Ann-Margret
| Ann-Margret | ||
 | ||
| Background information | ||
| Birth name | Ann-Margret Olsson | |
| Born | Apr 28, 1941 / 82 yo Valsjöbyn, Jämtland, Sweden | |
| Occupation | Actress/Singer | |
| Years active | 1961 – present | |
| Spouse(s) | Roger Smith (1967-present) | |
| Official site | http://www.ann-margret.com | |
Ann-Margret (born ✦April 28, 1941) is a Swedish-born American actress, singer and dancer. She has won the Golden Globe Award five times, and has been nominated for the Academy Award, Emmy Award and Grammy.
Early life
Ann-Margret was born Ann-Margret Olsson in Stockholm, Sweden, but later moved to Valsjöbyn, Jämtlands län, Sweden the daughter of Anna (née Aronsson) and Gustav Olsson, a native of Örnsköldsvik. She was born in a small town "of lumberjacks and farmers high up near the Arctic Circle". Her father worked in the United States during his youth and immigrated back in 1942, working with the Johnson Electrical Company, while his wife and daughter stayed behind.
Ann-Margret and her mother moved to the United States in November 1946, and her father took her to Radio City Music Hall on the day they arrived. They settled just outside of Chicago in Wilmette, Illinois. She became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1949. She took her first dance lessons at the Marjorie Young School of Dance, and showed natural ability from the start, easily mimicking all the steps. Her parents were supportive and her mother handmade all her costumes. Ann-Margret's mother worked as a funeral parlour receptionist after her husband suffered a severe injury on his job. While a teenager, Ann-Margret appeared on the Morris B. Sachs Amateur Hour, Don McNeill's Breakfast Club and Ted Mack's Amateur Hour.
Through high school, she continued to star in theatricals and she attended Northwestern University, where she was a member of the sorority Kappa Alpha Theta but did not graduate. As part of a group known as the "Suttletones," they performed at the Mist, a Chicago nightclub, and went to Las Vegas for a promised club date which fell through after they arrived. They plugged ahead to Los Angeles and, through agent Georgia Lund, secured club dates in Newport Beach and Reno, where Ann-Margret had a chance encounter with Marilyn Monroe, who was on location for The Misfits. Monroe noticed the striking girl in a crowd of onlookers, then chatted privately with her, offering her encouragement.
The group finally arrived at The Dunes in Las Vegas, which also headlined Tony Bennett and Al Hirt at that time. George Burns heard of her performance and she auditioned for his annual holiday show, in which she and Burns did a soft-shoe routine. Variety proclaimed, "George Burns has a gold mine in Ann-Margret...she has a definite style of her own, which can easily guide her to star status". She has been married to Roger Smith since 8 May 1967.
Recording career
Ann-Margret started recording for RCA in 1961 but her recording career was not as successful as her concurrent movie career. Her first RCA recording was "Lost Love" from her debut album And Here She Is: Ann-Margret, produced in Nashville with Chet Atkins on guitar, the Jordanaires (Elvis Presley's backup singers), and the Anita Kerr Singers, with liner notes by mentor George Burns. She had a sexy throaty singing voice and RCA attempted to capitalize on the 'female Elvis' comparison by having her record a version of "Heartbreak Hotel" and other songs stylistically similar to Presley's. She scored the minor hit "I Just Don't Understand" (from her debut album) which entered the Billboard Top 40 in the third week of August 1961 and stayed six weeks, peaking at 17. The song was later covered in live performances by The Beatles, who never officially recorded any version of the song. Her only charting album was The Beauty and the Beard (1964) on which she was accompanied by trumpeter Al Hirt. She also sang at the Academy Awards presentation in 1962, singing the Oscar-nominated song "Bachelor in Paradise", which caused a sensation and brought her offers for television and live concerts. Her contract with RCA ended in 1966.
Film career
- 1960s
In 1961, at nineteen, she filmed a screen test at 20th Century Fox and was signed to a seven-year contract. Ann-Margret made her film début in a loan out to United Artists in "Pocketful of Miracles", with Bette Davis. It was a remake of the 1933 movie "Lady for a Day". Both versions were directed by Frank Capra.
Then came a 1962 remake of Rodgers and Hammerstein's musical "State Fair" playing the "bad girl" role of Emily opposite Pat Boone. She had tested for the part of "Margy", the "good girl," but she seemed too seductive to the studio bosses who decided on the switch. The two roles mimicked her real-life personality - shy and reserved off stage but wildly exuberant and sensuous on stage. As she summed up in her autobiography, she would easily transform herself from "Little Miss Lollipop to Sexpot-Banshee" once she stepped on stage and the music began.
Her next starring role, as the all-American teenager Kim from Sweet Apple, Ohio, in "Bye Bye Birdie" (1963) made her a major star. The premiere at Radio City Music Hall, 16 years after her first visit to the famed theater, was a smash hit-the highest first-week grossing film to date at that theater. Life magazine put her on the cover for the second time and announced that the "torrid dancing almost replaces the central heating in the theater". She was asked to sing "Baby, Won't You Please Come Home" at President John F. Kennedy's private birthday party at the Waldorf-Astoria, one year after Marilyn Monroe's famous "Happy Birthday".
Ann-Margret met Elvis Presley on the MGM soundstage when the two filmed "Viva Las Vegas" (1964). They began a one-year affair that received considerable attention from the gossip columnists. The reports led to a showdown with Priscilla Presley, described by Priscilla in her 1985 book, "Elvis and Me", including a discussion of Ann-Margret's attempt to "cut her off at the pass" with a press announcement that she and Elvis were engaged to be married. Ann-Margret states that although they discussed marriage, she and Presley were never engaged and they both knew that the affair would run its course. Comparisons of Ann-Margret as the "female Elvis" were not confined to the publicity agencies. The two of them were truly similar in many ways-both were quiet and shy offstage and electric onstage, treasured their families and believed strongly in God, loved speed and motorcycles, could be defiant of danger, and could be self-destructive at times. After the affair ended, Presley remained a very close friend and continued to send Ann-Margret flowers at the opening of each of her stage appearances.
In 1963, Ann-Margret guest-starred in a popular episode of the animated TV series "The Flintstones", voicing Ann-Margrock, an animated version of herself. She sang the (literally) rock-ing song, "Ain't Gonna Be A Fool." Decades later, she recorded the theme song, a modified version of the Viva Las Vegas theme, to the live-action film "The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas" in character as Ann-Margrock.
While working on the film "Once a Thief" (1965), she met Roger Smith, who after his successful run on the private-eye television series "77 Sunset Strip" was performing a live club show at the Hungry i on a bill with Bill Cosby and Don Adams. That meeting began their courtship, which met with resistance from her parents.
Ann-Margret's husband, Roger Smith, was the co-star on the TV series "FBI" which starred Efram Zimbalist, Jr. [Note 1]
Ann-Margret starred in "The Cincinnati Kid" in 1965 opposite Steve McQueen. She also co-starred along with friend Dean Martin in the spy spoof "Murderers' Row" (1966).
Her redhead hair color (she is a "natural brunette") was the idea of Sydney Guilaroff, a hairdresser who changed the hair color of other famous actresses such as Lucille Ball.
She was offered the title role in "Cat Ballou" (1965) which would go to Jane Fonda, but her manager turned it down without telling her. In March 1966, Ann-Margret and entertainers Chuck Day and Mickey Jones teamed up for a USO tour to entertain U.S. servicemen in remote parts of Vietnam and other parts of Southeast Asia. She still has great affection for the veterans and refers to them as "My Gentlemen." Ann-Margret, Day and Jones reunited in November 2005 for an encore of this tour for veterans and troops at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada.
During a lull in her film career in the late 1960s, she performed live in Las Vegas, with her husband Smith (whom she had married in 1967) taking over as her manager after that engagement. Elvis and his entourage came to see her during the show's five-week run and to celebrate backstage. She followed up with a television special on December 1, 1968, starring Bob Hope, Jack Benny, Danny Thomas and Carol Burnett. Then she went back to Saigon as part of Hope's Christmas show. A second television special followed with Dean Martin and Lucille Ball. In 1970, she returned to films with R.P.M. and C.C. and Company (featuring her first nude scenes, although as with "Carnal Knowledge" in 1971, it is possible that a body double was at least partially used).
- 1970s and 1980s
In 1971, she starred in Mike Nichols's "Carnal Knowledge", marking a significant change from her sex-kitten musical roles and garnering a nomination for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.
On September 9, 1972, while performing at Lake Tahoe, Nevada, she fell 22 feet from an elevated platform to the stage and suffered injuries including a broken left arm, cheekbone and jawbone. Smith flew a stolen plane from Burbank, California to Lake Tahoe and back to get his wife to surgeons at UCLA for treatment, which included meticulous facial reconstructive surgery that required wiring her mouth shut and putting her on a liquid diet. Unable to work for ten weeks, she ultimately returned to the stage almost back to normal.
Throughout the 1970s, Ann-Margret balanced her live musical performances with a string of dramatic film roles that played against her glamorous image. In 1973 she starred with John Wayne in "The Train Robbers". Then came the musical "Tommy" in 1975, for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress. In addition, she has been nominated for ten Golden Globe Awards and has won five times, including her Best Actress for "Tommy". She also did a string of successful TV specials, starting with "The Ann-Margret Show" for NBC in 1968.
In 1978, she co-starred with Anthony Hopkins in the horror/suspense thriller "Magic".
In 1989, an illustration was done of Oprah Winfrey that graced the cover of TV Guide, and although the head was Oprah's, the body was referenced from a 1979 publicity shot of Ann-Margret. The illustration was rendered so tightly in color pencil by freelance artist Chris Notarile that most people thought it was a composite photograph.
- 1990s and 2000s
In 1993, she starred in the comedy "Grumpy Old Men" with Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon. Her character returned for "Grumpier Old Men" (1995), the sequel.
Ann-Margret published an autobiography in 1994 titled "Ann-Margret: My Story" < ISBN:0-399-13891-9 >, in which she publicly acknowledged her recovery from alcoholism. In 1995, she was chosen by Empire magazine as one of the 100 Sexiest Stars in film history; she ranked 10th.
In an episode of the TV series Popular she played God.
In 2001, she made her first appearance in a stage musical, playing the character of brothel owner Mona Stangley in a new touring production of "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas".
She also filmed "Any Given Sunday" (1999) for director Oliver Stone, portraying the mother of football team owner Cameron Diaz. In "Memory" (2006), she starred with Billy Zane and Dennis Hopper. Also in 2006, Ann-Margret had a small role in "The Break Up" starring Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn.
In the 2005 CBS miniseries "Elvis", she is portrayed by Rose McGowan.
My Gentlemen
Ann-Margaret.... This is a good counter balance story to the Jane Fonda "Vietnam Woman Of The Year" story.
- Memorial Day Tribute [Source 1]
Richard, (my husband), never really talked a lot about his time in Viet Nam other than he had been shot by a sniper. However, he had a rather grainy, 8 x 10 black and white photo he had taken at a USO show of Ann Margaret with Bob Hope in the background that was one of his treasures.
A few years ago, Ann Margaret was doing a book signing at a local bookstore. Richard wanted to see if he could get her to sign the treasured photo so he arrived at the bookstore at 12 o'clock for a 7:30 signing.
When I got there after work, the line went all the way a round the bookstore, circled the parking lot and disappeared behind a parking garage. Before her appearance, bookstore employees announced that she would sign only her book and no memorabilia would be permitted.
Richard was disappointed, but wanted to show her the photo and let her know how much those shows meant to lonely GI's so far from home. Ann Margaret came out looking as beautiful as ever and, as second in line, it was soon Richard's turn.
He presented the book for her signature and then took out the photo. When he did, there were many shouts from the employees that she would not sign it.
Richard said, 'I understand. I just wanted her to see it.'
She took one look at the photo, tears welled up in her eyes and she said, 'This is one of my gentlemen from Viet Nam and I most certainly will sign his photo.
I know what these men did for their country and I always have time for 'my gentlemen.
With that, she pulled Richard across the table and planted a big kiss on him. She then made quite a to-do about the bravery of the young men she met over the years, how much she admired them, and how much she appreciated them. There weren't too many dry eyes among those close enough to hear. She then posed for pictures and acted as if he were the only one there.
Later at dinner, Richard was very quiet. When I asked if he'd like to talk about it, my big strong husband broke down in tears. 'That's the first time anyone ever thanked me for my time in the Army,' he said. That night was a turning point for him. He walked a little straighter and, for the first time in years, was proud to have been a Vet. I'll never forget Ann Margaret for her graciousness and how much that small act of kindness meant to my husband.
I now make it a point to say 'Thank you' to every person I come across who served in our Armed Forces. Freedom does not come cheap and I am grateful for all those who have served their country.
If you'd like to pass on this story, feel free to do so. Perhaps it will help others to become aware of how important it is to acknowledge the contribution our service people make.
Don't be too busy today...
Have you ever noticed that only Seniors and Veterans stand in honor of our flag?
Share this inspiring message with friends and family.
On behalf of those who DO appreciate all that you did for us, thank you to each of you who receive this message who have served or are serving our country in the armed services or any other service.
IF YOU DON'T STAND BEHIND OUR TROOPS,
PLEASE, FEEL FREE TO STAND IN FRONT OF THEM!
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