Stephanie Beacham, the 69-year-old British actor who played Sable Colby in Dynasty in the late 1980s, has spoken out in a frank interview about how she was raped at the start of her career in the 1970s.

She revealed that keeping silent about the attack had damaged relationships and “screwed up” her life.

The impact of the attack caused her to end a relationship that could have resulted in marriage but she also said that on some occasions s**ual assault can be the fault of the victim.

She refused to name her attacker, but said he was not a “theatrical person”.

Beacham starred in The Nightcomers with Marlon Brando in 1971 and the Dynasty spinoff The Colbys.

In the interview, Beacham discussed how early in her career she learned how to avoid being inappropriately touched and carried a £5 note sewn into her coat as “getaway money”.

“I can remember avoiding rape several times and a couple of times not”, she said.

After being questioned further about the date, she added: “No, I will, for my own brain, be more specific and say once, and it was the very early 70s.

And that is fact.”

She denied that in her case it was her fault, but said that on some occasions a s**ual assault could be the fault of the victim.

“I’m getting terribly interested in looking back and now, with all the talk in the news about child abuse, I’m thinking, are we going too far? Isn’t it interesting how the victim thinks that it’s their fault? I’m old enough to think that maybe, sometimes, it is.”

Beacham spoke about how the experience had affected her relationships: “Yeah, absolutely.

I didn’t know that that’s what was causing it at the time.

But absolutely.

It caused me to break off a long-term relationship that probably should have been my marriage, because I couldn’t admit to it, I felt it was my fault.

No, it screwed up my life, definitely.”

Beacham’s first screen role was in the BBC series The Queen’s Traitor in 1967, in which she played Mary, Queen of Scots.

After decades of working in the US, she returned to the UK in 2003 to take a role in the ITV prison drama Bad Girls.

Among subsequent roles, she appeared in Coronation Street for five months in 2009.

In January 2010, Beacham entered Channel 4’s seventh and final series of Celebrity Big Brother as a housemate.

She was the only woman to make it to the final and finished in fifth place.
Beacham is among a number of female celebrities who have discussed their experiences of s**ual assault.