I had an affair with Christine Keeler, film critic reveals

Christine Keeler, the woman whose affairs with an English minister and a Soviet diplomat helped bring down a Tory government, later sought refuge in the arms of one of Britain's most celebrated film critics.

Shortly after the resignation of John Profumo, the Secretary of State for War and the suicide of society osteopath, Stephen Ward, in 1963, Keeler began dating the then fledgling Guardian journalist, Derek Malcolm.

The disclosure of the relationship was made by Malcolm himself who let it slip at a film premiere party in London. He said he was introduced to Keeler by the press officer of the Playboy Club in Mayfair in 1964.

"I think Christine just wanted to get away from it all because she had been figuratively screwed by the establishment, by a lot of very powerful people, and the whole fracas left her wanting to lead a normal life," recounted Malcolm, 74. "She was really very naïve, an innocent who thought I was a nice chap. After all she had been through I think she was quite relieved to be a with a funny little character like me."

Malcolm, who at the time was a sub editor at the Guardian, even persuaded his employers to interview her for job as arts desk secretary.

"At the last minute she didn't turn up. It was a shame really, because I think it would have been very good for her. She was working with a drugs addicts charity and so I told The Guardian about her. If you ask me I think she was very scared, that's why she didn't turn up."

But Malcolm, now a film critic for the Evening Standard, rejects the suggestion that he was the "third man" at the height of the scandal. "More like the 33rd man," he joked yesterday. "But Christine wasn't a prostitute or a call-girl. She just went to these society parties on the invitation of Stephen Ward. He would be asked to arrange girls to jazz up parties and Christine and Mandy Rice-Davies were two of those he invited."

It was Ward who took Keeler to Cliveden, Lord Astor's estate in Berkshire, where she met Profumo. When it emerged that she had also had an affair with a Soviet naval attache, Eugene Ivanov, the scandal became a matter of national security. In the end no security breach was found to have taken place, but Profumo resigned and never re-entered public life. Harold Macmillan, the Prime Minister, was out of office by early October, and the Conservative Party's reputation was badly tarnished. The following year, they lost the election.

Ward committed suicide on the final day of his trial for living off immoral earnings. Keeler was pilloried in the press and sentenced to nine months in prison for perjury after an unrelated trial, never really recovering from her notoriety. Malcolm recalls: "She didn't really talk about Profumo. I just think she liked him, he was a nice guy, but she was very guarded. She wanted to get away from all the nonsense, from all the ghastly men; men who she knew were going to exploit her. At least I wasn't like that.

"I knew her for about three years after which time we just drifted apart. She always said she was a footnote to history and I think she was. What would have happened if she had taken that job on The Guardian? Who knows, she might have ended up as arts editor."

Two lovers, two very different backgrounds

* DEREK MALCOLM. Aged 74. Film critic and historian

Educated at Eton, he became an amateur jockey before joining The Guardian as a racing correspondent. A film critic for several decades, he still writes for the Evening Standard. In 2003 his book Family Secrets revealed how in 1917 his father shot dead, but was found not guilty of murdering, his mother's lover.

* CHRISTINE KEELER. Aged 65. Former showgirl

Grew up in a caravan in Oxfordshire and gave birth at the age of 17 to a child who died a few days later. In 1959 she left home and headed for London. While working as a waitress, she met Maureen O'Connor, a girl who worked at Murray's Cabaret Club in Soho. She introduced Keeler to the owner, Percy Murray, who hired her almost immediately as a topless showgirl.