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Millie Perkins | |
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 Publicity photo (1959) | |
| Born | May 12, 1936 Passaic, New Jersey, U.S. |
| Education | Fair Lawn High School |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1959–2006 |
| Known for | |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 2 |
Millie Perkins (born May 12, 1936) is an American retired film, television actress and model known for her debut film role as Anne Frank in The Diary of Anne Frank (1959), and for her supporting actress roles in two 1966 Westerns, The Shooting and Ride in the Whirlwind , both directed by Monte Hellman.
Born on May 12, 1936, in Passaic, New Jersey, [1] Perkins grew up in Fair Lawn [2] and attended Fair Lawn High School. [3] Her father was a merchant marine captain of Hungarian and Mongolian descent. [4] Perkins was working as a receptionist at a New York City advertising agency when she caught the eye of a visiting photographer with a resultant career as a model; by 1958, Perkins was an international cover girl.
Soon thereafter, Perkins was vigorously pursued, and then selected, to portray Dutch Jewish diarist and Holocaust victim Anne Frank in the 1959 film adaptation of The Diary of Anne Frank . Perkins had never studied nor sought to be an actress, but director George Stevens saw her photo and tried to convince her to read for the part. [5] Finally, she flew to Hollywood for a screen test, and with much fanfare, landed the role. Perkins received almost universally excellent reviews for her portrayal of Frank, although the film was less of a box-office success than expected.
After her work with George Stevens, Perkins was placed under contract to 20th Century Fox. She was one of the promising young stars of Hollywood, but the studio contract system, which was coming to an end, was a poor fit for Perkins, who had come of age with the Beat Generation in 1950s New York City. George Stevens would later state: "Millie did not fit in. She was 10 years too early." Suspended for refusing the lead in the 1960 film Tess of the Storm Country – Perkins saw the film as a B-picture and a step back career-wise – Perkins was cast by 20th Century Fox in the 1961 film Wild in the Country, playing the supporting role of the girlfriend to star Elvis Presley – she would later play Gladys Presley in the 1990 miniseries Elvis ; the studio then dropped Perkins. Joshua Logan personally selected Perkins for the female lead in the 1964 film Ensign Pulver , but the film was a failure; Perkins would not appear in another mainstream film release for almost 20 years. She played the female lead in both of Jack Nicholson's inaugural productions The Shooting and Ride in the Whirlwind – shot side-by-side in 1965 – and in 1968 co-starred in Wild in the Streets which was written by her then-husband Robert Thom.
In 1976, Perkins moved to Jacksonville, Oregon, with her two daughters by Robert Thom, Lillie and Hedy; in 1977, People magazine reported that Perkins "conducts a drama-therapy workshop every Tuesday night in her living room and often speaks to high-school drama groups in the area." [6] In 1982, it was reported that Perkins was teaching drama at Southern Oregon University. [7]
In 1983, Perkins returned to feature films to play Jon Voight's ex-wife in Table for Five . She then played "mother roles" for the next 20 years; including Sean Penn's mother in the fact-based film At Close Range , the mother of Charlie Sheen's character in the 1987 movie Wall Street, the bereft Jewish mother in the 1996 film The Chamber , and Andy García's mother in the 2005 film The Lost City .
In 1961, Perkins made her television debut as a guest star on Wagon Train . As with her film work, her television appearances were sporadic until the 1980s, from when she had appeared on a variety of television shows, including seven episodes of Knots Landing (over the period 1983–1990) and fourteen episodes of Any Day Now (1998–2002). She portrayed character Glenda Vandervere in Murder, She Wrote (season two, episode 12: "Murder by Appointment Only") (01/05/1986). Perkins retired from acting after a 2006 six-episode arc on the television soap opera The Young and the Restless. Recent to her retirement, she was honored in the 2004 action-adventure video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas , in which one of the storyline girlfriends to protagonist Carl "CJ" Johnson, voiced by Orfeh, was named after her.
On April 15, 1960, she married actor Dean Stockwell. They divorced on July 30, 1962. In December 1964 (reportedly on Christmas day), Perkins married writer and director Robert Thom, [8] who wrote the script for the popular 1968 movie Wild in the Streets, in which she appeared. They had two children: Lillie Thom and Hedy Thom. [6] Perkins and Thom had been separated for some time when Thom died in 1979. [9]
This, unlike the complete film listing above, includes only series in which Perkins had a recurring role.
Priscilla Ann Presley is an American businesswoman and actress. She is the ex-wife of the late American singer Elvis Presley, as well as the cofounder and former chairperson of Elvis Presley Enterprises (EPE), the company that turned Graceland into one of the top tourist attractions in the United States. In her acting career, Presley costarred with Leslie Nielsen in the Naked Gun film trilogy and played Jenna Wade on the long-running television series Dallas.
Ann-Margret Olsson, credited as Ann-Margret, is a Swedish-American actress and singer. She has won five Golden Globe Awards and been nominated for two Academy Awards, two Grammy Awards, a Screen Actors Guild Award, and six Emmy Awards, winning in 2010 for a guest role in Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
The Diary of Anne Frank is a 1959 American biographical drama film based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning 1955 play of the same name, which was in turn based on the posthumously published diary of Anne Frank, a German-born Jewish girl who lived in hiding in Amsterdam with her family during World War II. It was directed by George Stevens, with a screenplay by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett, is the first film version of both the play and the original story, and features three members of the original Broadway cast.
Carolyn Sue Jones was an American actress of television and film. She began her film career in the early 1950s, and by the end of the decade had achieved recognition with a nomination for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for The Bachelor Party (1957) and a Golden Globe Award as one of the most promising new actresses of 1959. Her film career continued for another 20 years. In 1964, Jones began playing the role of matriarch Morticia Addams in the black and white television series The Addams Family.
Joan Ann Hackett was an American actress of film, stage, and television. She starred in the 1968 western Will Penny. She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress for the 1981 film Only When I Laugh. She also starred as Christine Mannon in the 1978 PBS miniseries version of Mourning Becomes Electra.
Gary Lockwood is an American actor. Lockwood is best known for his roles as astronaut Frank Poole in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), and as Lieutenant Commander Gary Mitchell in the Star Trek second pilot episode "Where No Man Has Gone Before" (1966). He starred in the only American film by French New Wave director Jacques Demy, Model Shop. He played numerous guest television roles from the early 1960s into the mid 1990s, and played the title role in The Lieutenant (1963–1964).
Elvis and Me: The True Story of the Love Between Priscilla Presley and the King of Rock N' Roll is a 1985 memoir written by Priscilla Presley, with Sandra Harmon. In the book, Priscilla talks about meeting Elvis Presley, their marriage, and the factors and issues that led to the couple's divorce.
Stella Stevens was an American actress. She is the mother of actor Andrew Stevens.
Wild in the Country is a 1961 American musical-drama film directed by Philip Dunne and starring Elvis Presley, Hope Lange, Tuesday Weld, and Millie Perkins. Based on the 1958 novel The Lost Country by J. R. Salamanca, the screenplay concerns a troubled young man from a dysfunctional family who pursues a literary career. The screenplay was written by playwright Clifford Odets.
Susan Elizabeth Strasberg was an American stage, film, and television actress. Thought to be the next Hepburn-type ingenue, she was nominated for a Tony Award at age 18, playing the title role in The Diary of Anne Frank. She appeared on the covers of LIFE and Newsweek in 1955. A close friend of Marilyn Monroe and Richard Burton, she wrote two best-selling tell-all books. Her later career primarily consisted of slasher and horror films, followed by TV roles, by the 1980s.
Dolores Hart, O.S.B. is an American Roman Catholic Benedictine nun and former actress. Following her movie debut with Elvis Presley in Loving You (1957), she made 10 films in five years, including Wild Is the Wind (1957), King Creole (1958), and Where the Boys Are (1960).
Sheree North was an American actress, dancer, and singer, known for being one of 20th Century-Fox's intended successors to Marilyn Monroe.
The Shooting is a 1966 American Western film directed by Monte Hellman, with a screenplay by Carole Eastman. It stars Warren Oates, Millie Perkins, Will Hutchins, and Jack Nicholson, and was produced by Nicholson and Hellman. The story is about two men who are hired by a mysterious woman to accompany her to a town located many miles across the desert. During their journey, they are closely tracked by a black-clad gunslinger, who seems intent on killing all of them.
Susan Walters is an American actress and former model, best known for her roles as Lorna Forbes on the ABC daytime soap opera Loving from 1983 to late 1986 and as Diane Jenkins on the CBS soap opera The Young and the Restless from 2001 to 2004, again briefly in 2010, and once more starting in March 2022. Walters had recurring roles as Principal Rimkus on The CW's One Tree Hill, as Carol Lockwood on The CW's The Vampire Diaries and as Natalie Martin on the MTV series Teen Wolf.
The Attic: The Hiding of Anne Frank is a 1988 television film directed by John Erman. It is based on Miep Gies's 1988 book Anne Frank Remembered. The film was broadcast as part of an ad hoc network, Kraft Golden Showcase Network. Playwright William Hanley received an Emmy for his script.
Karen Steele was an American actress and model with more than 60 roles in film and television. Her most famous roles include starring as Virginia in Marty, as Mrs. Lane in Ride Lonesome, and as Eve McHuron in the Star Trek episode "Mudd's Women".
Michele Carey was an American actress who was best known for her role as Josephine "Joey" MacDonald in the 1966 Western film El Dorado. She appeared in movies and guest-starred in television series in the 1960s and 1970s.
Austin Robert Butler is an American actor. Butler began his career on television, first in roles on Disney Channel and Nickelodeon, most notably on Zoey 101 (2007–2008), and later on teen dramas, including recurring parts on The CW's Life Unexpected (2010–2011) and Switched at Birth (2011–2012). He gained recognition for starring in The Carrie Diaries (2013–2014) and The Shannara Chronicles (2016–2017). Butler made his Broadway debut in the 2018 revival of The Iceman Cometh and portrayed Tex Watson in Quentin Tarantino's film Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019).
Elvis is an American drama series about the early life of Elvis Presley that aired on ABC from February 6 until May 19, 1990 before its cancellation due to the high cost of each episode. These ten episodes, along with three unaired episodes, were edited into a four-hour mini-series titled Elvis: The Early Years. The series starred Michael St. Gerard as Presley, Jesse Dabson, Blake Gibbons, Millie Perkins, and Billy "Green" Bush. Elvis voice-impersonator Ronnie McDowell provided the singing voice for St. Gerard on the series.
Robert Thom was an American writer of films, plays, novels and poems, best known for writing the screenplay for Death Race 2000 (1975), produced by Roger Corman's New World and directed by Paul Bartel.
Millie Perkins, the tiny New York model who rocketed to fame in the movie 'The Diary of Anne Frank,' secretly married playwright Robert Thom last Christmas.
His second wife was the actress Millie Perkins, from whom he had been separated in recent years.
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