Elen Willard

Last updated

Elen Willard
Elen Willard in One Step Beyond (To Know the End).jpg
Born
United States
OccupationActress
Years active1960–1966

Elen Willard is a retired American character actress who worked exclusively in various American network dramatic television series from 1960 to 1966. Her very first aired performance was a supporting role in a 1960 episode of the short-lived CBS detective series, Markham , which starred Ray Milland.

Successively, over a six-year period, Willard portrayed twenty-four characters in twenty different dramatic television series consisting of various featured guest star and supporting performances, including most notably Alcoa Presents: One Step Beyond , Outlaws , Perry Mason , Ben Casey , Dr. Kildare , Combat! , Gunsmoke , Whispering Smith , and Have Gun - Will Travel .

During just a mere collective five minutes of screen time, Willard may be best-known for her captivating, standout portrayal of the character Ione Sykes in the gothic-themed western episode of the science fiction/fantasy/horror anthology series The Twilight Zone entitled "The Grave", written, and directed by noted screenwriter, and director Montgomery Pittman. During the final two years of Willard's career she guest starred in four separate episodes of the ABC/Quinn Martin World War II based series Twelve O'Clock High .

Willard's last broadcast appearance was as a character that figured prominently in a Christmas-themed episode of The Man from U.N.C.L.E. entitled "The Jingle Bells Affair" which was initially aired December 23, 1966.[ citation needed ] Actor Earl Holliman, who guest starred opposite her in the second of her four appearances in Twelve O'Clock High, said in an interview for a book on that series published in 2005 that he had "... heard she had quit acting because it was such an emotionally painful experience for her." [1]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wendy Crewson</span> Canadian actress

Wendy Jane Crewson is a Canadian actress and producer. She began her career appearing on Canadian television, before her breakthrough role in 1991 dramatic film The Doctor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Senta Berger</span> Austrian-German actress (born 1941)

Senta Verhoeven is an Austrian-German actress. She received many award nominations for her acting in theatre, film, and television; her awards include three Bambi Awards, two Romys, an Adolf Grimme Award, both a Deutscher and a Bayerischer Fernsehpreis, and a Goldene Kamera.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frank Gorshin</span> American actor and comedian (1933–2005)

Frank John Gorshin Jr. was an American actor, comedian and impressionist. He made many guest appearances on television variety and talk shows, including The Ed Sullivan Show, Tonight Starring Steve Allen, The Dean Martin Show and Late Night with Conan O'Brien.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Glenn Corbett</span> American actor (1933–1993)

Glenn Corbett was an American actor in movies and television for more than 30 years. He came to national attention in the early 1960s, when he replaced George Maharis in the cast of the popular CBS adventure drama Route 66. He followed this with roles in high-profile films and television shows, including a guest role in the original Star Trek series, the daytime soap opera The Doctors, the primetime soap Dallas, and movies such as Chisum with John Wayne, as one of Jimmy Stewart's sons in Shenandoah, and the World War II epic Midway.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert Lansing (actor)</span> American actor (1928–1994)

Robert Lansing was an American stage, film, and television actor.

<i>Wagon Train</i> Western television series from 1957 to 1965

Wagon Train is an American Western television series that aired for eight seasons, first on the NBC television network (1957–1962) and then on ABC (1962–1965). Wagon Train debuted on September 18, 1957 and reached the top of the Nielsen ratings. It is the fictional adventure story of a large westbound wagon train through the American frontier from Missouri to California. Its format attracted famous guest stars for each episode appearing as travelers or residents of the settlements that the regular cast encountered.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anne Helm</span> American actress and author (born 1938)

Anne Helm is a retired Canadian-born actress and children's author, who primarily appeared in guest roles on episodes of various American television series. Her few film roles include playing Elvis Presley's love interest in the 1962 film Follow That Dream. Helm had two recurring roles, playing Molly Pierce in five episodes during the 85-episode run of the mid-1960s series Run for Your Life and playing the minor role of nurse Mary Briggs in an unknown number of episodes of the daily soap opera General Hospital from 1971 to 1973.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nancy Kovack</span> American actress (born 1935)

Nancy Kovack is a retired American film and television actress.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kenneth Tobey</span> American actor (1917–2002)

Jesse Kenneth Tobey was an American actor active from the early 1940s into the 1990s, with over 200 credits in film, theatre, and television. He is best known for his role as a captain who takes charge of an Arctic military base when it is attacked by a plant-based alien in The Thing from Another World (1951), and a starring role in the 1957-1960 Desilu Productions TV series Whirlybirds.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dana Wynter</span> German-born English actress (1931–2011)

Dana Wynter was a German-born British actress, who was raised in the United Kingdom and southern Africa. She appeared in film and television for more than 40 years, beginning in the 1950s. Her best-known film performance was in Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). A tall, dark, elegant beauty, she played both victim and villain. Her characters both in film and on television sometimes faced horrific dangers, which they often did not survive, but she also played scheming, manipulative women on television mysteries and crime procedural dramas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lawrence Dobkin</span> American actor, director and screenwriter (1919–2002)

Lawrence Dobkin was an American television director, character actor and screenwriter whose career spanned seven decades.

<i>Tabitha</i> (TV series) American fantasy sitcom, spin-off of Bewitched (1977–1978)

Tabitha is an American fantasy sitcom and a spin-off of Bewitched that aired on ABC from September 10, 1977, to January 14, 1978. The series starred Lisa Hartman in the title role as Tabitha Stephens, the witch daughter of Samantha and Darrin Stephens who was introduced on Bewitched during its second season.

The "Theme from Star Trek" is an instrumental musical piece composed by Alexander Courage for Star Trek, the science fiction television series created by Gene Roddenberry that originally aired between September 8, 1966, and June 3, 1969.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">BarBara Luna</span> American actress (b. 1936/37)

Barbara Ann Luna, also stylized as BarBara Luna, is an American actress from film, television and musicals. Notable roles include Makia in Five Weeks in a Balloon and Lt. Marlena Moreau in the classic Star Trek episode "Mirror, Mirror". In 2004 and 2010 she appeared in the first and sixth episodes of Star Trek: New Voyages, a fan-created show distributed over the Internet.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lois Nettleton</span> American actress (1927–2008)

Lois June Nettleton was an American film, stage, radio and television actress. She received three Primetime Emmy Award nominations and won two Daytime Emmy Awards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sue Randall</span> American actress (1935–1984)

Marion Burnside Randall, who acted under the name Sue Randall, was an American television actress whose entire seventeen-year career was spent in episodes of TV series, and one film (1957). Her best known role was the kindly Miss Alice Landers, Theodore "Beaver" Cleaver's elementary school teacher in the CBS and ABC sitcom Leave It to Beaver.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frank Aletter</span> American actor (1926–2009)

Frank George Aletter was an American theatre, film, and television actor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jill Haworth</span> English-American actress (1945–2011)

Valerie Jill Haworth was an English-American actress. She appeared in films throughout the 1960s, and started making guest appearances on television in 1963. She originated the role of Sally Bowles in the musical Cabaret on Broadway in 1966.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Comi</span> American actor (1932–2016)

Paul Domingo Comi was an American film and television actor.

<i>Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse</i> American TV anthology series (1958–60)

Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse is an American television anthology series produced by Desilu Productions. The show ran on the Columbia Broadcasting System between 1958 and 1960. Three of its 48 episodes served as pilots for the 1950s television series The Twilight Zone and The Untouchables.

References

  1. Allen T. Duffin and Paul Matheis, The 12 O'Clock High Logbook (Boalsburg, Pennsylvania: BearManor Media, 2005), p. 222.