A year before her breakout role as an international sex symbol in And God Created Woman (1956), Brigitte Bardot made a rare trip to Britain to co-star with Dirk Bogarde in the second of the “Doctor” comedy film series, Doctor at Sea. She played a cabaret performer stranded on a cargo ship who is first discovered by Bogarde, as Dr Simon Sparrow, taking a shower.
As I recounted in my 1987 book, The Golden Gong, filming was, with characteristic British modesty, to take place from the other side of the shower curtain, with Bardot’s body covered. However, as the producer Betty Box explained to me, the camera was able to pick out the outline of the garments which, frankly, looked foolish.
Bardot came to the rescue. She stripped off before an agog crew. Word whizzed round Pinewood Studios and often the sound stage was bulging at the seams.
Box would later recall in her own memoir that Bardot was “a joy to work with” and that her “fractured English charmed everyone”.
