
Judy Tatham (L) and Dame Margot in London, a week after the failed coup
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22339272It was one of the world's stranger coup plots, described by British diplomats as a "slapdash comedy", with the famous prima ballerina Dame Margot Fonteyn and her Panamanian husband trying to topple the government of Panama with the help of a flighty British model, Judy Tatham.
"It was all so amateur. She did it for a lark," says Tatham, about the escapade more than 50 years ago.
"Margot thought that [her husband] would end up as head of the country, and that she would be Queen of Panama. Her role was a romantic one. Mine was to help a friend."