Susan Dey

Early life and education

Dey was born Susan Hallock Dey in Pekin, Illinois, to Ruth Pyle (née Doremus) Dey, a nurse who died in 1961, when Susan was eight years old, and Robert Smith Dey, a newspaper editor for the New Rochelle, New York, Standard-Star. She attended Columbus Elementary School in Thornwood, New York, later moving to Mount Kisco, New York, where she graduated from Fox Lane High School in 1970.

Career

Dey was a model before starring as Laurie Partridge in the television series The Partridge Family from 1970 to 1974. She was 17 years old when she won the part and had no previous acting experience. She returned to weekly network television in 1977 as the co-star of the short-lived situation comedy Loves Me, Loves Me Not.

Her first film role was as a passenger in the 1972 airline hijack movie Skyjacked starring Charlton Heston. In a 1977 made-for-television movie, Mary Jane Harper Cried Last Night, Dey portrayed a disturbed young mother with serious psychological problems, who begins to take them out on her toddler daughter. Also in 1977, Dey starred opposite William Katt in a romance film, First Love, directed by Joan Darling.

Dey co-starred with Albert Finney in the 1981 science-fiction film Looker, written and directed by Michael Crichton. She had a leading role in 1986's Echo Park as a struggling waitress-actress who takes a job as a stripper who delivers singing telegrams. She starred on L.A. Law as California assistant district attorney Grace Van Owen, who later became a judge. Dey won a Golden Globe Award as Actress in a Leading Role – Drama Series for the role in 1988. She was also nominated in each of the following four years. She was also nominated for the Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series in 1987, 1988, and 1989.

She hosted a 1992 episode of Saturday Night Live. Later that year, she co-starred in the Diane English/CBS sitcom Love & War with Jay Thomas. Although the show ran until 1995, Dey was replaced in 1993 by Annie Potts because producers reportedly felt she had "no chemistry" with co-star Thomas. In 1993, she produced and starred in the ABC Movie of the Week Lies & Lullabies (later released on DVD as Sad Inheritance), where she played a pregnant cocaine addict.

Dey was mentioned in Shirley Jones's memoir as the only cast member who "consistently refused" to take part in Partridge Family reunions.

Personal life

Dey was married to Leonard "Lenny" Hirshan from 1976 to 1981. They have one daughter, Sarah, who was born in 1978. Dey has been married to her second husband, television producer Bernard Sofronski, since 1988. She serves as a board member of the Rape Treatment Center at UCLA Medical Center and co-narrated a documentary on campus rape with her former L.A. Law co-star Corbin Bernsen.