The secret world of Julie Christie; Behind Oscar glitz lie ghosts of star's incredible life.

Byline: By SARAH MANNERS

JULIE Christie is on the threshold of joining that exclusive band of screen stars who have twice won an Oscar.

If she is handed one of the coveted golden statuettes next weekend for her moving portrayal of an Alzheimer's victim in Away From Her, pictures of Christie's happiness will be beamed across the globe.

She will pose for the cameras, smile and wave, in an open display of joy at this most gregarious, glamorous and self-serving of award ceremonies.

Yet whatever her reaction, it is likely to be just another performance from an ageless actress who protects her famously secretive personal life as brilliantly as she portrays her characters.

For Christie, who spends most of her time hiding from the limelight on her remote farm at Cefn y Coed in Powys, Mid Wales, has some dark secrets which she is still reluctant to share with the outside world.

As yet she has even refused to confirm that she and her long-term partner, journalist Duncan Campbell, got married in a hush-hush ceremony in India in November last year.

Yet that pales into insignificance compared to some of the other dark personal events in her life that Christie has concealed for the vast majority of her 66 years.

They include the emerging story of the big sister she never knew and the tragedy that mirrored the plot of one of her most famous films.

And the mysteries all date back to virtually the day she was born in India in 1941.

The stunning star of countless hit films including Shampoo - where she starred with lover Warren Beatty - and Far from the Madding Crowd, enjoyed a childhood that was, on the face of it, idyllic.

Growing up on the beautiful plains of As s am in North-East India, she then attended boarding school in England where she says she was "loved by everyone".

But a darker story has emerged which casts a shadow over this image of childhood bliss.

Six years before Julie's birth, her tall and handsome father Frank St John Christie is said to have fathered an illegitimate child with one of his Indian plantation workers.

And, it is claimed, he remained devoted to his quiet and plain elder daughter June for the remainder of his life.

Yet while the two Christie girls grew up literally worlds apart, one quality links them to this day.

June, who built a career for herself as a midwife but who never married and died childless in 2005 at the age of 70, guarded her privacy as much as her younger sister. While alive, she told just a few trusted friends about Julie.

One of them, 72-year-old Binolian Graves, has disclosed that Julie knew about her big sister, but wanted nothing to do with her.

"June would tell me her sister was a famous actress but that they never hadany contact," says Binolian. "She told me Julie didn't want to know her. She didn't boast about being related to her. It was just a fact."

June was born in1934after Frank had an affair with a teenage Indian peasant girl on the tea estate he managed in Chabua, Assam.

After breaking off the relationship, he met and married Rosemary Ramsden in 1937 when she arrived in India from Hove, seduced by the low cost of living and idyllic lifestyle.

Rosemary gave birth to their two children - Julie in 1941 and then a son, Clive. But Frank could not keep his illegitimate family a secret for long and Rosemary responded by returning to East Sussex, sending Julie and her brother to boarding school and distancing her family from the girl.

Frank promptly moved June into his 19th Century colonial home but, according to his former servant, she was hidden away when Rosemary came back to visit, sometimes for a month at a time.

Jai Singh, 80, who worked on the Jamirah Estatefor15 years, claimed: "When his wife came here, June would be quickly sent away to stay with the family of a local schoolmaster.

"The Memsahib (Rosemary) would take us to one side and ask, 'Do you know where his Indian wife is? Do you know where his Indian daughter is'?"

Still living near the over grown ruins of Mr Christie's former plantation home, Jai added: "We were told not to say a word about June. When Mrs Christie asked me about it I replied, 'I don't know, ma'am'.

"As soon as the Memsahib had gone home, June would return to live with her father. They were very close. He doted on her. There was no stigma about having an Indian daughter. It was quite common among the plantation managers. People would treat her as his daughter and she received the respect that any Sahib's daughter would receive."

The contrast between June's relationship with Frank Christie and that of her half-sister is stark. Julie, who won the Oscar for Darling in 1966 and has been nominated a further three times, said of her days at boarding school: "I was loved by everyone, but it wasn't much good because my parents weren't with me."

And there is one further sadness that still haunts the actress, whose performance in Away From Her has already won her a Golden Globe.

After starring in the 1973 Nic Roeg film Don't Look Now-in which she joined co-star Donald Sutherland in one of cinema's steamiest scenes - she moved to her beautifully ramshackle bolt hole in Mid Wales.

And it was there that a terrible event occurred, mirroring the plot of the film.

Christie was employing her artist f Jonathan and Leslie Heale as live-in caretakers at the farmhouse when tragedy struck.

T h e c o u p l e ' s 22-month-old son Harry wandered off down the garden and fell into a 2ft-deep pond.

Christie arrived home to find his mother frantically searching for the toddler.

But the pond just outside the house, where the body was later found, was completely still - the little boy had sunk below the surface.

Mrs Heale told the inquest: "I could see the figure under the water. I waded in and pulled him out and ran to the house. His face was blue."

For a long time, the actress must have been haunted by the terrifying similarity between the drowning and that scene in the film.

We may never know.

For, unless she is on the silver screen performing, Christie's lips on these and other mysteries, have remained firmly sealed.

[email protected]

CAPTION(S):

TALE OF TWO CHRISTIES: Oscar nominee Julie, pictured above in Away From her, loves to retreat to her Powys farmhouse. Right, Christie was a sixties superstar; STYLE: Christie dazzles at the Baftas

Article Details

Printer friendly Cite/link Email Feedback
Publication:	Wales On Sunday (Cardiff, Wales)
Date:	Feb 17, 2008
Words:	1110
Previous Article:	Model hunt for Mister Right.
Next Article:	EXTRA TERRESTRIALS! EXCLUSIVE Hit show Torchwood could be making us report more aliens.