Apparently the perfect married couple.  Except that David and Barbara Hunter of Crossroads haven't bothered with a wedding in real life.

 

She is Sue Lloyd, a classically good looking, leggy blonde whose films include The Stud, The Bitch and Revenge of the Pink Panther.

 

He is Ronald Allen, a tall, dark matinee idol who turned his back on a Hollywood contract with Twentieth Century Fox "because they gave me no work."

 

Neither Ronnie, nearing 50, nor Sue, 43, has been married.

 

Ronnie used to share a flat with his best friend, actor Brian Hankins, until he died of cancer five years ago.

 

"Really, I'm not like David Hunter at all," Ronnie says.  "But Crossroads has kept me employed, and that is vitally important.  I'm not very good at being out of work, you fell so useless.  Ask one of the three and a half million unemployed."

 

When he's not learning lines Ronnie does crosswords - and smokes, puffing his way through 40 a day.

 

But he never drinks "well, ginger ale."

 

Sue, a doctor's daughter, led an independent high life until she met Ronnie.

 

She sold her racy story of her life and lovers - they included Peter Sellars and Sean Connery - to a Sunday paper for just under £30,000.  "Enough to buy my own bit of security - a flat in London," she says. 

 

Now she's writing a book and painting murals, a hobby which takes them both to art galleries, museums and stately homes.

 

"Aren't I lucky meeting Ronnie?" Sue says.  "We're a daffy, strange mixture but we get on terribly well.  Care for each other.  Belong.  He gives me what I hadn't got.  Stability.  He's like the Rock of Gibraltar.  And I add colour to his life."

 

Will they marry?

 

"The central pivot for getting married is to have babies, and Sue with her diabetes can't have any, so there really is no rush," explains Ronnie.

 

"Sue wears my engagement ring.  That's a sign of commitment.  I don't know many couples who work and live in such close harmony as us."