Shore Leave 38 - Friday - Barbara Bouchet

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Friday July 15, 2016

Like many at the Shore Leave convention, my knowledge of Barbara Bouchet began and ended with her appearance in the Star Trek TOS episode By Any Other Name. I knew there had to be more to her career than that, and there was!

During her talk (which she shared with Michael Forest, also of Star Trek TOS fame), she answered questions about her work on Star Trek. She also mentioned the time William Shatner came to her trailer and asked her to dinner. She didn't recognize him. He wasn't wearing his hairpiece. But she did go out with him. She said many good things about David Niven with whom she did the original Casino Royale playing the part of Miss Moneypenny.

Once she reached the age of 39, Barbara decided to stop acting in movies. In addition to her American and British films, she had acted in numerous Italian films until that time. She continued to do some television work. It wouldn't be until Martin Scorsese asked her to take a part in the movie The Gangs of New York (2002) that she would return to the American screen.

After Barbara left movies in the '80s, she was faced with a decision about what to do next. She said she was not one to just set around twiddling her thumbs. It was about this time that Jane Fonda was coming out with her exercise videos, and that struck Barbara as something she could do. Also, gyms were not very popular, especially for women, at that time in Italy. So she recorded exercise videos, opened a gym, and eventually added a line of clothing. She became the Jane Fonda of Italy. She said, "If you find Italian women attractive, you can thank me for that." She ran her fitness business for 12 years.

As of late, she has been doing theatre in Italy. She lamented about the low pay and the less-than-glamorous environment when travelling. Unless the show is in a major city like Milan, the tour does one night in each town, then it's off to the next venue early the following morning. Still, she loves the theatre.

Here are a few of the pictures I took of Barbara Bouchet at the Shore Leave 38 convention.

A few final notes on Ms. Bouchet:

1. She arrived early on Friday and stayed late on Sunday, even after most others had left and many of the vendor stalls had been dismantled. And she was available for autographs and questions nearly all of the time. She seems to take her convention responsibilities quite seriously!
2. She was very friendly and was willing to talk at length about here life and her time at the convention.
3. When she signs an autograph, you can actually read her signature. She thought that was important. "So many of them are just squiggle, squiggle, squiggle." I can't remember if those were her exact words, but it's close.

I hope to see her again at a future convention, though that may not happen as she lives on the other side of the pond. When I mentioned possibly going to Italy someday, she said, "Sure! Come on over to Italy!" Maybe I will.

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So, while I'm over in Italy you can read my story, The Song of Aiden, in Human 76 - a post-apocalyptic, shared-world anthology!

Check #Human76 on Twitter for news!

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© 2016 K. R. Smith All rights reserved