The wild sex parties of Diana Dors, England's answer to Marilyn Monroe
In the 1950s, Diana Dors was one of Britain’s biggest, and most lusted-after film stars, but her behind-closed-doors activities shocked Britain.
In the 1950s, Diana Dors was one of Britain’s biggest, and most lusted-after film stars. Dubbed ‘England’s Marilyn Monroe’, she was, by the time she was 25, the country’s highest-paid female actor, with a stream of leading parts in some of the most popular movies of the day, including the Brit-noir classic Yield To The Night and the 1958 crime thriller Tread Softly Stranger.
But away from the big screen, Dors’ life was in many ways more colourful and salacious than any part she ever played, as she sensationally confessed to the News of the World in 1960: "There were no half measures at my parties," the actor told the paper about the celebrity get-togethers at her home in Berkshire. "Off came the sweaters, bras and panties. In fact it was a case of off with everything – except the lights."
It wasn’t just Dors’ spicy tell-all that shocked readers in 1960, but her perceived lack of shame about filming guests having sex without their knowledge, and of watching copulating couples through a two-way mirror.
The Britain of 1960, it’s worth remembering, was still considerably prudish about sex, exemplified in the October of that year when Penguin Books found itself charged under the Obscene Publications Act, for publishing DH Lawrence’s erotically charged novel Lady Chatterley's Lover.
Given that even your common-or-garden marital rumpy-pumpy was rarely referenced in the media, then all this talk of orgies and two-way mirrors was explosive stuff, a titillating — and shocking — glimpse into a more licentious world, and all from the mouth of one of Britain’s most famous actors.
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Not that this was news to those in the know. The soirées that Dors put on with her first husband Dennis Hamilton were notorious in showbiz circles, and though the actress never named names, she would often claim in interviews that a litany of film stars, socialites, sportsmen and TV personalities were regulars.
One celebrity that did break cover, however, was Bob Monkhouse. In his 1993 autobiography Crying With Laughter, the comedian described how, in 1952, he was invited to one of what he called "one of [Dors’] famous parties".
"Hamilton," he wrote, "had provided a number of obliging girls for single gentlemen to enjoy," adding that, "The lights were kept dim for the continuous showing of blue movies."
But it wasn’t just "single gentlemen" that Dors and Hamilton were catering for. As the party went on, Monkhouse, then aged 24, began to notice a pattern. "An amorous couple," he related, "would get the nod from Hamilton and follow him out of the room." The comedian explained that Hamilton would return alone, but then leave again with Dors, before coming back around 15 minutes later, upon which they would give the nod to another pair of lovers.
Then, Hamilton and Dors called Monkhouse’s name, and he and the woman he’d been set up with followed the couple down a corridor festooned with porngraphic photos into a bedroom that looked, as Monkhouse wrote, "[like] a knocking shop in Marrakesh".
"I’ll lock the door so that no-one can interrupt you," Hamilton told the comedian. "You’ve got about a quarter of an hour, so make the most of it."
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On the ceiling was a mirror and as the couple disrobed, they heard a squeal of laughter from above. Suddenly aware that they were being watched, Monkhouse scrambled for his clothes and ran towards the door, where he was greeted by a disappointed looking Dors. "What a waste," she told him. "Still, the night’s still young, come upstairs and join us."
"Some people absolutely adore putting on a show," she added, explaining that she thought Monkhouse had known beforehand about the two-way mirror. Ushering him into the upstairs room, he was greeted by the sight of "whispering, laughing couples, mostly in varying states of undress." No longer expected to perform, Dors told him to simply lie down and watch the next couple.
It would take another eight years for Dors’ parties to become public knowledge, and upon publication of the News of the World’s exclusive, the establishment queued up to scold her. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Geoffrey Fisher, branded the actress a "wayward hussy", while the Mayor of Swindon, where the actress had been born in 1931, accused her of "bringing shame" on the town. The Press Council, meanwhile, stated that the newspaper’s story was "grossly lewd and salacious… a disgrace to British journalism."
Yet the lurid revelations did little harm to Dors’ career, and she appeared to revel in the notoriety it brought her, continuing to host wild, sex-fuelled parties throughout the 60s and 70s, while playing a more varied selection of roles on the big and small screens.
She married actor Alan Lake in 1968 (Dennis Hamilton died of a heart attack in 1959) and, years later, their son Jason would recount how his mother’s libidinous get-togethers were a regular part of his childhood.
"There were no taboos in our house," he said. "I was only seven but I was free to wander in and out of my mum’s parties, no matter how hot they got. She loved having friends around to watch the porn films made. They would sit around giggling as couples groped each other and made love on the bed. Most of them didn’t even know they had been filmed."
Even the two-way mirror device still existed, albeit as what Lake described as a "more up-to-date version".
"Some of the girls were wise to it," he explained. "Mum just said, ‘This is what happens’, and I thought it was completely normal."
Yet for all the debauchery of Diana Dors’ famous parties, she was, according to her son, monogamous herself, and never — to his knowledge — joined in with the sexual shenanigans. "Sometimes she would disappear into a room with dad and lock the door," he remembered, "but I never saw them with other people."
Diana Dors died aged 52 in 1984.
