Rita Tushingham

Rita Tushingham (born 14 March 1942) is an English actress best known for her starring roles in 1960s films including A Taste of Honey, The Knack …and How to Get It, Doctor Zhivago and Smashing Time.

Tushingham was born in Liverpool, Lancashire where her father was a grocer who ran three shops and she grew up in the Hunt's Cross area. She attended the Heatherlea school in Allerton, the La Sagesse convent school in Grassendale and then learnt shorthand and typing at secretarial school. She wanted to be an actress from an early age and trained at the Shelagh Elliott-Clarke school before working backstage as an assistant stage manager at the Liverpool Playhouse.