FARRAH FAWCETT Biography - Actors and Actresses

 
 

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FARRAH FAWCETT

Name: Ferrah Leni Fawcett                                                             
Born: 2 February 1947 Corpus Christi, Texas, U.S.                                     
                                                                                     
Ferrah Leni Fawcett (born February 2, 1947) is an American actress. She became a     
noted pop culture figure and sex symbol of the 1970s and into the 1980s, shaping     
the landscape of fashion and pop culture.                                             
                                                                                     
Fawcett, the younger of two daughters, was born in Corpus Christi, Texas, the         
daughter of Pauline (née Evans), a homemaker, and James Fawcett, an oil field       
contractor. As a child, Ferrah (later changed to "Farrah") displayed a               
natural athletic ability which her father encouraged. She attended John J.           
Pershing Middle School in Houston, Texas, a school which is now the magnet           
program for fine arts, and graduated from W.B. Ray High School in 1965. She           
attended the University of Texas at Austin and was a member of the Delta Delta       
Delta sorority.                                                                       
                                                                                     
The late 1960s and early 1970s saw Fawcett doing commercials and TV guest spots       
but she still sought that big breakthrough role that would launch her career. In     
April 1976, a poster company Pro Arts Inc., that had started out making anti-war     
posters, started to hear about a young up-and-coming beauty named Farrah Fawcett     
doing Wella Balsam shampoo commercials. They got in touch with her agent at           
the time, Rick Hersh, and arranged a photo shoot. Fawcett arranged to have Bruce     
McBroom, a freelance photographer that she worked with before, to do the shoot.       
McBroom took the pictures at Farrah's poolside Bel Air, California home. For the     
back drop, McBroom used the ratty old Indian Blanket covering his '37 Chevy car       
seat.                                                                                 
                                                                                     
On September 22, 1976, the first episode of Fawcett playing the character Jill       
Munroe in the TV series Charlie's Angels was aired. Around the same time, her         
swimsuit poster was released. It went on to sell a still-unrivaled 12 million         
copies and she became known for her tousled mane, beautiful smile and enviable       
figure. Charlie's Angels went on to become a huge hit but after just one year         
Fawcett left the show. As settlement to a lawsuit stemming from her early             
departure, Fawcett appeared three more times as a guest star in each of seasons       
three and four. She was replaced on the show in 1977 by Cheryl Ladd (who             
portrayed her younger sister Kris).                                                   
                                                                                     
Farrah Fawcett, top, in Charlie's Angels                                             
                                                                                     
Fawcett achieved critical praise and the first of three Emmy Award nominations       
as a serious actress for her role as a battered wife in the 1984 television           
movie The Burning Bed. She also won acclaim in the stage and movie version of         
Extremities, in which she played a rape victim who turns the tables on her           
attacker. She then played a predatory role in another miniseries, Small               
Sacrifices, receiving a second Emmy nomination. Her third Emmy nomination came       
in 2004 for her work in The Guardian. Fawcett has been nominated for several         
other awards as well a Golden Globe and ACE awards.                                   
                                                                                     
Fawcett, who resisted any nudity in films or magazines through the 70s and 80s,       
caused a major stir by posing nude in the December 1995 issue of Playboy, which       
became the best-selling issue of the 1990s, with over 4 million copies sold           
worldwide. She later posed for the July 1997 issue (aged 50), which also became       
a top seller, and appeared fully nude in the 2000 Robert Altman movie Dr T and       
the Women.