Dame Diana Rigg left her £3.3million fortune to her daughter, a nail bar technician and a number of charities in a will made before her death.
The star – christened Enid – found fame in the 60s and 70s playing a variety of sultry roles, including leather-clad Emma Peel in The Avengers and James Bond ’s doomed lover in On her Majesty’s Secret Service.
The actress – who also starred as ruthless matriarch, Lady Olenna Tyrell, in HBO’s Game of Thrones, died from cancer in September 2020, aged 82, leaving an estate now disclosed to have a value of £3,368,886.
In a will signed days before she died, Dame Diane left the vast bulk of her fortune, which includes property in France and America, to 43-year-old Rachael Stirling.
(Image: Corbis via Getty Images)
Rachael is her daughter by her second husband, Archibald Stirling – a theatre director and former officer in the Scots Guards.
Ms Stirling – who has starred in numerous stage and screen dramas including Snow White and the Huntsman, Detectorists, Tipping the Velvet and Doctor Who – was appointed her mother’s executor alongside Lady Sarah Keswick, daughter of the Earl of Dalhousie.
(Image: Getty Images)
On top of the £3m fortune left in a trust for her daughter, Dame Diana gave £280,500 to relatives and charities.
This included £50,000 to both Great Ormond Street Hospital and the St Christopher’s Hospice in south east London, and £20,000 to the Earls Court Youth Club.
Other bequests from Dame Diana, who lived at nearby Cornwall Gardens, include an enigmatic gift of £5,000 to “Jessica of the Nail Gallery at 300 Fulham Road, London”.
(Image: Hulton Archive)
She also left £500 to the Other Club – a dining society set up by Winston Churchill in 2011 which meets at the Savoy Hotel.
In her recently disclosed will, she asked that the £500 be used “to provide wine at the next gathering after my death and for me to be acknowledged in the menu but not toasted”.
Dame Diana, who was born in Yorkshire but spent part of her childhood in India, carved out an acting profile that spanned TV, movies and the stage after cutting her teeth training with the Royal Shakespeare Company.
(Image: Getty Images)
She won widespread recognition, reaping BAFTA, Emmy and Tony awards throughout her 50-year career.
After making her name in The Avengers, she became the only woman to truly marry 007 in the Bond movies and later won critical acclaim for her roles in Game of Thrones and the Greek stage tragedy Medea.
Paying tribute after her death, Jonathan Kent, who directed Dame Diana in Medea, said: “Her combination of force of personality, beauty, courage and sheer emotional power, made her a great classical actress – one of an astonishing generation of British stage performers.”
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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
