2017-09-30

Anne Jeffreys is dead at 94

Anne_Jeffreys_deadAnne Jeffreys (“Amanda Croft” from Falcon Crest’s season 2) died Wednesday at her home in the Brentwood neighborhood of Los Angeles. She was 94.
Her death was confirmed by her son Jeff Sterling.
Born Anne Carmichael on January 26, 1923 in Goldsboro, North Carolina Jeffreys entered the entertainment field at a young age, having her initial training in voice (she was an accomplished soprano).
She was in the musicals “I Married an Angel” (1942), with Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy, and “Step Lively” (1944), with Frank Sinatra. She played the virtuous Tess Trueheart in “Dick Tracy” (1945) and its 1946 sequel; the lady in red who led a criminal to his death in “Dillinger” (1945); and the newcomer Robert Mitchum’s girlfriend in “Nevada” (1944).

Low-budget westerns became a big part of her film career; in 1943 and 1944 she starred with Bill Elliott and Gabby Hayes in at least eight, including “Wagon Tracks West” and “Death Valley Manhunt.”

Between the movies and her television success, she appeared in four Broadway shows: “Street Scene” (1947), a musical drama by Elmer Rice, Kurt Weill and Langston Hughes; “My Romance” (1948), an operetta-style musical; “Kiss Me, Kate,” in which she replaced the original female lead, Patricia Morison, in 1950 as Lilli Vanessi, a tempestuous actress who finds herself cast opposite her ex-husband in a musical version of “The Taming of the Shrew”; and “Three Wishes for Jamie” (1952), a musical comedy that also starred John Raitt.
She continued working in television until she was 80, in guest roles, as a series regular on “Finder of Lost Loves” (1984-85), as Mel Ferrer’s love interest Amanda Croft in Falcon Crest (1982 - 1983) opposite Jane Wyman and in a recurring role as David Hasselhoff’s mother on “Baywatch” in the 1990s. She was back on the small screen one last time when she played a patient in a 2013 episode of “Getting On,” the dark HBO comedy series set in a hospital’s extended-care ward.

She married twice. In addition to her son Jeff, Anne Jeffreys is survived by two other sons, Dana and Tyler; five grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.Anne Jeffreys1Anne Jeffreys3Anne Jeffreys2

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