'She was as she wrote – bright, vivid, funny, generous, modest'

I met Rachel at a party - a book launch, I think. “You're Richard Eyre,” she said, and I admitted it. It was a passionate friendship at first sight. I knew her writing and was thrilled to find that, in person, she was as she wrote (not always the case) - very bright, vivid, funny, warm, dazzlingly well read, unopinionated but never short of an opinion, modest, generous, loyal, even though a connoisseur of gossip.

- Sir Richard Eyre, director

We became ardent emailers, swapping views on books, films, food, theatre and people with such frequency that, at one point, I suggested it would save time to have two buttons on our laptops: AGREE and DI