After attending school in Europe and living in Italy, singer, musician, songwriter and actress Beverly D'Angelo worked as a cartoonist for Hanna-Barbera Productions and sang in Canadian coffee-houses and with the rock group, Elephant. She gained her first stage experience with the Charlotte Town Festival Company. Her Broadway debut came in the rock musical Rockabye Hamlet, in which she played Ophelia. She debuted onscreen in a supporting role in the horror film The Sentinel (1977), going on to gain much exposure in Clint Eastwood's comedy Every Which Way But Loose (1979); she also had the female lead in the film version of the rock musical Hair (1979) and played country singer Patsy Cline in Coal Miner's Daughter (1980). Other than three National Lampoon "vacation" movies, the films she has subsequently appeared in have generally been unsuccessful, although she has remained a busy stage, screen, and TV actress.
Beverly D'Angelo
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- Left home as a teenager to study art in Italy.
- Worked as an illustrator at Hanna-Barbera Studios and as a singer before pursuing an interest in acting.
- Made silver-screen debut in the 1979 film adaptation of the musical Hair.
- Did all her own singing as Patsy Cline in 1980's Coal Miner's Daughter.
- After her marriage to an Italian aristocrat ended, she took up with Irish writer-director Neil Jordan, who directed her in 1988's High Spirits and 1991's The Miracle.
- Best known for her role as the matriarch of the quirky Griswold clan in the National Lampoon's Vacation films.