Valerie Leon (born November 12, 1945) is a British actress, regarded as something of a cult figure due to her roles in a number of high profile British film “franchises”.

Valerie Leon in ‘The Spy Who Loved Me’.

Her father was a director of a textile company and her mother, who trained at RADA, stopped acting to become a full-time mother. She is the eldest of four privately-educated children. After leaving school she became a trainee fashion buyer at Harrods before playing truant one day to go to an audition which led to her becoming a chorus girl then going on tour with Barbra Streisand in Funny Girl.

Leon has appeared in several of the Carry On films, been both an “official” and “unofficial” Bond girl – having played the “hotel receptionist” in The Spy Who Loved Me and the “Lady in Bahamas” in Never Say Never Again, and starred in the Hammer horror film Blood from the Mummy’s Tomb as well as appearing alongside Peter Sellers in Revenge of the Pink Panther. She also appeared in Up Pompeii.