See also Biography Index (J) :: Filmography Index (J) :: Discography Index (J)

Date of Birth
14 February 1936, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA

Mini Biography

Joan O`Brien began her show-biz career while she was in high school, on a local TV music show in California with Tennessee Ernie Ford. Soon she was a successful singer, and made the jump to acting. In about half the films she ever made it appeared that Joan played a nurse. Perhaps her most memorable appearance was in Blake Edwards` Operation Petticoat (1959), as the nurse who gets in everyone`s way because her, umm, "proportions" cause uncomfortable crowding in a small submarine. Because of her, Cary Grant becomes the first officer in the history of the U.S. Navy to sink an enemy truck! She again played a nurse in the Jerry Lewis film _It`s Only Money (1963)_ and yet one more time with Elvis Presley in It Happened at the World`s Fair (1963)--and, according to legend, fired up a hot off-screen romance with Elvis. Also in 1963, in a strange sort of "Columbo" connection, she was voted "most likely to wed Robert Vaughn". Joan`s final movie was Get Yourself a College Girl (1964), a "Swinging Sixties" teenfest also featuring Nancy Sinatra, with music by The Animals and The Dave Clark Five. After that she went back to singing for a while, touring with the Harry James Orchestra. She left show business for good to concentrate on raising her kids, and later became a successful executive with the Hilton Hotel chain.