Sylvia Kristel Posters & Photographs for Sale

Sylvia Maria Kristel (28 September 1952 – 17 October 2012) was a Dutch actress and model who appeared in over 50 films. She is best remembered as the eponymous character in five of the seven Emmanuelle films.

Kristel was born in Utrecht, the Netherlands; she was the elder daughter of an innkeeper, Jean-Nicholas Kristel, and his wife Pietje Hendrika Lamme. In her 2006 autobiography, Nue, she stated that she was sexually abused by an elderly hotel guest when she was nine years old, an experience she otherwise refused to discuss. Her parents divorced when she was 14 years old, after her father abandoned the family for another woman. "It was the saddest thing that ever happened to me," she said of the experience of her parents' separation.