Lee Purcell (born Lee Jeune Williams; June 15, 1947)[2] is an American actress[3] who worked primarily in the 1970s and 1980s.[4]
Purcell was born Lee Jeune Williams at the Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point (North Carolina), the elder daughter of Major Frank D. Williams Jr., a highly decorated Marine Corps pilot who was killed while on active duty when she was two months old.[5] Her mother, Lee (née McKnight) Williams (1925-2014), remarried, to Donald Purcell, a U.S. Navy doctor assigned to the Marine Corps.[6] Lee Purcell has a younger sister.[7]
She graduated from Paragould High School in 1965[7] and briefly attended Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri as a dance and theatre student until she was expelled.[why?][8][9][10][11]
She moved to California in 1967[12] and studied acting. Purcell supported herself by working in commercials[11] and selling clothes at a disco.[13]
In 1969, Purcell was selected for her first feature film by Steve McQueen in his company's production of Adam at Six A.M., co-starring Michael Douglas.[14] Asked to explain why he chose Purcell from nearly 500 other available actresses, McQueen said, "It wasn't easy. We kept narrowing down the field over a period of weeks until it came to giving screen tests to six of them. All of them were good, but Lee seemed to jump right out of the screen."[15]
Her television work included roles as Billie Dove and Olivia de Havilland in two biopic TV movies: The Amazing Howard Hughes (1977)[16] and My Wicked, Wicked Ways: The Legend of Errol Flynn (1985).[17]
She was nominated for two Emmy Awards. In 1991, she was nominated as Outstanding Lead Actress for Long Road Home[18] and in 1994 as Outstanding Supporting Actress for Secret Sins of the Father. She was co-producer, and starred in the 1998 low-budget cable-TV movie Malaika (alternate title Tons of Trouble).[19]
Purcell's film career wound down in 1983 and she has only had five motion picture credits since, the last in 2015. She has continued to do television projects.[20]
In December 2010 Purcell launched an interactive fashion and beauty website, BoomerBabes, geared towards Baby Boomer women. The website did not gain any visitors[21] and BoomerBabes stopped updating in 2014.[22]
Purcell is a member of the Church of Scientology.[23]
Media related to Lee Purcell at Wikimedia Commons