Raquel Welch: a life in pictures
Jo Raquel Tejada was born in Chicago on 5 September 1940, to a Bolivian father and a mother of English descent.
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Raquel Welch married her childhood sweetheart James Welch in 1959; they divorced in 1964, but she kept his surname. She began to appear on television and took bit parts in movies. Here she is, second from right, in the Elvis Presley vehicle Roustabout, 1964
Photograph: Sunset Boulevard/Corbis via Getty Images
Raquel Welch in a publicity shoot circa 1965
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Welch’s firstleading role was in the cult sci-fi film Fantastic Voyage in 1966, playing Cora Peterson, part of a medical team who are shrunk to microscopic size and sent into the body of an injured scientist to repair damage to his brain. The part turned her into a star
Photograph: TCD/Alamy
Raquel Welch at the Royal premiere of Born Free at the Odeon, Leicester Square in 1966.
Photograph: George Freston/Getty Images
Despite having only three lines in the Hammer fantasy film One Million Years BC made in 1966, Welch made an impact. This shot of her wearing a doe-skin and fur bikini was taken by an unnamed unit still photographer, turned into a poster and became a globally iconic pin-up.
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The Oldest Profession, 1967
Photograph: Cinetext/Allstar
Welch, wearing a crocheted mini dress is besieged by photographers as she enters a room in Paris for her wedding ceremony to her manager Patrick Curtis in 1967. The ceremony was delayed for 15 minutes while police and city officials tussled with the photographers who had been ordered out of the room
Photograph: AP
Welch’s first starring role was as Fathom Harvill in this British spy comedy Fathom, 1967
Photograph: Silver Screen Collection/Silver Screen
Welch in silk chiffon pajamas by Pauline Trigere, Julianelli silver sandals and large Hattie Carnegie earrings, shot for Vogue in 1967
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Welch played Lust in the Peter Cook and Dudley Moore comedy Bedazzled in 1967which retells the Faust legend set in swinging-60s London
Photograph: 20th Century Fox/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock
Raquel Welch plays cards with locals in Saint-Tropez during a break in filming the crime drama the Biggest Bundle of Them All in 1968
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Bandolero!, 1968
Photograph: 20th Century Fox/Allstar
Frank Sinatra as Tony Rome and Welch as Kit Forrester in the detective movie Lady in Cement, 1968
Photograph: 20th Century Fox/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock
Welch as Sarita and Jim Brown as Lyedecker in 100 Rifles, 1969. The director tried to persuade Welch to go nude in her famous shower scene, but, as she did throughout her career, she refused
Photograph: 20th Century Fox/Allstar
Raquel Welch circa 1970
Photograph: Herbert Dorfman/Corbis via Getty Images
Raquel Welch and Ringo Starr in the British comedy The Magic Christian in 1969
Photograph: Bettmann/Bettmann Archive
Raquel Welch as the eponymous transexual heroine in Myra Breckinridge, 1970, with Farrah Fawcett as Mary Ann Pringle
Photograph: 20th Century Fox/Ronald Grant Archive
Raquel Welch circa 1970
Photograph: Terry O’Neill/Iconic Images/Getty Images
Welch leaves a Hollywood party in June 1971
Photograph: Ron Galella/via Getty Images
Hannie Caulder, 1971
Photograph: Paramount/Allstar
Fuzz, 1972
Photograph: Filmways/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock
Raquel Welch with fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent circa 1975
Photograph: Terry O’Neill/Iconic Images/Getty Images
Raquel Welch with Miss Piggy in the Muppet Show, 1976
Photograph: Henson Assoc./Allstar
Welch arrives at the Academy Awards in Los Angeles in 1978 with André Weinfeld. The pair were married for 10 years from 1980
Photograph: AP
Raquel Welch as voluptuous alien Captain Nirvana with Robin Williams in Mork and Mindy in 1979
Photograph: Paramount/Allstar
Welch dances during a rehearsal in 1981 for the Tony winning Woman of the Year, which she starred in for two weeks while Lauren Bacall was on vacation
Photograph: Franco/AP
Welch on the runway at Jean Paul Gaultier’s amFAR (The American Foundation for AIDS Research) benefit fashion show in Los Angeles on 2 September 1992
Photograph: Berliner Studio/REX/Shutterstock
Leslie Nielsen with Welch in Naked Gun 33 1⁄3: The Final Insult in 1994
Photograph: ZUMA Press, Inc./Alamy
Welch as Mrs. Windham-Vandermark in Legally Blonde, 2001
Photograph: MGM/Allstar
Gina Gershon as Donatella Versace, Madison McAleer as Young Allegra and Raquel Welch as Aunt Lucia in the television movie House of Versace, 2013
Photograph: Lifetime Television/Allstar
Welch as Celeste Birch and Eugenio Derbez as Maximo in the comedy How to Be a Latin Lover, 2017
Photograph: Allstar
Raquel Welch 1940 - 2023
Photograph: Vera Anderson/WireImage