Actor Ronald Allen has a woman problem.  Hundreds of women problems.  Everytime he gets involved with a girl in Crossroads the female fans don't like it.

 

The letters pour in from women of all ages complaining that the girl is not right for David Hunter, the character played by Allen in the popular ITV soap opera.

 

Hunter is co-director of the Crossroads motel, with Meg Mortimer (Noele Gordon).  Producer Jack Barton says, "We know from the hundreds of fan letters we get for Ronald Allen that a vast army of females, ranging from teenyboppers to very old women, are in love with him."

 

Yet the character of Hunter is not the hairy, rough-tough lover type seemingly so adored by women today.  He is a neatly-groomed, impeccably dressed matinee idol.

 

Allen, who is in his early 40s says, "This means my screen affairs are usually conducted in a Boy Scout manner."

 

But in one love scene, with April Walker playing a model, he remembers little was left to the imagination.  "The sequel was shattering," he says.  "We were inundated with letters from ladies of all classes and ages, married and unmarried.  They said in effect, 'Never do that again.  You've been unfaithful to me.  Remember you are mine.'  It was frightening.  What astonished me was the romantic, unsexual, almost schoolgirl love of these fans."

 

Does he mind being a 1976 matinee idol?  Allen explains, "I'm an actor.  My job is to give as much pleasure as I can.  I don't care what you call me so long as I'm successful doing that."

 

Allen is a bachelor.  He lives in South London.  He rarely walks the streets alone in case he is mobbed by women.  He says, "I was once in a restaurant when I was recognised through the window.  The women streamed in, but the restaurant owner didn't think it very funny."