Daliah Lavi (born Daliah Lewinbuk or Levenbuch)

12 October 1942 – 3 May 2017) was an Israeli actress, singer, and model. She played the Detainer in the 1967 spoof Casino Royale, which, although not an Eon production, represents one of the first female 007s and the first 007 to kill James Bond.

Biography

At age 10, she met Kirk Douglas, who was in Israel to film The Juggler, and told him she would like to be a dancer. Douglas helped persuade her parents to send her to Stockholm, Sweden, to study ballet. Not suited to the climate, she would give up dancing and return to Israel to model. She performed her national service as a goodwill ambassador and appeared in several more films until, on a trip to Rome, she was spotted on a beach and offered a role in Two Weeks in Another Town, reuniting her with Douglas.

Fluent in several languages, she acted in German, French, Italian, Spanish, and English films. Lavi played European entertainer Ilona Bergen in the 1965 mystery film Ten Little Indians, an adaptation of Agatha Christie’s thriller about a group of strangers with deadly secrets who are lured to an isolated locale and murdered one by one.