February 05
Tessa Charlotte Rampling's Birthday

There is a fine line between the concepts of sensuality and sexuality. Although some use the words interchangeably, most etymologists use the word sensuality to describe that which appeals to multiple senses. The use of the term sensual when applied to Charlotte Rampling not only embraces her sexual appeal, but a somewhat ethereal quality that one sees in her eyes that captivates all of one's senses. Her eyes are are smoldering, hypnotic, and Eve-like, promising men the knowledge of good and evil. In France, she is called La Légende.

In Giles Hattersley's article on Charlotte in the April 25, 2010 The Sunday Times, he reports that, " Looking at her in the bar — with her unlifted face, a gaggle of grandchildren to her name and well into her seventh decade — it is utterly remarkable how she still gives off the sex factor. The photographers Helmut Newton and Juergen Teller have both seized on it in the past, and she continues to be a fashion muse (most recently for Marc Jacobs). I know the fun starts at 60 these days, but Rampling is something else. Her va-va-voom is enough to give the Saga set a collective heart attack — and she’s cool with that."

Charlotte began as a model when she was seventeen and had her first major film break in Georgy Girl (1966). Four years later. she took on the controversial role of a young wife sent to a Nazi concentration camp in The Damned (1969). That experience gave her the courage to play a concentration camp survivor who is reunited with the Nazi guard in a sadomasochistic relationship in The Night Porter (1974), and continued to play in sexually provocative films such as Swimming Pool (2003) and in Heading South (2005). In.Max mon amour (1986), she plays a women in love with a chimpanzee.

Charlotte's personal life has been as controversial as some of her films. In 1972, she married Bryan Southcombe and lived in a ménage à trois with a male model, Randall Laurence which may be one reason why she is called La Légende. Charlotte was quoted by the syndicated columnist Earl Wilson as saying: "There are so many misunderstandings in life. I once caused a scandal by saying I lived with two men [...] I didn't mean it in a sexual sense [...] We were just like any people sharing an apartment." They divorced in 1976. In 1978, she married the French composer Jean Michel Jarre. She divorced him in 1997 when she found out about his affairs with other women and had a nervous breakdown.

One of her lesser known films is Rebus (1989) in which Charlotte plays the enigmatic Contessa di Du Terrail and which has a great soundtrack by John Coltrane. It also serves as an appropriate reference for a mouth-watering sensual Indonesian treat for her birthday - Mee Rebus and enjoying her delicious performance in the film.

Mee Rebus

Ingredients

Garnish

1 packet instant chicken curry paste (more or less to taste)
10 small potatoes – peeled and but into large chunks
6-7 cups low sodium chicken stock
1 TB tamarind paste (remove seeds)
1 TB sugar
Salt

Hard-boiled eggs
Spring onions
Fried shallots
Bean sprouts
Sambal (chili based sauce)

Instructions

1. Boil potatoes until tender in a large pot of salted water. Drain and mash until smooth.
2. In a large pot, mix together 1/3 cup of chicken curry paste with potato puree. Slowly add in chicken stock
3. Stir in tamarind paste (if your tamarind paste is hard, dissolve it in a bit of water and then remove the seeds). Y
4. Leave to simmer for about 30 min. Season with, salt and sugar
5. Serve with garnish and Sambal.