Joan Van Ark

Infobox actor

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caption = Joan Van Ark, June 2008
birthdate = Birth date and age|1943|6|16|mf=y
birthplace = New York, New York U.S.
occupation = Actress
yearsactive = 1963 - present
spouse = John Marshall, 1966 - present

Joan Van Ark (born June 16, 1943) is an American actress, most notable for her role as Valene Ewing on the hit TV series "Dallas" and, most prominently, its long-running spin-off series "Knots Landing".

Biography

Early life

Van Ark was born in New York City, the daughter of Dorothy Jean (née Hemenway), a writer, and Carroll Van Ark, who was born in Holland, Michigan and worked in advertising and public relations. [ [http://www.genealogymagazine.com/joanvanark.html The Dutch-American Roots of Joan Van Ark ] ] [ [http://www.filmreference.com/film/42/Joan-Van-Ark.html Joan Van Ark Biography (1943?-) ] ] Her father named her after Joan of Arc because he was certain that she would become famous. [ [http://www.go-star.com/antiquing/vanark.htm The Celebrity Collector - Joan van Ark ] ] Van Ark's paternal great-grandfather, Gradus, was an immigrant from the Netherlands. [ [http://www.dahef.org/HallOfFame/1996-van_Ark.html DAHEF - Hall of Fame - 1996 - Joan van Ark ] ] Both Van Ark's parents and her sister, Carol, were all writers. [ [http://www.joanvanark.com/courant1.html Hartford Courant Review ] ] She grew up in Boulder, Colorado and also has a brother, Mark. Van Ark, just out of high school (1961), was the second youngest student to attend the Yale School of Drama on a scholarshipFact|date=June 2008. The youngest was Julie Harris Fact|date=June 2008. Years later, they would co-star as mother and daughter on the CBS television series "Knots Landing".

Career

Van Ark began her professional career at the Guthrie Theater in Molière's "The Miser", opposite Hume Cronyn and Zoe Caldwell. That was followed by "Death of a Salesman" at the Guthrie with both Cronyn and Jessica Tandy. After a season at the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., Joan was cast in the national touring company of "Barefoot in the Park", directed by Mike Nichols. She recreated the role in the critically acclaimed London Company and later on Broadway. She earned a Tony nomination for her performance in "The School for Wives", and won the Theater World Award for "The Rules of the Game".

After receiving a contract with Universal Studios, Van Ark co-starred with Bette Davis in "The Judge and Jake Wyler", a 1972 television pilot that failed to be picked up by NBC. She accepted the her best-known role as Valene Ewing (originally as a one-time guest appearance on "Dallas") in 1978. However, writers later worked the character into a couple of additional episodes; she then carried the character over into the long-running spin-off "Knots Landing" in 1979. She remained with "Knots Landing" for thirteen of the show's fourteen seasons, leaving in 1992 (although she did return for the series' final episode in May 1993). During her thirteen seasons on "Knots Landing", Van Ark earned six nominations and two Soap Opera Digest Awards for Best Actress. During the series' run, Van Ark became best friends with co-star Michele Lee, mirroring their characters' on-screen relationship. Van Ark also starred in the TV comedies, "Temperature Rising" and "We've Got Each Other". She was also the voice of Spider-Woman in the animated series of the same name. After leaving Knots Landing, she starred in an ill-fated pilot called "Spin Doctors", a sitcom for NBC that was not picked up. In May 1997, she reprised her role of Valene Ewing in the CBS mini-series, "Knots Landing: Back to the Cul-de-sac", while in December 2005, Van Ark appeared in the non-fiction reunion "Knots Landing: Together Again" in which she reminisced with the other cast members of the long running CBS television show. In addition, she originated the role of Gloria Fisher/Abbott on CBS television's "The Young and the Restless" from 2004 - 2005, then decided to leave the role and was replaced by Judith Chapman.

Van Ark also appeared off-Broadway opposite John Rubenstein in "Love Letters". More recently, she co-starred in the New York production of Edward Albee's Pulitzer Prize winning play "Three Tall Women". Her Los Angeles theater credits include "Cyrano de Bergerac" - playing Roxanne opposite Richard Chamberlain's Cyrano - "Ring Around the Moon" with Michael York and Glynis Johns, "Chemin de Fer", "Heartbreak House", and "As You Like It", for which she won a Los Angeles Drama Critics Award. She also appeared as Lady Macbeth in the Grove Shakespeare Festival's production of "Macbeth".

Van Ark has also starred in the Williamstown Theater Festival productions of "The Night of the Iguana", "The Legend of Oedipus", and the festival's 40th anniversary production of Stephen Sondheim's "A Little Night Music".

Van Ark has played a variety of guest roles in her career, including an episode of "M*A*S*H" where she played a nurse, and "Rhoda" playing Joe Gerard's (Rhoda Morgenstern's then-fiance) ex-wife. In 1978, she also ppeared in an episode of "Wonder Woman" with Ted Shackleford who would later become her screen husband Gary Ewing on Knots Landing.

In 2001, Van Ark was featured in an episode of the Howard Stern-produced show "Son of the Beach" as Ima Cummings, the mother of show regular BJ Cummings (played by Jaime Bergman). The episode aired in April of that year.

In 2008, Van Ark was reunited with her Knots Landing co-star Donna Mills in an episode of the FX drama series "Nip/Tuck".

Personal life

Joan Van Ark has been married to husband John Marshall since 1966. They have one child, voice actress/performer Vanessa Marshall (born October 19, 1969).

References

External links

*imdb name|id=0005521|name=Joan Van Ark