Mara Corday(1930-2025)

Actress Mara Corday was born Marilyn Joan Watts in Santa Monica, California in 1930. 17 years later, she put her foot on the bottom step of the show biz ladder, dancing in the back row of the chorus in "Earl Carroll's Revue" at the famed showman's theater-restaurant in Hollywood. Modeling for photographers led to wider exposure and ultimately to TV roles and bit parts in low-budget movies. As a Universal-International contract player, she was in most every type of B picture that the studio made. She gave up acting in the early '60s to concentrate on marriage and motherhood during 17 tumultuous years as the wife of actor Richard Long. After his 1974 death, she played supporting parts in her friend (Clint Eastwood)'s movies, just as he played a supporting role in one of hers (Tarantula (1955)). She died in 2025 at the age of 95.