American actress Raquel Welch, star of the 60s and 70s who is widely remembered in Hollywood for her role as a cave naiad in a bikini of animal skin in "A million years before Jesus Christ", died Wednesday at the age 82 years old, announced his manager.
Ms. Welch "passed away peacefully early this morning after a brief illness," he said in a statement sent to AFP, without further details. During her career, she had appeared in more than thirty films, including "Le Voyage Fantastique" and "Les Trois Mousquetaires".
His performance in this 1973 film earned him a Golden Globe. The actress has also starred in more than fifty television series.
Born Jo Raquel Tejada, this American of Bolivian origin first made a name for herself as a beauty queen by winning several modeling competitions, before conquering Hollywood.
After the disappearance of Marilyn Monroe, the young amazon with the auburn mane regained the status of universal sex symbol, sweeping away the idea that only a blonde could embody the quintessence of femininity. To his great despair, his fame was mainly based on his plastic.
"I really had the feeling that people were totally laughing at me, they were only interested in the other woman: the one astride, in the rabbit skin bikini, with this impossible hourglass figure!" she does so in her autobiography published in 2010.
After twenty extra roles, she was spotted by 20th Century Fox who chose her in 1966 as the headliner for Richard Fleischer's "The Fantastic Journey". The science fiction film makes her take off.
That same year, she played a prehistoric savage in "One million years before Jesus Christ", a poor quasi-silent film whose only poster will mark the history of cinema. She poses there in the famous animal skin bikini whose shreds seem to have been torn off by a ferocious animal or a hungry caveman.
She will then chain the films in the 70s but will remain confined to her status of beauty.
A yoga enthusiast, she got into the wellness business in the 1980s.
After having hidden her Latin origins for a long time, the actress ended up assuming her roots later in her career, playing Hispanic roles in "American Family" (2002) or "Tortilla soup" (2001).
In 2008, then aged 68, she divorced her fourth husband, 14 years her junior.
The end of his career saw him occasionally appear on screen, but he mostly focused on his brand of wigs.
She leaves behind two children, Damon and Tahnee Welch.
02/15/2023 23:38:54 - Los Angeles (AFP) - © 2023 AFP
