Personal Life
Sid James married three times. James and his first wife divorced in 1940 mainly as a result of James's many relationships with other women; it was a pattern that continued throughout his life. In 1943, he married a dancer, Meg Sergei, née Williams (born 1913). Five years later they had a daughter, Reina, before getting divorced on 17 August 1952.
On 21 August 1952 James wed Valerie Elizabeth Patsy Assan (born 1928), an actress who used Ashton as her stage name. During the latter part of their marriage they lived in a house partly designed by James himself called Delaford Park situated in Iver, Buckinghamshire, a location close enough to Pinewood Studios to allow him to return home for lunch whilst filming. During his marriage to Valerie he had an alleged affair with his Carry On co-star, Barbara Windsor, which was dramatised in the 1998 stage-play Cleo, Camping, Emmanuelle and Dick and its 2000 television adaptation Cor, Blimey!. James's alleged obsession with Barbara Windsor was such that it was said he returned to his home one day to find that all of the furniture had been rearranged, and on another occasion that her husband of the time, Ronnie Knight, had put an axe in his floor. Close friends of the time, including Vince Powell and William G. Stewart, have dismissed the suggestions.
James was an inveterate gambler, and a largely unsuccessful one, losing tens of thousands of pounds over his lifetime. His gambling addiction was such that he had an agreement with his agent, Michael Sullivan, whereby his wife did not know how much he was being paid, with a portion set aside for gambling.
Read more about this topic: Sid James
Famous quotes containing the words personal and/or life:
“The city is a fact in nature, like a cave, a run of mackerel or an ant-heap. But it is also a conscious work of art, and it holds within its communal framework many simpler and more personal forms of art. Mind takes form in the city; and in turn, urban forms condition mind.”
—Lewis Mumford (1895–1990)
“There is probably not more than one hundred dollars in cash in circulation today. That is, if you were to call in all the bills and silver and gold in the country at noon tomorrow and pile them on the table, you would find that you had just about one hundred dollars, with perhaps several Canadian pennies and a few peppermint Life Savers.”
—Robert Benchley (1889–1945)