Mandy Rice-Davies
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Mandy Rice-Davies (born 21 October 1944) is famous mainly for her minor role in the Profumo affair which discredited the Conservative government of British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan in 1963.
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[edit] Background and link to Stephen Ward & Christine Keeler
She was born Marilyn Rice-Davies in Pontyates near Llanelli, Wales, and later moved to Shirley in Solihull, England. As a teenager, she appeared much older than her actual age and as such, at age 15, she got a job as a clothes model at Marshall & Snelgrove, a department store in Birmingham. Rice-Davies came to London, where she met Christine Keeler and a well-connected osteopath Stephen Ward. As a result of her involvement in Ward's social set, she became intimate with many powerful people, including the then Viscount Astor. She never in fact met John Profumo [1], whose brief relationship with Keeler, with whom Rice-Davies shared a flat, was at the centre of the affair that caused him to resign from the government in June 1963. Rice-Davies had been one of the mistresses of notorious slum landlord Peter Rachman who had owned the flat she shared with Keeler.
[edit] "He would, wouldn't he?"
While giving evidence at the trial of Stephen Ward, Rice-Davies made the quip for which she is most remembered and which is frequently used by politicians in Britain[2]. When the prosecuting counsel pointed out that Lord Astor denied having an affair or having even met her, she replied, "Well, he would, wouldn't he?". She traded on the notoriety the trial brought her, comparing herself to Nelson's mistress, Lady Hamilton [3]. She married an Israeli businessman, Rafi Shauli, and went on to open a string of successful nightclubs and restaurants in Tel Aviv. The restaurants and nightclubs, which bore her name, were called: Mandy's, Mandy's Candies and Mandy's Singing Bamboo. Rice-Davies also parlayed her minor fame into a series of unsuccessful pop singles for the Ember label in the mid-'60s, including Close Your Eyes and You Got What It Takes.
In 1980, with Shirley Flack she co-wrote her autobiography, Mandy. In 1989, she wrote a novel titled Communism and You.
In the 1989 film about the Profumo affair titled Scandal, actress Bridget Fonda portrayed Rice-Davies.
[edit] "I want Mandi"
At the height of the Profumo scandal, the first prime minister of independent Malaya (now Malaysia) Tunku Abdul Rahman arrived in London for a visit. At a reception party at London Airport when asked what he wanted to do first, he replied "I want Mandi" which shocked the reception party because they did not know that "Mandi" means "take a bath" in Malay.[4]
[edit] Notes
- ^ David Profumo (2006) Bringing the House Down
- ^ This quote later became a common saying in British politics, often altered to "He would say that, wouldn't he?" Examples follow in these links:
- Scottish Parliament committee news release 22 February 2001 "So perhaps there is a slight Mandy Rice Davies feel to this backing with a hint of 'well he would, wouldn't he?'."
- Lords Hansard text for 6 Feb 2002 "I pause to anticipate the interjection—'He would say that, wouldn't he?'" spoken by Lord McIntosh of Haringey.
- Well he would say that, wouldn't he? by Bronwen Maddox in The Times January 11, 2006
- ^ The Penguin Dictionary of Modern Quotations (J. M. & M.J. Cohen, 1971) 190:69
- ^ Jennifer Gomez, All Tunku wanted was ‘to mandi’, not Mandy, the New Straits Times online, 17 September, 2007
