Audrey Hepburn

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In the series of interviews conducted and collected by Cameron Crowe towards the end of the last century, it's clear that the revered director Billy Wilder - then over ninety years old - has lost none of his famed wit and intelligence. Here is a man who does not suffer fools gladly, who has no qualms about speaking ill of the dead, even sacred Hollywood cows like Humphrey Bogart. There is one performer, however, about whom Wilder positively gushes -

"There was so much inside her, a feeling that communicated. Off camera she was just an actress. She was very thin, a good person, sometimes standing on the set she disappeared. But there was something very likable about her, just absolutely adorable about her. You trusted her, this tiny person. When she stood before the camera, she became Miss Audrey Hepburn. That's the "element x" that people have or don't have. You can meet somebody and be enchanted, and then you photograph them and it's nothing. She had it. And there will not be another. You cannot duplicate her, or take her out of her era. If the "element x" could be distilled, you could make all the Hepburns you wanted... But you can't: she started something new, something classy. Today there is Julia Roberts. She is quite capable, very funny... But no actress should be expected to be Audrey Hepburn. That dress by Mr. Givenchy has already been filled."

It's not unusual for a celebrated star to be transformed into an iconic idol after their death - as was the case with Marilyn Monroe or James Dean - but that's not how it worked with Hepburn. She was worshipped by the film industry and the movie-going public from the very start.

Rob Fraser