Helena has won several accolades for her work including Best Actress at the Swedish Film Awards, the Montreal Film Festival and the 1995 Istanbul Film Festival for her performance in Nutley's The Last Dance.
Ms Christopher, the daughter of a miner who trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (Lamda), married Burton when she was 19 having met him on the set of her first and only film, The Last Days of Dolwyn, in 1948.