Back in the early-to-mid 1990s, during my early-to-mid teens, I was a frequent reader of the British video entertainment magazine, Video World. It claimed to be, “Britain’s Biggest Selling Video Entertainment Magazine” and I had no cause to disagree. It was great for a horror/sci-fi movie buff, such as myself, it was packed with interviews and reviews of the very latest video releases, it highlighted many movies that would more often be over looked by “mainstream” movie reviews reporting on their stars, directors, effects, and gore and curiously, the magazine had no age restriction to it despite having the back pages completely devoted to the latest adult releases and, as I said before, I was a teenage boy.
The pages also contained a great many classified ads, but there was always one in particular that was always there; Fiona Cooper Adult Videos! Each issue seemed to contain a full page, full colour ad (in some cases as many three pages) devoted to this one company that promised the very latest range of adult entertainment, photo sets, and “telephone entertainment” boasting hundreds of videos to suit every taste, also adding that they were always looking out for new models to feature.
Originally set up in 1978 by one “Fiona Cooper,” a former French model who was now the leading name in mail order adult glamour videos, she promoted (in “her” own words) “SEXY videos…but never SEX videos.” Her mail away video catalogue (which could be bought for £2) focused on “the girl next door” and the catalogue also contained a letters page and various competitions. At one point they even sold limited edition figurines of their most popular girls!
Video World magazine themselves described Fiona Cooper’s videos as “A must for those of you with an eye for glitz underwear…Fiona’s got quite a treat in store…slick stripping and half decent soundtracks give the Fiona Cooper tapes an edge over many of the adult tapes.” Now I must stress, I never actually mailed away for their catalogue and wasn’t familiar with their products, but the models that featured in their relentless adverts were regular faces to me! Case in point; one “Ingrid,” who’s full page ads declaring that I could “spend an hour with Ingrid for only £5” was as regular a feature in Video World magazine as their contents page! The advertised “hour” was of course a video, a “full 1 hour long on high quality Sony tape” to be precise, but who was “Ingrid”? This was something I asked myself three years ago when I was researching through my back issues for another project and so down the rabbit hole I went. I did some digging for all the good it did me! The Internet turned up nothing. Even back issues of catalogues themselves offered very little information on her, only in that she was apparently Swedish, that she was one of three sisters (called Imogen and Josie, who had also stared in Fiona Cooper videos), and that she had done three videos and three photo shoots for the company and for 36p a minute, I could have heard her speak via the company’s “Lipstick Lines” service. Undeterred, I contacted the company itself that was still in business (although Fiona Cooper had long retired, her daughter Chloé now apparently ran the business side of things), but this too yielded no results, as they could only tell me that Ingrid featured in their “classics library,” so it seemed that the quest had come to a disappointing end and that was that.
As I said, this was three years ago, but seeing as I had expressed an “interest” in their company, I now found myself on the Fiona Cooper mailing list and so their manila envelopes bearing a Halifax, Yorkshire postmark, became a regular feature of my mornings each quarter. That was until summer 2017 when something called a “Mum’s last swansong” flyer came through the door. It seemed that Fiona Cooper had died! Chloé informed us; “Mum is no longer with us, and her last call was to say that when she leaves, FC leaves with her,” so once again I found myself asking another question; “So who was Fiona Cooper then?”
Once again, I did some digging and this time, discovered something startling! It seemed that all along Fiona Cooper was in fact a “he”; one Philip Joseph Sutcliffe, in fact who had been jailed for 18 months back in 2002 after indecent images of children were found on his personal computers. Having admitted to three offences of making indecent photographs of a child, he was sentenced for three offences of indecent assault and two offences of taking indecent photographs before being ordered to pay £3,500 costs and be placed on the Sex Offenders’ Register for 10 years. Then, in February of 2017, he was once again sentenced to four years in prison by Sheffield Crown Court after admitting to abusing a 13 year-old girl. The official Fiona Cooper website claims, “On September 1st 2017, Fiona Cooper made the tough decision to call it a day. They will no longer be creating new and exciting content – images or videos,” which was a novel way of announcing that the company’s owner was now in prison! So, that really was the end of an article that turned up more questions than answers, perhaps teaching us a valid lesson; beware, that rabbit hole it might lead somewhere unpleasant! All that aside though… I wonder who Ingrid was?
About the author
Arfon Jones is an artist/illustrator based in Gwynedd, North Wales in the United Kingdom. Although he holds a B.A. in illustration, he regards himself to be a self-taught artist, working mostly in acrylic and pen, turning his hand to three-dimensional pieces from time to time. His work has been publicly displayed in the United Kingdom, Europe, and the United States and used in wide range of publications, books, comics, magazines, DVD’s, posters, logo design, and private portraits.
Tara Bardot. Give me a shout if you need anymore info 🙂
Or Tara Jackson if you want her real name. Originally from Derby.
I too was a fan of Ingrid, I know I have a dvd in storage, but unable to access it. Am stunned to find Fiona is called Phillip, so who is Chloe. I met one lady who has modelled for Fiona Cooper, a young Australian called Chanta Rose, I seen her as a stripper in London, then met her later in a local bar in London. She told me of an incident with Fiona’s husband wanting to get inside her knickers. Chanta Rose at the time had a boyfriend who doubled as her minder.
Allegedly did hardcore with Philip Sutcliffe against her wishes. Was released on “cock sucking beauties” and on an extended version of Chanta’s title. She didn’t look best pleased or happy to be there.
Hi Alan. I’m wondering if you can help? I had quite an extensive FC DVD collection a few years ago but sadly it got damaged when the old house got flooded a few years back. I’ve been trying to get back as many titles as I can, but it’s proving difficult. I’m wondering if you, or anyone you might know has a FC DVD collection and would be willing to sell any duplicate copies? Or if you could point me in the direction of anyone who has? Many thanks in advance.
Richard.
Hello, I realise I’m over a year late….but if you’re still looking for DVDs, then I have hundreds of genuine FC DVDs available. I’m a fellow collector, so been buying and selling these things for yonks, thus do have surplus to sell on. Open to deals, so contact me.
I heard there was a video of Zarina Masood where she only wanted to do bikini, but he somehow convinced her to go all the way. There is a clip of the video, but not the buildup. Just her having sex with him and seems to have enjoyed it. Not like many said where she didn’t want to. Can anyone confirm? It was said to be in FC 1330, but I can’t find the full scene.
It was pulled from sale at some point – Zarina may have “bought” the title or something else went down.
I have FC1330 and can confirm the scene is indeed in that title.
Ingrid is Tara Jackson sometimes Tara Bardot or Tara Bardot Jackson as well as many other names she has used. She is from Derby in England, has 2 Sons, was in a relationship with porn guru David Sullivan, publisher Whitehouse, Park Lane and many other hard-ish core magazines. She did glamour modelling in The Sport and Star, also was a Daily Sport candidate parliamentary by-election 1990’s and became Editor of Titbits in 1992. She also ran a Model agency supplying girls for TV stations.
Fiona (Phil) made videos and photos sets. There was even a photo set of a girl who they claimed was Fiona. I bought quite a few photo sets, videos (and even a limited edition little statuette of Ingrid) and still have Ingrid stuff. Later they bought out DVDs up till I thought around 2008, Then some other guy was selling Fiona stuff up until 2 or 3 years ago.
Tara has been in many adult mags since she did the Fiona stuff at the end of the 80’s. I have not heard or seen anything about her since about 1994, not even on any social media. I asked bout her on twitter and some guy had photos and a video of her in a bar around the time he said she was dating one of his band members or a Guns n Roses tribute band. Quite a few of the girls from Fiona went on to do the UK adult mags…Club, Escort, Knave, Parade ETC…, I have been trying to collect all the ones Tara was in and got quite a few.
Who was “Chloe Cooper” then? Was she Sutcliffe’s daughter? She only appeared in the one film – 275 – but she does get director credits in many later films. She was claimed to be 18 in 2004, when she made 275, which would make her 34 now. Here she is from 275. I wonder where she is and what she’s doing these days…
She is not Sutcliffe’s daughter. They are all pro models. Chloe is a photographer/studio owner called Leigh from a studio from down in Essex. You can see her on DVD 1137. All the later videos are shot in her house in Essex.
I have an extensive collection of FC DVDs but some are missing, I’m trying to find Gail 331. jeffbushyb@hotmail.com
I have recently unearthed 100 Fiona Cooper DVD’s and 91 catalogues. Should I sell, bin, or donate? I feel the time has come to move these on and would be interested in opinions. Thanks in advance. JT notacavemananymore@gmail.com
These are some screen grabs from her Fiona Cooper videos.