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Cast of Owen Marshall, Counselor at Law (1973). Back, L-R: Reni Santoni, Arthur Hill, Lee Majors. Front: Joan Darling and Christine Matchett

Joan Darling (née Kugell;[1] born April 14, 1935[2]) is an American actress, film and television director and a dramatic arts instructor.

Biography

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Born Joan Kugell in Newton, Massachusetts and raised in neighboring Brookline, she is the oldest of four children born to Helen Kerner and attorney Simon Harris Kugell, who started the Boston University Law Review.[3][4] She attended Brookline High School,[5] Carnegie Institute of Technology,[6] and the University of Texas.[7]

From 1955 through at least 1958, Kugell performed with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, gaining favor with both audience and critics for the quality and versatility of her work.[8][9] In addition, it brought her a 1956 scholarship from the Beta Sigma Phi sorority.[10]

In November 1960 (having, in the interim, married singer Erik Darling, thus acquiring the stage name by which she has since become best known), Darling resumed her career with the New York improvisational theater troupe, "The Premise Players,"[11] and soon graduated to off-Broadway and Broadway productions. She appeared in fellow "Premise" player Theodore J. Flicker's The Troublemaker (1964)—her feature film debut—and later his The President's Analyst (1967). She went into television in the 1970s. She was a regular on the law series Owen Marshall, Counselor at Law, playing office secretary to Arthur Hill, Lee Majors, Reni Santoni, and David Soul.[12]

Darling was the first woman nominated for an Emmy for directing. She was nominated four times, winning one. She was nominated two times for a Directors Guild of America award, winning one.[13][14] She was nominated for an Emmy for her performance of Dorothy Parker in Woven in a Crazy Plaid.[15]

Darling directed episodes of the television series Rhoda, Doc, Taxi, Hizzonner, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, Magnum, P.I., Steven Spielberg's Amazing Stories, M*A*S*H, and The Bionic Woman.[16] She directed the famous "Chuckles Bites the Dust" episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show and received a 1976 Emmy nomination for Outstanding Directing in a Comedy Series.[17] She directed the "The Nurses" episode of M*A*S*H and received a 1977 Emmy nomination for her directing efforts there as well.[18] She also directed feature films such as First Love (1977), The Check Is in the Mail (1986), and a number of television movies.[19]

In December 1987, an inside joke/homage to the then-52-year-old actress/director's career was evidently being made when the character portrayed by Darling in the "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" episode of Jake and the Fatman (that of "an assistant DA [who] has trouble convincing ['Fatman' McCabe] she's stumbled onto a possible homicide case"),[20] was assigned Darling's own birth name, Joan Kugell.[21]

In 1976, Darling broke new ground when she directed the feature film First Love. At the time, she was part of a small circle of women directors to direct a major Hollywood studio feature film.[22]

Personal life

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Darling was married three times. The first marriage, to physicist Robert Klein, began in 1954 and was dissolved two years later, while the second—to folksinger Erik Darling — commenced on September 28, 1958,[23] and lasted roughly five years before ending in divorce. She kept his surname professionally, though.[24][25][26] Since 1966, Darling has been married to Bill Svanoe,[12] a writer and a professor at UNC-Chapel Hill.[27]

Partial filmography as director

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Episode 7, season 6, "Chuckles Bites the Dust", 1975.

  • Doc (TV series)

All 4 episodes in season 1, 1975.

Episode 11, second 2, "Love Songs of J. Nicholas Lobo", 1975.

Season 1, episodes 1-21, 36, 39 (23 total). In particular, Joan Darling directed all 20 episodes airing in the first month of the show.

Episodes 9, 12, 20 of season 1 and episode 5 of season 2 (4 total).

Episode 5, season 5 ("The Nurses"), 1976.

References

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  1. ^ Brewer, Annie M., ed. (1982). Biography Almanac. Detroit, MI: Gale Research Company. p. 40. ISBN 9780810311411.
  2. ^ Singer, Michael (1989). Film Directors. Lone Eagle Pub. p. 85. ISBN 9780943728278.
  3. ^ Wilson, Earl (June 11, 1963). "Joan Darling Recalls UT". Austin American-Statesman. p. 25. Retrieved March 14, 2024.
  4. ^ "Deaths and Funerals: Simon H. Kugell". The Boston Globe. December 17, 1942. p. 11. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  5. ^ "Brookline Science Fair Winners in State Exhibition This Week-End". Daily Boston Globe. May 2, 1951. p. 3. ProQuest 839503896. Honorable mention went to Ilene Conry, David Carr, Madeleine Paul, Glenda Stone, Joan Kugell, Calvin Gross, Robert Goodman, George Melzer, and Marcia Ullian.
  6. ^ Scott, Jack D. (September 4, 1955). "YOUTH FRONTIER: WORKING THEIR WAY THROUGH COLLEGE". Los Angeles Times. p. F11. ProQuest 166874777. There are those who try to tie in their current college training with outside employment. Joan Kugell, a sophomore in drama at Carnegie Institute of Technology, specializes in children's parties, makes as much as $9 for 20 minutes by putting on an elf act, leaping about as Peter Pan and re-enacting story-book characters.
  7. ^ "UT Drama Department Selects 'Guest Actor'". The Austin American. October 6, 1955. p. D6. ProQuest 1611083142. Also appearing in Fry's lyrical comedy of 15th Century England will be Norma Dunlap, Ted van Griethnysen, Hubert Whitfield, Ruby Chromchak, Rea Hooker, Dan Kelleher, Charles Miller, Joan Kugell, Mary Gassett and Dick Foose.
  8. ^ "Reviewer Says Timon Good Entertainment". Medford Mail Tribune. August 24, 1955. p. 12. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  9. ^ "End of Season Reviews of Festival Plays". Medford Mail Tribune. September 7, 1958. p. 6. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  10. ^ "Annual Dinner Given for Cast; Awards Given". Medford Mail Tribune. June 24, 1956. p. 21. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  11. ^ Davis, James (November 25, 1960). "Big Shot Show Coming; Holiday Mats Do Well; Off-Beat Theater". New York Daily News. p. 76. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  12. ^ a b Lewis, Jean (August 17, 1975). "Joan Darling Becomes a Television Director". The Binghamton Press. p. TV15. ProQuest 2044001678. Television viewers remember Joan as Frieda Krause, the eager, engaging secretary-law student on ABC's 'Owen Marshall' [...] [I]n 1960 she became the only distaff member of the Premise — an improvisational theater group — and toured London, Washington, Miami, Los Angeles and New York. [...] Two films, 'The Troublemaker' and 'The President's Analyst' followed, and Joan appesared in New York television and had leads in two Broadway shows. [...] Joan has been married nine years to Bill Svanoe, a TV and film writer.
  13. ^ "CBS 10-for-15 In DGA Nominations". Variety. February 18, 1976. p. 96. ProQuest 1401280034. Comedy series: Hy Averback for 'Bombed' episode of 'Mash' (20th-Fox-CBS); Hal Cooper, 'Maude' series (Tandem-CBS); Joan Darling, 'Chuckles Bites the Dust' seg of 'The Mary Tyler Moore Show' (MTM-CBS).
  14. ^ Desowitz, Bill (March 11, 1985). "Forman awarded DGA's best laurels for 'Amadeus' chores". The Hollywood Reporter. p. 48. ProQuest 2594610584. Joan Darling won the daytime dramatic award for the After School Special 'Mom's on Strike' (ABC);
  15. ^ "1977 Los Angeles Area Emmy Awards Nominees: INFORMATION; Individual Achievement (Restricted to on-air credit)". The Hollywood Reporter. April 21, 1978. p. 3. ProQuest 2598213054. Special: Wayne Threm, cameraperson, The Feminine Mistake, KNXT; Ken Dettling, lighting director, The Aman Folk Ensemble, KCET; John Cosgrove, director, I'll See You in Court, KNBC; Bill Stout, reporter, Without a Second Thought, KNXT; Ron Malvin, film editor, The Vanishing Land, KNBC; Bob Niemack, film editor, The Feminine Mistake, KNXT; Thomas D. Pineiro, film editor, They Still Say I Do, KABC-TV; Joan Darling, performer, Dorothy Parker: Woven in a Crazy Plaid, KNBC; Arnold Shapiro, writer, The Feminine Mistake, KNXT; Bill Stout, writer, Without a Second Thought, KNXT; Joe Landis and Larry Tubelle, writers, The 8th Annual Senior Olympics, KNBC; Anne Kaestner, writer, South Africa: A View From the Inside, KHJ-TV.
  16. ^ Naylor, Lynne (1994). Television Directors Guide. Los Angeles, CA: Lone Eagle Publishing Company. p. 25. ISBN 0-943728-59-2.
  17. ^ Emmy Awards 1976, imdb.com; accessed April 7, 2015.
  18. ^ Joan Darling Emmy Award Nominations, accessed 2023-10-20.
  19. ^ Craddock, Jim (2008). VideoHound's Golden Movie Retriever. Detroit, MI: Thomson Gale. p. 1656. ISBN 9781414429465.
  20. ^ Henniger, Paul (December 8, 1987). "TV highlights". The Indianapolis Star. p. 22. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  21. ^ "Highlights: Tuesday, December 8, 1987". The Tennessean. p. 6-B. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  22. ^ Smukler, Maya, "Working Girls: The History of Women Directors in 1970s Hollywood", PhD Thesis, 2014, accessed 2023-10-20
  23. ^ Rigdon, Walter, ed. (1966). The Biographical Encyclopaedia & Who's Who of the American Theatre. New York: James H. Heineman. p. 392. LCCN 65-19390.
  24. ^ Ulman, Nadine (February 2, 1961). "Quick-Thinking Player Has Instant Talent". Newsday. p. 49. Retrieved March 14, 2024.
  25. ^ "Quartet Tilts at U.S. Attitudes". The Age. February 7, 1963. p. TV4. Retrieved March 14, 2024.
  26. ^ McGilligan, Patrick (September 11, 1977). "The Lady Is a Tiger". The Boston Globe. pp. 18, 20, 46 and 48. Retrieved March 15, 2024.
  27. ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2006-02-12. Retrieved 2009-05-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
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