Book by Joan Collins

Press, 26 April 1984, Page 19

Book by Joan Collins

NZPA-AP New York Joan Collins, who has married three times, says her lifelong quest to capture impossible men was fuelled by her desire to replace her father, “an intimidating man who ran a theatrical agency in London.” Ms Collins, who plays the scheming Alexis on the television series “Dynasty,” says in her new book, “Joan Collins, Past Imperfect,” that her first husband, the British actor, Maxwell Reed, drugged and seduced her on their first date. She was 17 and he was 33.

Still, she says, she could not refuse him when he called the next night and asked her for a date. “I was probably flattered that he still wanted to see me after having had his way with me,” Ms Collins says. The couple married the day after she turned 18, but the union was short-lived.

Ms Collins says her second marriage to the singer, Anthony Newley, took place to fulfil her dying mother’s wish that she settle down and have children. The couple had two children, but broke up after about four years because he was wrapped up in his work. She married the record producer, Ron Kass, in the early 19705. They broke up in 1982, after having one child.

Ms Collins, who says she was born some time “between the end of the Depression and the beginning of World War II,” sums up her life saying, “My past was not perfect, but it certainly wasn’t dull.”