit interested in personal glory. He was one of the last
great showmen.
“Everyone today is just so much more boring.”
THE FIONA FILES
Fiona Richmonds notoriety came as much from her own career as from her
affair with Paul Raymond, writing articles for top-shelf magazine Mayfair
including a series entitled Around The World In 80 Lays.
After split ting with Raymond in 1977, she met and married TV producer
James Montgomery and the couple have a daughter called Tara.
She retired from show business in 1984 and ran a fashion company, worked as
a journalist and wrote her autobiography Tell Tale Tits.
Fiona now runs two boutique hotels with her partner, former pig farmer
Peter Pilbrow.
Bill
Paul Raymond died early in March
Author: Saxon
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