It was November 1967, and I was processing through the streets of the City of London; the crowds were four deep. Heated rocks to sit on had been promised but these failed to materialise. I was wearing two flesh-coloured body stockings, the bodice covered with shells and bits of mock seaweed. From the waist down, I wore cord jeans and thick socks and boots – but this part of me was invisible as I sat inside the papier-mâché unheated rocks, over which my glittering mermaid tail was spread. It was the 1967 Lord Mayor’s Show (which takes place this year on 11th November). The Mermaid Theatre, then run by the charismatic actor Bernard Miles, had a float in the procession with pirates from that year’s pantomime, Treasure Island. But a mermaid was needed, too, and they held a competition for ‘the most beautiful girl in the City of London’. My...
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