Barbara Bach Biography / Pictures

Barbara Bach (born August 27, 1947) is an American actress and model best-known as the Bond girl from the James Bond movie The Spy Who Loved Me (1977). She is married to musician Ringo Starr, former drummer of The Beatles.

Biography

Barbara was born in Queens, New York City, New York, the daughter of Marjorie and Howard Goldbach, a policeman. She was the oldest of five children. Her father was Austrian and her mother was Irish Catholic, and she attended a Catholic high school, Dominican Commercial in Jamaica, Queens Barbara left school at sixteen to become a model, quickly rising to the ranks of top models.

In 1971, Barbara co-starred with two other Bond girls, Claudine Auger and Barbara Bouchet in the mystery La Tarantola dal ventre nero giallo and had small roles in other Italian films.

In 1977, her role as the Russian spy Anya Amasova in The Spy Who Loved Me gained her recognition as an international sex symbol. Although her character Anya is seen as the first Bond girl who is an equal to Bond, since she is also an experienced spy, Barbara still walked away from the film saying that Bond is a "a chauvinist pig who uses girls to shield him against bullets." The following year she appeared in the movie Force 10 from Navarone. Barbara Bach did lose a role to actress Shelley Hack when she auditioned for the television series Charlie's Angels. Barbara has 28 films to her credit, although she has not worked as an actress since the mid-1980s.

Barbara met Italian businessman Augusto Gregorini on a flight to Rome in 1966. They were married in 1968 and moved to Italy where they had a daughter, singer-songwriter Francesca Gregorini (born August 7, 1968) and a son Gianni (born in 1972). In 1975, Barbara separated from Gregorini and moved back to the United States with her two children.

Barbara met Ringo Starr on the set of the film Caveman in February 1980, and they were married on April 27, 1981, a few weeks after the film's release. Barbara in recent years has accompanied Starr on his tours. Barbara has appeared on some of Ringo's music videos, and played on some of his songs.

Barbara holds a Master's Degree (UCLA, 1993) in Psychology. She started the Self Help Addiction Recovery Program (S.H.A.R.P.) with the help of George Harrison, Eric Clapton and Patti Boyd, who was a former wife of both Harrison and Clapton. Barbara and Starr created The Lotus Foundation, a charity with many sub-charities.