Lindsay Wagner Biography

Lindsay Jean Wagner (born June 22, 1949) is an American actress. She is best known for her portrayal of Jaime Sommers in the 1970s television series The Bionic Woman (for which she won an Emmy Award), though she has maintained a lengthy career in a variety of other film and television productions since.

Early life

Wagner was born in Los Angeles, California, the daughter of Marilyn Louise (née Thrasher) and German American William Nowels Wagner. When she was seven years old, her parents divorced and her mother moved with her to the northeast Los Angeles neighborhood of Eagle Rock, near Pasadena. Another move with her mother and stepfather (Ted Ball), brought Wagner to Portland, Oregon, where she attended David Douglas High School and appeared in a number of school plays. Wagner was a graduate student at the University of Oregon.

Career

Wagner worked as a model in Los Angeles, and gained some television experience by appearing as a hostess in Playboy After Dark. In 1971, she signed a contract with Universal Studios and worked as a contract player in various Universal productions. Her prime-time network television debut was in the series Adam-12, and she went on to appear in a dozen other Universal shows including Owen Marshall: Counselor at Law, The F.B.I., Sarge, and Night Gallery. Between 1971"75, she appeared in five episodes of Universal's Marcus Welby, M.D., and two episodes of The Rockford Files. In 1973, Wagner branched into film roles when Universal cast her in Two People (Wagner's first feature film and first lead role). She also starred in the film The Paper Chase (for 20th Century Fox) the same year.

In 1975, arranged under an extended contract with Universal Studios, Wagner played the role of Jaime Sommers, a former tennis professional who was the childhood sweetheart of "Six Million Dollar Man" Colonel Steve Austin (played by Lee Majors). According to Kenneth Johnson, interviewed for a featurette included in the 2010 North American DVD release of The Bionic Woman season 1, Wagner was cast in the role based upon her appeal and spontaneity, after he saw her appearance in the pilot and a follow-up episode of the The Rockford Files. In the second-season two-part episode, her character is critically injured in a skydiving accident and equipped with bionic implants similar to Col. Austin's, but her body rejects them, ultimately leading to her death.

This was intended to be Wagner's last role under her Universal contract, but public response to the character was so overwhelming that the "death" was retconned into a cover story for a near-death secret recovery, and Wagner appeared in a two-part episode which returned her character, followed by a spin-off series The Bionic Woman, which debuted in January 1976. She made several crossover appearances in the The Six Million Dollar Man during the series' run. The role earned Wagner an Emmy Award for "Best Actress in a Dramatic Role" in 1977.

Following the cancellation of The Bionic Woman in 1978, Wagner continued to act, predominantly in television mini-series and made-for-TV movies. These included the highly rated 1980 mini-series Scruples, as well as three made-for-TV Bionic reunion movies with Lee Majors between 1987 and 1994. Also in the 1980s, Wagner co-starred alongside Sylvester Stallone as his ex-wife in his 1981 movie Nighthawks and starred in two more weekly television series; Jessie (1984) and A Peaceable Kingdom (1989), though both of these were short-lived. In 1983, she also appeared in an episode of Lee Majors' series, The Fall Guy.

Wagner continued to act in the 1990s and 2000s, though in less prominent roles, such as a small part in the action movie Ricochet (1991). Her most recent projects have included the 2005 telemovie, Thicker than Water with Melissa Gilbert, Buckaroo: The Movie (2005), and Four Extraordinary Women (2006). In 2010, Wagner began a recurring role as Dr. Vanessa Calder in the SyFy channel's hit drama Warehouse 13, and played the character again in its Syfy sister show Alphas in 2011.

In the fall semester of 2013, she began to teach at San Bernardino Valley College in southern California (Acting and Directing for Television and Film, Motion Picture Production) as an adjunct faculty member.

Other work

In 1987, Wagner wrote a series of books with Robert M. Klein about using acupressure to achieve results akin to a surgical facelift. In 1994, she wrote one of the first "celebrity" vegetarian (and mainly vegan) cookbooks, High Road to Health. Wagner appeared in commercials as a spokesperson for Ford Motor Company and also appears in infomercials for Select Comfort's "Sleep Number" beds.

More recently, Wagner has given seminars and workshops for her self-help therapy, "Quiet the Mind and Open the Heart," which promotes spirituality and meditation. In 2010, she participated in interviews and featurettes included in the long-delayed North American DVD releases of The Bionic Woman and the 2011 release of The Six Million Dollar Man.

Honors

In 2012, a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs, California, Walk of Stars was dedicated to her.

Personal life

Prior to being married, Wagner lived with Captain Daniel M. Yoder (USAF), until he went to Vietnam. She has been married four times. From 1971"3, she was married to music publisher Allan Rider. From 1976"9, she was married to actor Michael Brandon. In 1981, she married stuntman Henry Kingi, whom she met on the set of The Bionic Woman. Wagner had two sons with Kingi; Dorian (b. 1982) and Alex (b. 1986), but the couple divorced in the late 1980s. Wagner then married TV producer Lawrence Mortorff in 1990, but they too divorced a couple of years later.

Dallas star Linda Gray was once married to Wagner's uncle, Ed Thrasher. Wagner and Gray also played romantic rivals in the television movie The Two Worlds of Jenny Logan (1979).

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1973	Two People	Deirdre McCluskey
1973	'	Susan Fields
1976	Second Wind	Linda
1981	Nighthawks	Irene
1981	High Risk	Olivia
1982	Memories Never Die	Joanne
1985	Martin's Day	Dr. Mennen
1986	Young Again	Laura Gordon
1991	Ricochet	DA Priscilla Brimleigh
1998	Frog and Wombat	Sydney Parker
2003	'	Penelope Audrey
2005	Buckaroo: The Movie	Ms. Ainsley
2006	'	Connie Zirpollo
2008	Billy: The Early Years	Morrow Graham

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1971	Adam-12	Jenny Carson	Episode: "Million Dollar Buff"
1971	'	Margie Holland	Episode: "Disaster on Turner Street"
1971	'	Stella Bowers	Episode: "In Defense of Ellen McKay"
1971	Sarge	Laurie Meyers	Episode: "The Combatants"
1971	Owen Marshall: Counselor at Law	Diana Oliver	Episode: "Until Proven Innocent"
1971"1975	Marcus Welby, M.D.	Various	5 episodes
1971	Rod Serling's Night Gallery	Nurse	Episode: "The Diary"
1972	Rod Serling's Night Gallery	Girl	1 episode
1972	O'Hara, U.S. Treasury	Edie Lang	Episode: "Operation: XW-1"
1972	'	Laurie Peale	Episode: "Dark Journey"
1974	'	Sara Butler	Episode: "Backlash of the Hunter"
1975	'	Sara Butler	Episode: "Aura Lee, Farewell"
1975"1976	'	Jaime Sommers	10 episodes
1976	Whodunnit?	Panellist	Episode: "Future Imperfect"
1976"1978	'	Jaime Sommers	58 episodes
1979	'	Meg Laurel	TV movie
1979	'	Jennie Logan	TV movie
1980	Scruples	Billy Ikehorn	TV miniseries
1981	Callie & Son	Callie Bordeaux	TV movie
1982	Memories Never Die	Joanne Tilford	TV movie
1983	I Want to Live	Barbara Graham	TV movie
1983	'	Mary Connors	Episode: "Devil's Island"
1983	Princess Daisy	Francesca Valenski	TV movie
1983	Two Kinds of Love	Susan Farley	TV movie
1984	Jessie	Dr. Jessie Hayden	TV movie
1984	Passions	Nina Simon	TV movie
1984	Jessie	Dr. Jessie Hayden	10 episodes
1985	'	Claire Fielding	TV movie
1985	This Child Is Mine	Bonnie Wilkerson	TV movie
1986	Child's Cry	Joanne Van Buren	TV movie
1986	Young Again	Laura Gordon	TV movie
1986	Kate & Allie	Julia	Episode: "Late Bloomer"
1986	Convicted	Martha Forbes	TV movie
1987	Stranger in My Bed	Beverly Slater	TV movie
1987	'	Jaime Sommers	TV movie
1987	Student Exchange	Principal	TV movie
1988	Evil in Clear River	Kate McKinnon	TV movie
1988	Alfred Hitchcock Presents	Susan Forrester	Episode: "Prism"
1988	'	Uli Derickson	TV movie
1988	Nightmare at Bitter Creek	Nita Daniels	TV movie
1988	Scandals	Host	TV movie
1988	Police Story: Burnout	Det. Sidney Shannon	TV movie
1989	From the Dead of the Night	Joanna	TV movie
1989	Voice of the Heart	Katharine Tempest	TV movie
1989	Bionic Showdown: The Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman	Jaime Sommers	TV movie
1989	'	Rebecca Cafferty	12 episodes
1990	Shattered Dreams	Charlotte Fedders	TV movie
1990	Babies	Yvonne	TV movie
1991	Fire in the Dark	Janet	TV movie
1992	She Woke Up	Claudia Parr	TV movie
1992	Treacherous Crossing	Lindsey Thompson Gates	TV movie
1992	Against All Odds	Host	TV series
1992	To Be the Best	Paula O'Neill	TV movie
1992	'	Holly	TV movie
1993	Nurses on the Line: The Crash of Flight 7	Elizabeth Hahn	TV movie
1994	Men Who Hate Women & the Women Who Love Them	Host	TV movie
1994	Once in a Lifetime	Daphne Fields	TV movie
1994	Bionic Ever After?	Jaime Sommers	TV movie
1995	Fighting for My Daughter	Kate Kerner	TV movie
1996	Sins of Silence	Molly McKinley	TV movie
1996	'	Raeanne Gilbaine	TV movie
1997	Contagious	Dr. Hannah Cole	TV movie
1997	Their Second Chance	Barbara	TV movie
1998	Voyage of Terror	Dr. Stephanie Tauber	TV movie
2002	'	Agatha B.	Episode: "Farewell My Lovelies"
2005	Thicker Than Water	Jess Jarrett	TV movie
2006	Four Extraordinary Women	Anne	TV movie
2010"2013	Warehouse 13	Dr. Vanessa Calder	Episode: "For the Team" Episode: "Buried" Episode: "Love Sick" Episode: "Fractures" Episode: "The Living and the Dead"
2011	Alphas	Dr. Vanessa Calder	Episode: "Never Let Me Go"

Books

• High Road to Health: A Vegetarian Cookbook by Lindsay Wagner and Ariane Spade (1994) ISBN 0-671-87277-X
• Lindsay Wagner's New Beauty: The Acupressure Facelift by Lindsay Wagner and Robert M. Klein (1987) ISBN 0-13-536806-5
• 30-Day Natural Face Lift Program by Lindsay Wagner and Robert M. Klein (1988) ISBN 0-86188-779-4