I first discovered Carol White after five or six people said; ‘Hey, Amanda – You look a bit like Carol White, you know!’  I didn’t know, so I set out to discover who my supposed doppelganger actually was – or rather, who she wasn’t.  She was not (as she has often been tagged) ‘The Battersea Bardot’, for although she did have lots of piled up blonde hair and a lovely figure, she lacked the full-on sex-kitten allure of Brigitte; Carol White was simply too fragile.

So little is known about her that it seems strange that she was once the quintessential ‘It’ girl of British kitchen-sink dramas of the 1960s.  Shot to stardom in Ken Loach’s powerful 1965 television drama Cathy Come Home, Carol White went on to star in a string of Sixties Brit hits, the best of which was Poor Cow, based on the novel by Nell Dunn.  As ‘Joy’, the sluttish, working-class single-mother who must somehow survive alone whilst boyfriend Terence Stamp in jail, White’s powerful portrayal earned her critical applause on both sides of the Atlantic.  Hollywood came calling, and in 1968 she made Daddy’s Gone a Hunting, a low-budget thriller which in no way showcased her talents and did nothing to help her gain Stateside success.

      
Carol White

Her film career dwindled in the ‘70s, replaced by the drug and booze addiction which had clouded her personal life.  She died forgotten and unknown in 1991 – some sources say of cirrhosis of the liver, others say a drug overdose.

Personally, I think she died of a broken heart.

The reasons I love Carol White are manifold; first of all, she was a wonderful actress who was always underrated.  Too pretty to be a ‘character actress’ but lacking the beauty of Julie Christie, Carol’s cinematic career was unfairly limited to playing the put-upon, working class heroines so favoured by British film of the 1960s. Her role in I’ll Never Forget What’s-His-Name with Oliver Reed did find Carole in a standard ‘pretty-girl’ leading role, but the film’s flop hindered – more than helped – her career. 

With the end of the ‘kitchen-sink’ genre, so came the end of Carol White.  Although she manage to eke out a few, minor roles in low-budget American thrillers, her great dramatic ability was never really tested, and (in my opinion) the world lost a woman who – had she been given encouragement – could have outshone every other actress of her era.

Secondly, I love Carol White because she was always a bit ‘rough around the edges’; her beehive was untidy, her roots were always showing, and her mini-dresses always seemed to need a good iron.  I relate to this sort of ‘chic’, and her somewhat sloppy style has been a great source of personal inspiration.

Thirdly, I love Carol White because I do look a bit like her, and I think we always warm to people for whom we hold a vague resemblance.

But most of all, I love Carol White because she always seemed so sad.

I would really have liked to have been her friend.

An angel’s face at the factory gates, Rest in Peace, Carol White.