Joan Collins, Dame of the Rock has opened up about how her first husband raped and raped them on their first date. She also remembered details from five other marriages she had in a documentary.
This is Joan Collins, which airs tonight on BBC2 at 9pm, follows the 88-year-old star, who is known for sporting an array of shoulder pads as Alexis Colby in US soap Dynasty from 1981 to 1989, as she opens up about her life and relationships.
In one shocking moment, she revealed how her ex-husband film star Maxwell Reed – whom she married out of ‘shame’ after he raped her on their first date – tried to pimp her out to ‘old rich men’ for £10,000 a night.
Meanwhile she also explained how Marilyn Monroe told her to watch out for ‘wolves’ in Hollywood, including Daryl Zanuck, who later pinned her against the wall in an attempted sex attack.
Joan Collins, Dame of the Earth has shared how her first husband raped and raped her as she recalled details about her five marriages. (pictured together with Percy Gibson).
Joan, who was born in Maida Vale, spoke about her childhood with her parents, Elsa and Joseph Collins.
She replied, “Mum was busy trying please.” [my father]I used to hate it all the time.
“I pledged that I wouldn’t depend on any man for anything. I must have my own identity.
She explained how she began landing film roles at the age of 17, dropping out of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, and quickly began earning up to £300 a week.
In one shocking moment, she revealed how her ex-husband film star Maxwell Reed – whom she married out of ‘shame’ after he raped her on their first date – tried to pimp her out to ‘old rich men’ for £10,000 a night (pictured together)
Her father, a highly successful actor agent, was not impressed with her choice of career.
She said, “He did not want me in showbiz. He knew all the dangers.”
He said that you’ll be done by 23 because the men are so prey-oriented. He understood before the Me Too movement what the men were like.
Joan played the role of a rebellious teenager in I Believe in You. Joan met her husband Reed when she was just 14 years older.
When she was asked by the movie star for her autograph, she said: ‘The enormous powder blue Buick drove up in front of Bayswater Tube station.
“He spoke with an American accent, which is quite unusual for someone from South London.
“He was 31, I was 17, and I was a virgin. That would have caused trouble at my home.
Joan, still virginal at the time she met Reed as a film star and received a drink from him while on her date.
He gave his wife a glass of rum and coke when he was going to bathe. Also, some books were given to her.
The drug she was given was called a “Mickey Finn” and it could have been Rohypnol. She woke up in the living room to see him having sex.
Through a sense of guilt over being attacked, Joan went on to marry Maxwell and was subjected to abuse throughout their four-year marriage, culminating in the actor attempting to sell her to a sheikh for £10,000.
She replied, “Had my sexuality been as innocent and right, I would not have done it. But, I felt a deep sense of guilt so I did.”
“The honeymoon turned out to be a failure. We appeared outwardly content, but I was really miserable.
The second marriage she had was with British actor-composer Anthony Newley. (See them making their first public appearance together after they got married).
Her star was growing in Hollywood but her marriage was falling apart. He tried to push her to Arab Sheikh, Les Ambassadeurs Casino, for thousands of pounds.
She stated that he gravitated to rich, old men. That night she discovered why.
‘Max told me, ‘He’ll pay you £10,000 for one night – and I can even watch’. The handsome and unlovable man in my life made me cry. “Never again in a million of my life.”
“I came home to Mummy.”
Joan married Ron Kass, her third husband, in 1972. They had a daughter named Katy.
When she filed from divorce, he asked for £950 per month, claiming he had ‘discovered’ her and therefore deserved a cut of her wage.
She confessed the marriage cost her £7,500 – an incredible £1.9 million today.
She left Reed and jumped into Hollywood. Marilyn Monroe was there to party at Gene Kelly’s.
After Zanuck was warned, the girl recalls how Zanuck ‘chased’ her and then ‘trapped’ her against a wall.
She responded, “He pinched me like a honey beetle on a board, and then said, “You need to have a real guy honey, a true man.”
In 1983 she divorced Kass and met her fourth husband Peter Holm at a party.
“Luckily, there was a makeup man down the corridor. He saved me and allowed me to get away.”
Meanwhile she called Welsh star Richard Burton, whom she starred with in the Sea Wife, a ‘neanderthal’.
She explained that they did have chemistry on-screen, but then he took the necessary pass like most actors, and charmingly told me that he’d ‘bonk’ a snake dressed in a skirt.
‘No way was he tempted, even though I saw many others fall like ninepins under his feet. Elizabeth is surprised that he was a known wolf. [Taylor]He was married to her.
Her second marriage came in 1963 when she tied-the-knot with British pop star and serial cheater Anthony Newley, the father of her two children Tara and Alexander, now 58 and 56.
The relationship lasted only six years.
Newly produced and starred in an autobiographical movie about a hero, who was torn between the mother of his child and the blonde. Joan played Joan herself.
She said that Hieronymus Merkin had made the film Can Mercy Humppe Ever Forget Mercy Humppe? and was trying to find true happiness.
“I realized that he had been having affairs from the moment we got married and now he was making an obvious movie about the wives he had slept with.” “I was devastated.”
Joan married Ron Kass, her third husband, in 1972 and welcomed Katy with Apple, the head of the Beatles record label.
The family was unable to make ends meet after Kass relocated them to LA as studio heads.
Joan starred in B-list movies and even once queued for an unemployment cheque.
Tragedy struck when Katy, then nine, was hit by a car and suffered a catastrophic brain injury in 1980.
She said: ‘I was told she was going to die and she was in a coma for a long time.
She eventually began making little noises and took her first tentative steps. It was all going to work out for her.
“Katy’s accident is the most horrible thing I have ever experienced.”
After Katy recovered, Joan learned the family were almost bankrupt after Kass had taken out a huge loan for their home in LA.
She divorced from Kass in 1983, and went on to meet her fourth husband, Scandinavian singer Peter Holm, at a party.
Joan said, at the height her stardom as Alexis from the TV soap Dynasty was, that Holm was charming and open-minded.
Joan stated that Ron Kass was her manager. He installed a computer in her office to track her business and had created a prenuptial agreement within weeks.
Collins claims that Peter became increasingly controllful after they were married in 1985. Joan says she didn’t like him and then stupidly ignored his advice…
“The problem was that I was too stubborn to admit that I had made a horrible mistake.”
Joan claimed that Holm had quickly changed his behavior after the wedding and that he didn’t need to make it seem like he loved her anymore. Holm became a bossy, dogmatic man, and criticized Joan publicly. He also made disparaging remarks about Joan’s age and snide comments about her appearance.
The pair split in 1987. In court he demanded to be given £35,000-a-month living expenses – £60,000 in today’s terms – as well as the LA house and their villa in the South of France.
Finally, Joan recalled how she met and married fifth husband Percy Gibson – 32 years her junior – in 2000 when he managed a theatre production she was in.
She stated that: “It was wonderful, Percy and it was madly in love.
“I have finally found my soulmate.” My husband for life.
She continued, “I’m fortunate in my life. But I have also experienced some disasters and unhappy times.”
“There were terrible, painful divorces and the almost-death situation of my daughter. There was also bankruptcy. I have not been able to get any acting work. There are many.
“But who really wants the reality?” There is already too much reality in our world. The public doesn’t have to pay that.
Joan Collins is on BBC2 at 9pm on January 1.