| Joyce Meadows | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1930s Arrowwood, Alberta, Canada |
| Nationality | Canadian-American |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1956–present |
Joyce Meadows (date of birth and names of family members unavailable; believed to have been born in the early 1930s) is a Canadian-American actress. From 1960-1961, she co-starred as Stacy in the syndicated western series Two Faces West with Charles Bateman and Francis De Sales. The previous season, 1959–1960, she appeared as Lynn Allen on three episodes entitled "Sphere of No Return", "The Breaking Point", and "Buried Alive", of NBC's adventure/drama series The Man and the Challenge, with George Nader.[1] She also appeared in films, including the 1957 science fiction thriller about a bizarre nuclear scientist, The Brain from Planet Arous, with John Agar and Robert Fuller.[2]
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Joyce Meadows was born as Joyce Burger, and in 1953 Joyce Burger won the 1953 title of Miss Sacramento. She later went to Hollywood and changed her name to Joyce Meadows. Meadows was raised in early childhood on a farm near her birthplace, the village of Arrowood in Alberta province. According to her website, as a child she acted on the "stage" of her family's back porch. Her family moved to Montana, where she attended her first motion picture at the age of eight. She was active in theatre arts in high school and performed the part of Juliet in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet at the Little Eaglet Theatre in Sacramento, California. She moved to Los Angeles, while she was still a teenager. Meadows was a student of Jeff Corey, procured a scholarship to the Pasadena Playhouse, and thereafter studied with Mira Rostova and Stella Adler in New York City.[3]
Her early television roles were in the middle 1950s in such series as Kenneth Tobey's Whirlybirds and Broderick Crawford's Highway Patrol, both in syndication, and on CBS's General Electric Theater anthology series, hosted by Ronald W. Reagan. In 1958, she appeared as Ann in "The Neal Bowers Story" of CBS's The Millionaire, with Martin Milner in the starring role. She also guest starred in Harbor Command, Wendell Corey's syndicated drama about the United States Coast Guard.[1]
In addition to her The Man and the Challenge episodes, Meadows appeared in these dramatic series in 1959:
Her western roles began in 1958 as the fictitious Annie White in the episode "Sheriff Billy" of NBC's The Restless Gun, starring John Payne.
Her subsequent westerns include the following:
Meadows highlights with photographs these latter two western episodes on her website.[3]
While busy with many of these guest-starring roles, Meadows appeared in twenty-five episodes of Two Faces West:
Into the 1960s, she guest starred twice as Myra Carter in the episodes "Bentley and the Social Worker" and "Bentley and the Blood Bank" of John Forsythe's NBC sitcom Bachelor Father. In 1960, she appeared as Blaise Newsome in the episode "Six Superior Skirts" and as Jessica King in the segment "Perfect Setup" of the ABC and Warner Brothers detective series 77 Sunset Strip.[1]
Between 1959-1961, she appeared three times on CBS's Alfred Hitchcock Presents: (1) as Janice Wright in "The Last Dark Step", (2) as Frances Randall in "A Night with the Boys", and (3) as Enid Patterson in "The Throwback". In the latter episode, young Elliot Gray (played by Scott Marlowe) and the older Cyril Hardeen (Murray Matheson) both vie for the affections of Enid. After Enid chooses Elliot, Cyril challenges him to a fistfight without knowing that Cyril has hired a younger and stronger proxy.[4]
Meadows also appeared twice as the character Adrian on CBS's The Aquanauts adventure series, with Keith Larsen, Jeremy Slate, and Ron Ely, in episodes entitled "Deep Escape" and "The Jeremiah Adventure", the latter with Peter Falk. She appeared on the CBS sitcom Bringing Up Buddy that same year as Wilella Grant in the episode "Auntie's Cake". In 1961, she appeared as Anne Wills in "The Boat Caper" of the NBC crime drama Michael Shayne, starring Richard Denning, Gary Clarke, Herbert Rudley, and Jerry Paris.[1]
In 1964, Meadows appeared on Richard Crenna's CBS political drama Slattery's People in the role of Gert in the episode "Question: Is Laura the Name of the Game?" She appeared three times on CBS's Perry Mason legal drama in the episodes "The Cause of the Golden Fraud" as Sylvia Welles, "The Case of the Woeful Widower" as Carole Moray (1964), and as Audrey Stemple in "The Case of the Frustrated Folksinger" (1965). Meadows appeared as the character Anna on The Alfred Hitchcock Hour in the 1965 episode "Completely Foolproof".[1]
In 1965, she portrayed Isobel Moon in the film Zebra in the Kitchen, with child actor Jay North, formerly of CBS's Dennis the Menace, Andy Devine, and Martin Milner, her co-star from the previous The Millionaire episode.[1]
In 1987, she appeared as Ms. Maytag in the episode "The Matchmaker" of the syndicated version of the Punky Brewster sitcom. During the first half of the 1990s, she was again quite active, having been cast in such roles as that of a judge in the 1995 episode "Whine, Whine, Whine" of ABC's Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman.[1]
In 2009, Meadows appeared in the film short A Golightly Gathering, a reference to the 1961 picture Breakfast at Tiffany's, with Audrey Hepburn and Buddy Ebsen in the roles of Holly and "Doc" Golightly. Meadows also had an uncredited bit part in Breakfast at Tiffany's.[1]