Tania Mallet, the model and actor who played Tilly Masterson in the 1964 Bond film Goldfinger, has died aged 77. The official James Bond Twitter account confirmed the news, saying: “We are very sorry to hear that Tania Mallet who played Tilly Masterson in Goldfinger has passed away. Our thoughts are with her family and friends at this sad time.”
The third Bond film after Dr No and From Russia With Love, Goldfinger memorably begins with the murder of Goldfinger’s assistant Jill Masterson after she is covered in gold paint. Mallet played Masterson’s sister Tilly, who attempts to kill Goldfinger in revenge, but is herself killed by Oddjob’s steel-rimmed bowler hat.
Mallet, who was born in Blackpool in 1941, was a successful model in the late 50s and early 60s, part of the same generation as the likes of Celia Hammond and Jean Shrimpton. She twice appeared on the cover of Vogue in 1961, and was in Michael Winner’s short documentary Girls Girls Girls! in the same year, as one of three flatmates trying to make it in London’s fashionable occupations. Mallet is seen acquiring poise after receiving tuition from the Lucie Clayton model school.
After being spotted by Bond producer Alfred “Cubby” Broccoli in a photoshoot, Mallet was auditioned for From Russia With Love, and then cast in Goldfinger, though she later said she thought the money on offer – £50 a week – was “dreadful”, far less than she would earn per day as a model, so she demanded and received a threefold increase.
Despite Goldfinger’s high profile, Mallet said it was “not difficult” to turn her back on the film industry and return to modelling: “I was always more comfortable in a small studio with just the photographer and his assistant.” She also said she felt stifled by the restrictions the acting contracts – such as being unable to go abroad, or being banned from horseriding – placed on her lifestyle.
Helen Mirren was Mallet’s first cousin, and described her in her autobiography as “impossibly beautiful and kind” and “a loyal and generous person”, using her earnings to pay for her brothers’ education and supporting her mother.
