TO the outside world Vicki Rebecca lived a glamorous £1,000-a-day life and had even appeared in a James Bond film.
But away from the cameras, the Abderdeen-born glamour model battled a crippling, decade-long heroin addiction that nearly cost her life.
Between high-paying jobs throughout her twenties, Vicki would lock herself away in her flat to scoff McDonald’s burgers and watch films while shooting up multiple times a day.
The addiction also left her needing to sneak away to the toilets while on photoshoots and movie sets to take drugs – including while appearing as a nude model for the opening sequence of the 1979 Bond film Moonraker, which starred the late Sir Roger Moore.
Vicki’s turning point came after a spiritual experience at 29, which led to her leaving London to get clean and eventually retraining as a psychotherapist.
Now In her brave memoir, Naked Truth: Diary of a Glamour Model, the 67-year-old recounts her journey from seedy photobooths in Soho to high-paying gigs before quitting fame to overcome her addiction.
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She tells The Sun: “I was a ‘functional’ heroin addict, I was managing my life until the habit got worse and worse and all I wanted to do was sit in my joggers and eat McDonald’s.
“I would wake up in the morning looking awful with bags under my eyes and track marks, and not a great complexion, then on went the make-up so I could go to a shoot.
“I was living two different lives: Marilyn Monroe and a junkie, my life was crazy and a paradox.
“I’d appeared in a James Bond film and was impersonating Marilyn Monroe, the most beautiful and gorgeous Hollywood star the world had ever seen.
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“But at the same time I was an addict and during shoots, I would be racing to toilets to jack up.”
Vick was introduced to heroin by a friend one year before filming Moonraker – and recalls being one of two naked models, whose silhouettes featured in the film.
Then 22, she was required to jump around on a trampoline to create the acrobatic poses needed by the film’s director.
She recalls: “I was jumping up and down on a trampoline so that it looked like I was tumbling through the air.
“I was completely naked apart from a g-string with a bit of make-up. There was minimal staff on set so it wasn’t like the crew was standing around gawping.
“In another scene, which wasn’t used in the film, I had to jump off 18ft scaffolding into the arms of the actor who played Jaws, Richard Kiel.
“He was a giant of a man with hands that were literally the size of a bunch of bananas and he had to catch me. I tried that shot a few times, too many for my liking.”
Vicki believes she would have used drugs during the 10-day shoot at Pinewood Studios for Bond, which paid around £1,800, and between takes recalls “a lot of waiting around, drinking tea and eating bacon rolls”.
She adds: “I felt really proud to appear in the James Bond film, even if my part was a blink and you’ll miss it kind of moment. It really impresses people even now.”
Vicki’s other big moments included appearing on The Sun’s Page 3 and in the 1979 film The B***, which starred Joan Collins.
She also had numerous high-paid jobs as a Marilyn Monroe lookalike – after being convinced to go for a test shoot when a photographer noticed her similarities to the Hollywood icon.
GETTING HELP:
If you think that you have a drug addiction then please contact your GP.
You can also visit FRANK for honest information about drugs and to find local treatment services.
If you are having trouble finding the right help, call the FRANK drugs helpline on 03001236600
Or click here to visit the NHS website for more advice and support
It would help her to land jobs that paid up to £1,000 per day and fly overseas to open nightclubs – as well as to feature in a sketch in The Two Ronnies TV show.
She says: “It was incredible really. I recreated a lot of the Marilyn shots you might imagine, like the one where her skirt pops up while standing above a Subway grate.
“We did that for Philips Lady Shaver and another similar one for Kodak. Then I was lying on a bed for a furniture company and did about everything else you could imagine.
“I ended up jetting off all over the world and sometimes was met off the planes with bunches of flowers. I opened supermarkets and nightclubs including one in Reykjavik, Iceland. It was really crazy.”
But the jobs weren’t always so elegant – when Vicki moved to London in her late teens, she stumbled across an advert for ‘Glamour models’ but the job turned out to be “pretty sleazy”.
She recalls: “I remember thinking, ‘Oh, I’ll be posing in lingerie adverts or underwear cataologues’.
“But it ended up being this pretty sleazy ‘come up and photograph us’ booth.”
As a junkie, there were just two types of day – the ones when I had heroin and would be lying in bed shooting up and the ones when I didn’t and was hunting for more
Years later, while portraying Marilyn, her heroin addiction was worsening with her spending up to £250 a day on the drug as it took over her life.
She says: “People became aware of my addiction, I used to be late to shoots and would disappear to the toilets for far too long.
“In one shoot, I remember lying on a big heart-shaped bed for a calendar and the first assistant yelled ‘cut’. He could see my track marks from using and I was sent to make-up.
“No one would say anything to me, they wanted me to finish the shoot because a lot of money had been invested in that day or half a day of work.”
In her personal life, Vicki became increasingly reclusive and she details the struggles of her addiction.
“As a junkie, there were just two types of day,” she says. “The ones when I had heroin and would be lying in bed shooting up and the ones when I didn’t and was hunting for more.
“I’m definitely not blaming my modeling career for my addiction, it was a path. I was a bit of a rebel in the Seventies and I experimented with drugs.”
During this time, Vicki says her family were “suspicious” but she “lied to them, like all addicts do” and was able to “put on a good show” while visiting them in Scotland.
I don’t look back at my life and feel sad. There was a lot of love and laughter, but there was also darkness, sexual violence, addiction and other disturbing things
Vicki
She attempted to wean herself off the drug multiple times using Methadone and had attempted going cold turkey but it “was absolutely insufferable”.
During one fateful moment in 1985, she recalls walking around a building site while battling suicidal thoughts when she heard a voice in her head say: “You can be reborn.”
She recalled: “It felt like an external voice, it was so strong and felt like a body, mind and soul feeling. It was extraordinary and wouldn’t be the first time I would hear it.
“I didn’t stop using in that minute but it helped to lead me to a point where I could stop using. It was almost like a lifeline. It saved my life.”
In 1987, Vicki left London and returned to Aberdeen to get clean after asking for help from her family.
She says: “I got to a place where I felt I had no more choice but to move back home, I knew I couldn’t do it in London because it was too easy to access drugs and it was high quality.
“I knew going back to Aberdeen I’d have a better chance of making it.”
Vicki discovered meditation and alternative therapies that helped her to battle the addiction and within three years, she used methadone for the last time.
She initially studied to be a lawyer and later became a psychotherapist, specialising in neurolinguistic programming (NLP) and hypnotherapy.
Now 33 years in recovery and 25 years as a therapist, she uses her lived experience and training to help others.
Vicki hopes her brutally honest book Naked Truth – which became an international bestseller on Amazon on the day it launched – will help others and insists: “If I can do it, anyone can.”
She says: “I don’t look back at my life and feel sad. There was a lot of love and laughter, but there was also darkness, sexual violence, addiction and other disturbing things.
“Writing the book was a real eye-opener, it made me realised I have really lived a life between all of that and I’ve changed so much over the years.
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“I don’t pull any punches and that’s the kind of honest society needs. It’s authentic and raw, that’s what I think is inspirational.”
Find out more about Vicki Rebecca’s work and her book here.
Timeline of James Bond actors
Over the years there have been seven actors who have played 007.
The first ever James Bond film was in 1962, and this is who has played the lead role over the years:
- Sean Connery – The late star was the first ever actor to play Bond, and reprised the role for seven movies.
- George Lazenby – The star only played Bond once, but was the youngest actor to ever play the spy.
- Roger Moore – The late movie star spent 12 years making seven films in the famous franchise.
- Timothy Dalton – The smooth actor took over from Roger Moore and appeared in The Living Daylights and Licence to Kill.
- Pierce Brosnan – The handsome star played Bond for four movies from 1995 to 2002.
- Daniel Craig – The British star was the first blonde James Bond and the sixth actor to win the role in 2005.
