Joan Collins
| Joan Collins | ||
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| Background information | ||
| Born as: | Joan Henrietta Collins | |
| Born | May 23, 1933 Paddington, London, England | |
| Spouse(s): | Maxwell Reed (1952 - 1956) div Anthony Newley (1963 - 1971) div Ron Kass (1972 - 1983) civ. ann. Peter Holm (1985 - 1987) civ. ann. Percy Gibson (2002 - ) | |
| Children: | 3, including Tara Newley and Alexander Newley | |
| Relatives: | Jackie Collins (sister) | |
| Occupation: |
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| Years active | 1946–present | |
| Website: | http://joancollins.net | |
Dame Joan Henrietta Collins DBE (born ✦23 May 1933) is an English actress, author and columnist. Collins is the recipient of several accolades, including a Golden Globe Award, a People's Choice Award, two Soap Opera Digest Awards and a Primetime Emmy Award nomination. In 1983, she was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She has been recognised for her philanthropy, particularly her advocacy towards causes relating to children, which has earned her many honours. In 2015, she was made a Dame by Queen Elizabeth II for her charitable services. She is one of the last surviving stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood.
Collins was born in Paddington, London and trained as an actress in her teens at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. She signed to The Rank Organisation at the age of 17 and had small roles in the British films Lady Godiva Rides Again (1951) and The Woman's Angle (1952) before taking on a supporting role in Judgment Deferred (1952). Collins went under contract to 20th Century Fox in 1955, and in that same year she starred as Evelyn Nesbit in The Girl in the Red Velvet Swing, Elizabeth Raleigh in The Virgin Queen and Princess Nellifer in Land of the Pharaohs, the latter garnering a cult following. Collins continued to take on film roles throughout the late 1950s appearing in The Opposite Sex (1956), Sea Wife (1957) and The Wayward Bus (1957). After starring in the epic film Esther and the King (1960), she was released on request from her contract with 20th Century Fox.
Collins appeared only in a few film roles in the 1960s, notably starring in The Road to Hong Kong[Note 1] (1962), Warning Shot (1967) and Subterfuge (1968). Collins began to take on local roles again back in Britain in the 1970s, appearing in the films Revenge (1971), Quest for Love (1971), Tales from the Crypt (1972) Fear in the Night (1972) and Dark Places (1973), as well as Tales That Witness Madness (1973), Empire of the Ants (1977), which earned her a Saturn Award nomination, The Stud (1978), Zero to Sixty (1978), Game for Vultures (1979) and The Bitch (1979). From 1981 to 1989, she starred as Alexis Colby in the soap opera "Dynasty", which made her an international superstar. It brought her critical acclaim, winning her the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Television Series – Drama in 1982, and earning her a nomination for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series in 1984.
In the 1990s and 2000s, Collins worked sporadically in acting. She took fewer film roles, most notably appearing in The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas (2000) and the TV movie These Old Broads (2001) alongside Elizabeth Taylor, Debbie Reynolds and Shirley MacLaine. She made her comeback to mainstream television in the 2010s, taking on recurring roles in the series "Happily Divorced" (2011–2013), "The Royals" (2014–2018), "Benidorm" (2014–2017) and "American Horror Story: Apocalypse" (2018). Her first starring film role since the 1980s was The Time of Their Lives (2017), and she has also appeared in various independent films, which includes the critically-acclaimed Gerry (2018).
Early life
Collins was born on 23 May 1933 in Paddington, London, and brought up in Maida Vale, the daughter of Elsa Collins (née Bessant), a dance teacher, and Joseph William Collins, a talent agent[citation needed] whose clients would later include Shirley Bassey, The Beatles and Tom Jones. Her father, a native of South Africa, was Jewish, and her British mother was Anglican. She had two younger siblings, Jackie, a novelist, and Bill, a property agent. She was educated at the Francis Holland School, an independent day school for girls in London.
Collins made her stage debut in the Henrik Ibsen play A Doll's House at the age of nine, and at the age of 16 trained as an actress at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) in London. At the age of 17, Collins was signed to the Rank Organisation, a British film studio.
Personal life
Collins has been married five times, first to Northern Irish actor Maxwell Reed, whom she married on 24 May 1952 after he allegedly raped her. She divorced Reed in 1956.
In 1959, Collins began a relationship with the then-unknown actor Warren Beatty. They became engaged in 1960, but his infidelity led to their split. Collins revealed in her 1978 autobiography that she became pregnant by Beatty but had an abortion to avoid a scandal that at the time could have seriously damaged their careers.
In 1963, she married actor and singer-songwriter Anthony Newley, with whom she had two children, Tara and Alexander. She wed her third husband, American businessman Ron Kass in 1972, and the couple had a daughter.
After Collins' marriage to Kass ended in divorce in 1983, she married former singer Peter Holm on 3 November 1985 in a ceremony in Las Vegas. After a bitter separation, they were divorced on 25 August 1987.
She married her fifth and current husband Percy Gibson, who is 31 years her junior, on 17 February 2002 at Claridge's Hotel in London.
As of 2019, Collins had three grandchildren.
Collins's younger sister was Jackie Collins, a bestselling author, who died in September 2015. Collins was informed only two weeks before her sister's death about the breast cancer Jackie had suffered from for over six years.
Over the years, Collins has been named "England's most beautiful girl", "the most beautiful woman in the world"[citation needed], and "the world's sexiest woman".
Collins maintains residences in London, Los Angeles, New York City, and France,[55] describing her life in 2010 as being "that of a gypsy".
In 2019, Collins and Gibson escaped a "terrifying" fire at her London flat in Eaton Place. Gibson was able to contain the blaze using a fire extinguisher before the emergency services arrived. Collins was treated for smoke inhalation but was otherwise unharmed and thanked the emergency response crews on social media.
Acting career
- Wikipedia article: Joan Collins Acting career
Bibliography
- Wikipedia article: Joan Collins Bibliography
Theater
- Wikipedia article: Joan Collins Theater
Filmography
- Wikipedia article: Joan Collins Filmography
Discography
- Wikipedia article: Joan Collins Discography
Notes
- ↑ starring Bing Crosby, Bob Hope and Dorothy Lamour
External links
- Joan Collins at the Internet Movie Database
- Joan Collins at the Turner Classic Movie Database
- Joan Collins at All Music Guide
- Works by or about in libraries (WorldCat catalog)Debrett's People of Today
- Joan Collins interview on BBC Radio 4 Desert Island Discs, 22 July 1990
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