A fascinating aura of mystery seemed to surround the characters portrayed by blue-eyed blonde actress Susan Oliver, whose trademark high cheekbones, rosebud lips and heart-shaped face kept audiences intrigued for nearly three decades. She left a fine legacy of work on stage, film and TV.
Born Charlotte Gercke on February 13, 1932 (some sources incorrectly list years as early as 1929 or late as 1937), in New York City, she was the daughter of well-to-do George Gercke, a political reporter and journalist for the New York World, and his astrology practitioner wife, Ruth Oliver (aka Ruth Hale Oliver), both of whom divorced while Susan was still quite young (age 3). As a privileged adolescent, she went to various public and boarding schools. As a teenager, she lived with her father and traveled with him overseas to Japan, where he maintained a news post. While there (1948-1949) she studied at the Tokyo International College and developed an interest in Japan's deep obsession with the American pop culture. Much later in her career (1977), in fact, Susan would write and direct Cowboysan (1978), a short film which told of Japanese actors performing in an American western.
In the spring of 1949, Susan briefly rejoined her mother, who was now remarried, living in Los Angeles, and gaining a solid reputation as Hollywood's astrologer to the stars. By that fall, however, Susan was back East, studying drama at Pennsylvania's Swarthmore College (for four years). She then continued her training at New York City's Neighborhood Playhouse, while finding stage work in both summer stock and regional theaters. Commercials and daytime/prime-time TV work started coming Susan's way and, by that time, she had already changed her stage moniker to the more flowing name of Susan Oliver.
The year 1957 began with a debut ingénue role as a Revolutionary War-era daughter in the Broadway comedy, "Small War on Murray Hill", which opened and closed at the 埃塞尔·巴里摩尔 Theater after only nine days. A far more potent and substantial role fell her way in October of that same year, when she replaced British actress 玛丽·乌尔 as "Allison Porter" in the superior "kitchen sink" drama, "Look Back in Anger". Susan continued to find extensive dramatic work in live East coast TV plays, with roles on The Kaiser Aluminum Hour (1956), 美利坚的冷酷时刻 (1953), Studio 57 (1954) and Matinee Theatre (1955). At this juncture, she decided to migrate back to Los Angeles for more on-camera opportunities and attained guest roles on such popular prime-time series as Wagon Train (1957), Father Knows Best (1954), The Millionaire (1955) and The Lineup (1954).
Susan made her cinematic debut as the tough, ill-fated title role in Warner Bros.' low-budget melodrama, The Green-Eyed Blonde (1957). The film was shot in black and white, so it didn't matter that Susan's eyes were blue. Topbilled, she played the rebellious delinquent leader at a girls' reformatory and lent class to the rather exploitative material, which was written by blacklisted writer 达尔顿·特朗勃. Two years later, Susan returned to the big screen as another tough cookie in the better-received biopic, The Gene Krupa Story (1959), as a jazz singer who lures the renowned drummer (played by 萨尔·米涅奥) down the road to drugs and near ruin. A brief return to the Broadway stage, with the comedy "Patate" starring 汤姆·伊威尔 and 李·鲍曼, would last only four days but Susan earned great notices and won New York's Theatre World Award World for her "outstanding breakout performance".
On early 1960s TV, Susan continued to offer a number of striking and often showy, neurotic performances on episodes of Bonanza (1959), Wanted: Dead or Alive (1958), 77 Sunset Strip (1958), Wagon Train (1957), The Virginian (1962), Adventures in Paradise (1959), Route 66 (1960), Dr. Kildare (1961) and The Fugitive (1963). Filmwise, she found a few lead and support roles in the 伊丽莎白·泰勒-starred Butterfield 8 (1960); as a psychiatric nurse in the all-star hospital melodrama, 管理员 (1963); in the tailored-for-the-teens romp, Looking for Love (1964), as a pal to 康妮·弗朗西丝; and in the hilarious 杰瑞·刘易斯 slapstick vehicle, 无序有序 (1964), in which she added rather heavy drama as a depressed hospital patient. Her most challenging role, during this time, was as the ambitious wife of doomed country music legend Hank Williams (George Hamilton, in offbeat casting) in 田园心声 (1964).
Susan's name remained active particularly on TV, where she graced such programs as The Andy Griffith Show (1960), The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters (1963), Burke's Law (1963), Dr. Kildare (1961), Ben Casey (1961), Gomer Pyle: USMC (1964), 我的三个儿子 (1960), The Invaders (1967) and 洋场私探 (1967). Classic TV showcases includes the 1960 The Twilight Zone (1959) episode, The Twilight Zone: People Are Alike All Over (1960), in which she plays beautiful martian, "Teenya", who encounters astronaut 罗迪·麦克道尔, and the unsold 1964 Star Trek: The Original Series (1966) pilot, Star Trek: The Original Series: The Cage (1966), as "Vina", the sole survivor of a crashed spaceship who charms "Commander Christopher Pike" (杰弗里·亨特, the captain subsequently replaced by 威廉·夏特纳's "Captain Kirk", when the show became a series). Footage from that pilot was later incorporated into the two-part episode, "The Menagerie". In 1966, Susan made bittersweet news, when her regular role as "Ann Howard" in the prime-time hit soaper, 小城风雨 (1964), was pushed off a cliff to her death. Written out after only five months of a year-long planned role, audiences (as well as Susan) were saddened by the loss of a character they had grown to care about. Susan, subsequently, starred in her own pilot for a new series, "Apartment in Rome", but it didn't sell.
Unfortunately, Susan's late 1960s work in a variety of film genres and opposite a number of formidable leading men were ultimately too few and did not help to advance her career. These included the LSD-induced drama, The Love-Ins (1967), with Richard Todd and 詹姆斯·迈克阿瑟; the western, A Man Called Gannon (1968), starring 安东尼·弗兰西欧萨; and the sci-fiers, 种族漩涡 (1969) with 雷蒙·雅克 and 力抗邪魔 (1969) with 盖·斯托克维尔. The 1970s, too, hardly fared better with standard roles in 早上的金杰 (1974) (donning a black wig), the Spanish-made drama Nido de viudas (1977), and 几乎不工作 (1980), in which she reunited with 杰瑞·刘易斯 in what was supposed to be his come-back attempt. That film was ultimately shelved, before earning scant release a couple of years later.
Susan appeared as a regular for one season (1975-76) on Days of Our Lives (1965) and received a "Supporting Actress" Emmy nomination for the made-for-TV movie, Amelia Earhart (1976), playing aviatrix Neta "Snookie" Snook, friend and mentor to the title character, played by Emmy-nominated 苏珊·克拉克. The role of "Snook" was tailor-made for Susan, who, by this time, had merited attention as a licensed commercial pilot.
Susan's passion for flying had been compromised a decade earlier after a dramatic 1966 commercial plane scare. The near-death experience kept the actress on solid ground for well over a year, before she managed to overcome her paralyzing fear. In 1970, fully recovered, she co-piloted a single-engine Piper Comanche to victory in the Powder Puff Derby racing event, a victory that earned her the name, "Pilot of the Year". [Amelia Mary Earhart was the first female pilot to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean]. In her attempt to fly to Moscow, however, the Soviet government denied her entrance to their air space and she was forced to end her journey in Denmark. Susan would later write about her flying exploits in her autobiography, "Odyssey: A Daring Transatlantic Journey" (1983).
Susan's last years were focused on the small screen, with roles in the TV-movies, Tomorrow's Child (1982) and International Airport (1985), and standard guesting on The Love Boat (1977), Murder, She Wrote (1984), Simon & Simon (1981) and 弗雷迪的噩梦 (1988). She also moved behind the camera a few times, directing episodes of M*A*S*H (1972) and Trapper John, M.D. (1979). A long-time smoker, the never-married Susan was diagnosed with lung cancer and died at the Motion Picture and Television Hospital in Woodland Hills, California at age 58 -- an untimely end for such a beautiful lady and strong talent.
She was a licensed pilot.
She won the Powder Puff Derby in 1970.
She was named Pilot of the Year in 1970.
Attempted to become the first woman to fly a single-engine plane solo from New York to Moscow, but was deterred in Denmark when the Soviet government denied her permission to enter their air space.
Her mother was noted Hollywood astrologer Ruth Oliver. She died in 1988, two years before Susan. Her father, George Gercke, was a newspaperman.
Gorgeous blonde of 1960s movies with equally gorgeous cheekbones who tended to play neurotic, troubled types. She attracted major television attention on 小城风雨 (1964) when her character, Ann Howard, was killed off, and also has a minor cult following as Vina from the original series pilot Star Trek: The Original Series: The Cage (1966).
Trained at the Neighborhood Playhouse.
Her memoir "Odyssey" detailed her journeys as a pilot. She once survived the crash of her own Piper Cub plane in 1966.
In celebration of Star Trek: The Original Series (1966)'s 30th anniversary, an action figure was released of Susan as her character, Vina, on Star Trek: The Original Series: The Cage (1966).
Was a Buddhist and an expert on baseball.
She was one of the original 19 women admitted to the American Film Institute's Directing Workshop for Women (AFI DWW).
A week after her popular character Ann Howard on 小城风雨 (1964) was killed off on the series in 1966, Susan survived the crash of a Piper Cub near Santa Paula, California that a friend was piloting.
Oliver experienced an event in February 1959 that belied her later aviation accomplishments. She was a passenger aboard the Clipper Washington, a Boeing 707 on a transatlantic flight from Paris to New York City when it dropped from 35,000 feet to 6000 feet. It happened on February 3, 1959, the same day 巴迪·霍利 died in an airplane crash. These events caused her a paralyzing fear of flying and it took extensive hypnosis to overcome it. In July 1964, she was reintroduced to personal flying during an evening flight over Los Angeles in a Cessna 172. The experience motivated her to return the next day to the Santa Monica Airport to begin training for a Private Pilot certificate next year.
Lived with 吉姆·哈顿 throughout 1963. They parted when she began focusing on her career as a pilot.
Susan Oliver became an iconic image within the Star Trek universe as the original "green Orion slave girl.".
Twice played a character who shares a prison on another planet with someone who is from Earth, and both with similar names: Teenya on The Twilight Zone: People Are Alike All Over (1960) and Vina on Star Trek: The Original Series: The Cage (1966).
Platinum blonde hair
Sparkling blue eyes
High cheekbones
