Candice Bergen


Actor
Candice Bergen

About

Also Known As
Candice Patricia Bergen
Birth Place
Beverly Hills, California, USA
Born
May 09, 1946

Biography

As the Emmy-winning star of TV's "Murphy Brown" (CBS, 1988-1998), Candice Bergen succeeded in making the public forget that long before embodying her sassy TV reporter alter ego, the actress had begun her career as a model and rather unsuccessful dramatic film actress before an Oscar-nominated turn in "Starting Over" (1979) paved the way for future comedic success. The beautiful Bergen w...

Photos & Videos

The Wind and the Lion - Poster Art
Carnal Knowledge - Movie Poster
Bite the Bullet - Movie Poster

Family & Companions

Terry Melcher
Companion
Record producer. Involved in the late 1960s.
Bert Schneider
Companion
Producer. Together from 1971 to March 1974.
Louis Malle
Husband
Director. Married from September 27, 1980 until his death on November 23, 1995; born on October 30, 1932.
Marshall Rose
Husband
Real estate developer. Dating as of fall 1998; married on June 15, 2000.

Bibliography

"Knock Wood"
Candice Bergen, Linden Press (1984)

Notes

Awarded honorary doctorate degree from alma mater University of Pennsylvania (1992).

She holds the record for most Emmy wins (five) for lead actor in a single series.

Biography

As the Emmy-winning star of TV's "Murphy Brown" (CBS, 1988-1998), Candice Bergen succeeded in making the public forget that long before embodying her sassy TV reporter alter ego, the actress had begun her career as a model and rather unsuccessful dramatic film actress before an Oscar-nominated turn in "Starting Over" (1979) paved the way for future comedic success. The beautiful Bergen was a child of Hollywood privilege, but early on made a name for herself as an independent, politically progressive feminist who also enjoyed a side career as a nationally published photojournalist. She let a good bit of her real life experience shine through in her work, often portraying professional, intellectual characters whose tough exteriors guarded an inner world of fragility. For "Murphy Brown," Bergen earned a record five Emmy awards for bringing unprecedented depth to a leading female TV character, transforming her into an icon of the 1990s working woman - and one who stood up to a real-life Vice President's character assassination after Murphy chose to have a child out of wedlock. After a decade of playing that revered character, she proved a perfect addition to the cast of the darkly comic legal drama "Boston Legal" (ABC, 2004-08), going barb for barb with co-stars William Shatner and James Spader and proving age had only fine-tuned her comedic chops. When rebooted classic TV shows became a fad in the late 2010s, Bergen ably returned to a rebooted "Murphy Brown" (CBS 2018-19).

Candice Bergen was born on May 9, 1946, and as the daughter of one of the era's top entertainers, she was immediately in the spotlight. Her father, ventriloquist Edgar Bergen, was known the world over for the comedy act he performed with his cheeky wooden sidekick Charlie McCarthy on the radio and the big screen. Her mother, Frances Bergen, was a talented singer, actress and model in her own right. The couple was the toast of Hollywood and their gorgeous blonde daughter played with the children of other famous entertainers while the likes of Jimmy Stewart or Walt Disney were having cocktails in the family living room. While sometimes it was hard playing second fiddle to her father's famous dummy - who, incidentally, had a bigger bedroom than she did - Bergen was given the opportunity to take the stage early on, guesting on dad's radio show at the age of eight and going head to head with Groucho Marx on "You Bet Your Life" (NBC, 1950-1961) when she was 12. By the time "Candy" was a Beverly Hills teen, she was modeling for the Ford agency and beginning to tire of her conservative, privileged background. She spent a few years studying writing and art history at the University of Pennsylvania before returning to Los Angeles where she lived with record producer Terry Melcher (Doris Day's son) and half-heartedly launched a film career with a role as an intellectual lesbian in "The Group" (1966).

For her first acting outings, Bergen did not earn critical favor and in fact was likened to her inanimate "brother" Charlie. But her beauty and lineage were enough to propel her career. Bergen took a string of film jobs based on their opportunity to travel to exciting locations, appearing in "The Sand Pebbles" (1966) opposite Steve McQueen and playing Elliot Gould's leading lady in the counter-culture "Getting Straight" (1970). A progressive feminist who had even joined Abbie Hoffman on some of his anti-establishment pranks, Bergen reinforced her image with a role as a white woman "getting back to the land" by living among Native Americans in "Solider Blue" (1971). She played a co-ed romanced by Art Garfunkel in Mike Nichols' comedy "Carnal Knowledge" (1971), yet there were many who continued to question her acting talent, given her obvious blonde beauty. Bergen herself admitted she did not take acting very seriously in her early years, when her passion leaned more towards radical politics, photography and exotic travel. She spent some time in Africa with famed anthropologist Jane Goodall at her chimpanzee research site and landed photojournalism assignments for major magazines. Her exclusive photo feature on president Gerald Ford and the first family was published in Ladies Home Journal and a session with aging silent filmmaker Charlie Chaplin was featured on the cover of Life magazine.

After several years away from the screen, Bergen returned in the mid-1970s with a new focus and dedication towards acting. She immediately gave a strong dramatic performance in John Milius' "The Wind and the Lion" (1975), in which she played an American woman kidnapped by a Moroccan sheik (Sean Connery). That same year, a spot as the first female guest host of "Saturday Night Live" (NBC, 1975- ) suggested a career shift for the actress who had largely been seen in dramatic fare. She followed up in "Oliver's Story" (1978) - the sequel to 1970's "Love Story" - and worked with famed German director Lina Wertmuller in "The End of the World in Our Usual Bed in a Night Full of Rain" (1978), but she finally hit her stride with a shift towards comedy the following year.

Appropriately enough, her turnaround came with "Starting Over" (1979), where she was brilliant in the poignantly funny role of a tone deaf woman determined to be a singer. The film demonstrated her full comedic and dramatic range and earned her an Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actress. She followed up with a strong performance in "Rich and Famous" (1981), a remake of the 1943 Bette Davis-Miriam Hopkins vehicle "Old Acquaintance," starring opposite Jacqueline Bisset as a pair of best friends challenged by their competition in careers and love. That same year, Bergen married award-winning French film director Louis Malle and began splitting her time between the United States and France.

Bergen was still active in photojournalism, so when the opportunity arose to fuse both of her careers with a brief portrayal of her idol photographer Margaret Bourke-White in Richard Attenborough's Oscar-winning epic "Gandhi" (1982), she jumped at the chance. In 1985 she gave birth to daughter Chloé and made her Broadway debut in David Rabe's Hollywood satire "Hurlyburly," directed by Mike Nichols. Her career shifted away from the big screen with diverse TV movie roles as the evil Morgan Le Fay in "Arthur the King" (CBS, 1985), the doomed Polish wife of an abusive husband in "Murder: By Reason of Insanity" (CBS, 1985), and the insecure wife who would do anything to revive the career of her fading movie star husband in the ABC miniseries "Hollywood Wives" (1985). In 1987, she was cast as the society debutante-turned-escort service owner Sidney Biddle Barrows, the so-called "Mayflower Madam" (CBS), before creating her career legacy with the title role in "Murphy Brown."

The female-centric program stood head and shoulders above the sitcom crowd for its bold incorporation of current events and lifestyle issues into the setting of a fictional TV news magazine. With her reputation in journalism and history as a proponent of progressive causes, Bergen was a perfect choice to play the wry, outspoken news anchor who eventually evolves into a single parent, breast cancer survivor and role model for the new wave of 1990s working moms. Her iconic modern image so permeated pop culture that it was even referenced by Vice President Dan Quayle in a 1992 "family values" speech that critiqued the show's so-called "glamorizing" of the single parent lifestyle. But Quayle was the one to receive media backlash and Bergen and "Brown" continued to be a major television force, with its star earning a record five Emmy wins for Best Actress before requesting her name be removed from the ballot.

After the "Murphy Brown" era came to a close in 1998 - and after weathering her husband Louis Malle's death from cancer in 1995 - Bergen made several television appearances, including as an editor of Vogue magazine in "Sex and the City" (HBO, 1998-2004) and launched her own short-lived talk show on the Oxygen network, "Exhale with Candice Bergen" (2000-01). After a long absence from the big screen, she emerged in a small role as a beauty pageant judge in the Sandra Bullock hit comedy "Miss Congeniality" (2000) and took on roles as a New York mayor in the Reese Witherspoon rom-com "Sweet Home Alabama" (2002) and a flight attendant in the airline comedy "A View from the Top" (2003).

Welcome guest spots on "Law & Order" (NBC, 1990-2010) and "Will & Grace" (1998-2006) helped woo Bergen back to primetime. In 2005, she joined the cast of the acclaimed dramedy, "Boston Legal." Bergen was a hit as the whip smart and sexy Shirley Schmidt of the Boston law firm Crane, Poole and Schmidt, where among her many duties were keeping unpredictable former lover Denny Crane (William Shatner) in line. In 2006, Bergen's always-lively performance earned Emmy and Golden Globe nominations and she was again given an Emmy nod in 2008. That same year, the 62-year-old actress reprised her role - this time, in a cameo - as Vogue editor Enid Frick in the wildly popular chick flick, "Sex and the City" (2008). Bergen reteamed with "Murphy Brown" creator Diane English for a small role in her remake of the George Cukor classic "The Women" (2008), along with supporting roles in romantic comedies "Bride Wars" (2009) and "The Romantics" (2010). Black holiday comedy "A Merry Friggin' Christmas" (2014) and Warren Beatty's long-gestating Old Hollywood romance "Rules Don't Apply" (2016) followed, along with key roles in Noah Baumbach's comedy-drama "The Meyerowitz Stories" (2017) and the Reese Witherspoon vehicle "Home Again" (2017). In January 2018, CBS announced that Bergen would star in a revival of "Murphy Brown" during the 2018-19 season, following the successful revival of another iconic '90s sitcom, "Will and Grace," for NBC; co-stars Faith Ford, Joe Regalbuto and Grant Shaud also returned, as did creator Diane English.

Filmography

 

Cast (Feature Film)

Book Club (2018)
The Meyerowitz Stories (2017)
Home Again (2017)
The Rules Don't Apply (2016)
Beautiful & Twisted (2015)
Live From New York! (2015)
Herself
Merry Friggin' Christmas (2014)
The Romantics (2010)
Bride Wars (2009)
Sex and the City (2008)
The Women (2008)
Footsteps (2003)
Daisy Lowendahl
The In-Laws (2003)
Sweet Home Alabama (2002)
View from the Top (2001)
Miss Congeniality (2000)
Kathy Morningside
AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies (1998)
Who Is Henry Jaglom? (1997)
Herself
Mary & Tim (1996)
Belly Talkers (1996)
Herself
Mayflower Madam (1987)
Arthur the King (1985)
Morgan Le Fey
Stick (1985)
Kyle Mclaren
Murder: By Reason Of Insanity (1985)
Ewa Berwid
Gandhi (1982)
Rich and Famous (1981)
Starting Over (1979)
Oliver's Story (1978)
The End of the World in Our Usual Bed in a Night Full of Rain (1978)
Lizzy
The Domino Principle (1977)
Bite the Bullet (1975)
11 Harrowhouse (1974)
T. R. Baskin (1971)
T. R. Baskin
The Hunting Party (1971)
Melissa Ruger
Carnal Knowledge (1971)
Susan
Getting Straight (1970)
Jan
Soldier Blue (1970)
Cresta Marybelle Lee
The Adventurers (1970)
Sue Ann Daley
The Magus (1968)
Lily
Live for Life (1967)
Candice
The Day the Fish Came Out (1967)
Electra
The Group (1966)
Elinor "Lakey" Eastlake
The Sand Pebbles (1966)
Shirley Eckert

Producer (Feature Film)

Mary & Tim (1996)
Co-Executive Producer

Music (Feature Film)

Starting Over (1979)
Song Performer

Misc. Crew (Feature Film)

Who Is Henry Jaglom? (1997)
Other
Belly Talkers (1996)
Other

Cast (Special)

Great Women of Television Comedy: A Museum of Television & Radio Special (2003)
Interviewee
CBS at 75: A Primetime Celebration (2003)
The 26th Annual Kennedy Center Honors: A Celebration of the Performing Arts (2003)
AFI's 100 Years...100 Passions (2002)
Host
The Kennedy Center Honors: A Celebration of the Performing Arts (2001)
Presenter
The Human Face With John Cleese (2001)
Intimate Portrait: Diane Von Furstenberg (2000)
Narrator
Saturday Night Live: 25th Anniversary Primetime Special (1999)
A Home for the Holidays (1999)
Influences: From Yesterday to Today (1999)
CBS: The First 50 Years (1998)
Intimate Portrait: Faith Ford (1998)
The American Film Institute Salute to Robert Wise (1998)
Performer
Artists & Entertainers: People of the Century: CBS News/Time 100 (1998)
Interviewee
The Walt Disney Company Presents The 8th American Teacher Awards (1998)
Presenter
53rd Presidential Inaugural Gala (1997)
American Comedy Honors (1997)
1997 Emmy Awards (1997)
Presenter
Images of Life: Photographs That Changed the World (1996)
1996 Emmy Awards (1996)
Presenter
Night of About 14 CBS Stars (1996)
Edgar Bergen: His Many Voices (1995)
Interviewee
The Murphy Brown Special (1995)
The First 100 Years: A Celebration of American Movies (1995)
47th Annual Emmy Awards (1995)
Presenter
The American Film Institute Salute to Jack Nicholson (1994)
Performer
The 8th Annual American Comedy Awards (1994)
CBS Sneak Peek II (1994)
46th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards (1994)
Presenter
A Century of Women (1994)
Voice
Comic Relief VI (1994)
Bob Hope: The First Ninety Years (1993)
45th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards (1993)
Presenter
Laughing Matters (1993)
Great Television Moments: What We Watched (1993)
Aretha Franklin: Duets (1993)
49th Annual Golden Globe Awards (1992)
Performer
The 44th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards (1992)
Presenter
The 6th Annual American Comedy Awards (1992)
Performer
A User's Guide to Planet Earth: The American Environment Test (1991)
Funny Women of Television: A Museum of Television & Radio Tribute (1991)
Big Bird's Birthday or Let Me Eat Cake (1991)
1991 Emmy Awards (1991)
Performer
The 62nd Annual Academy Awards Presentation (1990)
Presenter
CBS Comedy Bloopers (1990)
CBS Comedy Bloopers II (1990)
Time Warner Presents the Earth Day Special (1990)
42nd Annual Primetime Emmy Awards Presentation (1990)
Host
Comic Relief IV (1990)
CBS Premiere Preview Spectacular (1989)
The 41st Annual Emmy Awards (1989)
Performer
The 61st Annual Academy Awards Presentation (1989)
Performer
Paris '89 (1989)
Host
Memories Then & Now (1988)
It's Up to Us: The Giraffe Project (1988)
Moving Day (1987)
Bugs Bunny/Looney Tunes All-Star 50th Anniversary (1986)
The Way They Were (1981)
The Woody Allen Special (1969)
Guest

Music (Special)

Edgar Bergen: His Many Voices (1995)
Song Performer ("The Tennessee Waltz")

Cast (Short)

The Lion Roars Again (1975)
Herself

Cast (TV Mini-Series)

Hollywood Wives (1986)

Life Events

1952

Made her radio debut as a guest on her father's program

1958

Appeared with her father on Groucho Marx's quiz show "You Bet Your Life" (NBC) as Candy Bergen

1966

Played Shirley Eckert, an assistant school teacher, in the Oscar nominated movie, "The Sand Pebbles"

1966

Made her film-acting debut in "The Group," playing a glamorous lesbian

1967

Made adult TV episodic debut, "Coronet Blue" (CBS)

1968

Wrote "The Freezer," which was included in the publication "Best Short Plays of 1968"

1971

Acted in the Mike Nichols-directed "Carnal Knowledge"

1975

Starred as an American woman kidnapped in the Middle East in the period drama "The Wind and the Lion"

1975

Worked as a photojournalist for <i>Life</i>, <i>Playboy</i> and <i>Esquire</i>

1978

Co-starred opposite Ryan O'Neal in "Oliver's Story," a sequel to O'Neal's 1970 hit film "Love Story"

1979

Earned a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for her comedic turn as Burt Reynolds' ex-wife in "Starting Over"

1981

Teamed with Jacqueline Bisset in George Cukor's "Rich and Famous"

1982

Played photojournalist Margaret Bourke-White in the Oscar-winning "Gandhi"

1985

TV-movie debut in "Arthur the King" (CBS)

1985

Made miniseries debut in "Hollywood Wives" (ABC)

1985

Appeared in her last feature for 15 years, "Stick"

1985

Made her Broadway debut in the Mike Nichols-directed "Hurlyburly"; replaced Sigourney Weaver in the role of Diane

1988

Made her TV series debut, playing controversial TV journalist "Murphy Brown" (CBS), show achieved a level of political notoriety in the 1992 presidential election when Dan Quayle mentioned the show in a campaign speech, known as the "Murphy Brown speech"

1996

Made first TV-movie in nearly a decade, "Mary & Tim" (CBS)

2000

Hosted the talk show "Exhale with Candice Bergen" for the Oxygen network

2000

Returned to features in "Miss Congeniality" as the sweet-yet-demented pageant host Kathy Morningside

2002

Served as an occasional contributor to NBC's morning show "Today"

2002

Played the NYC mayor in "Sweet Home Alabama"

2002

Had a recurring role on HBO's "Sex and the City" playing Enid Frick, Carrie Bradshaw's (Parker) editor at <i>Vogue</i>

2003

Appeared on NBC's "Will & Grace" as 'Candy Bergen,' an acquaintance of Karen

2005

Joined the cast of ABC's "Boston Legal" as Shirley Schmidt, the third partner of Crane, Poole & Schmidt; earned Golden Globe (2005), Emmy (2006, 2008) and SAG (2006) nominations

2008

Reprised the role of <i>Vogue</i> editor Enid Frick in "Sex and the City: The Movie"

2008

Was featured in Diane English's female ensemble "The Women," a remake of the 1936 play by Clare Boothe Luce

2009

Co-starred opposite Kate Hudson and Anne Hathaway in the comedy "Bride Wars"

2011

Had a recurring guest role on "House"

2014

Appeared in the holiday-themed comedy "A Merry Friggin' Christmas"

2017

Starred in Noah Baumbach's dramedy "The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected)"

2018

Cast in the comedy "Lapham Rising"

2018

Reprised her most famous role in the reboot of "Murphy Brown"

2018

Appeared with Diane Keaton, Jane Fonda and Mary Steenburgen in "Book Club"

Photo Collections

The Wind and the Lion - Poster Art
Here is the primary art used in movie posters for MGM's The Wind and the Lion (1975), starring Sean Connery and Candice Bergen.
Carnal Knowledge - Movie Poster
Carnal Knowledge - Movie Poster
Bite the Bullet - Movie Poster
Here is the American one-sheet movie poster for Columbia Pictures' Bite the Bullet (1975), starring Gene Hackman. One-sheets measured 27x41 inches, and were the poster style most commonly used in theaters.

Videos

Movie Clip

Group, The (1966) -- (Movie Clip) Landlord, Fill The Flowing Bowl Somewhat bawdy English traditional song Landlord, Fill The Flowing Bowl among several choral pieces opening Sidney Lumet's The Group, 1966, introducing classmates Joan Hackett, Candice Bergen, Shirley Knight, Joanna Pettet et al, and their valedictorian Kathleen Widdoes.
Group, The (1966) -- (Movie Clip) Not To The Manor Born New England ladies' college graduates led by "Lakey" (Candice Bergen) at the speedily arranged New York wedding of classmate Kay (Joanna Pettet) to aspiring playwright Harald (Larry Hagman) in Sidney Lumet's The Group, 1966, from the Mary McCarthy novel.
Carnal Knowledge (1971) -- (Movie Clip) A Special Quality Jonathan (Jack Nicholson) makes a play for his best friend's girl Susan (Candice Bergen) while on a contrived visit to Smith College in director Mike Nichols' Carnal Knowledge, 1971.
Sand Pebbles, The (1966) -- (Movie Clip) Most China Sailors Headed up the Yangtze in 1926 to a new ship, Navy engineer Jake (Steve McQueen) with the only other young American on board, Vermonter Shirley (Candice Bergen), whom he met the previous evening, early in Robert Wise’s The Sand Pebbles, 1966, from the Richard McKenna novel.
2010 (1984) -- (Movie Clip) We Have Often Spoken About HAL Star Roy Scheider is not seen here, as he’s busy assembling an American crew to visit the spaceship lost in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, instead we meet Bob Balaban as Dr. Chandra, who designed the HAL 9000 computer, conversing with its “sister” SAL, in the sequel 2010, 1984.
Wind And The Lion, The (1975) -- (Movie Clip) Tangier, October 15, 1904 Writer-Director John Milius’ rousing opening, an Arab band we’ll later learn is led by Sean Connery, and the American compound in Tangier, where Candice Bergen resides, Billy WIlliams, the cinematographer, her companion, shooting on location in Spain, in The Wind And The Lion, 1975.
Wind And The Lion, The (1975) -- (Movie Clip) I Am Not A Barbarous Man Her character is fictional but the kidnapping is not, Candice Bergen as American Mrs. Pedecaris, with kids (Simon Harrison, Polly Gottesman), taken by Moroccan chieftan Raisuli (Sean Connery), who is at pains to explain his actions, in writer-director John Milius’ The Wind And The Lion, 1975.
Bite the Bullet -- (Movie Clip) Opening Credits Nevada is the backdrop for the opening title sequence from writer/director Richard Brooks' 1975 revisionist Western Bite the Bullet, starring Gene Hackman and James Coburn.

Trailer

Family

Edgar Bergen
Father
Ventriloquist, actor. Died in 1978.
Frances Bergen
Mother
Actor. Former Chesterfield Girl.
Kris Bergen
Brother
Film and video editor. Born on October 12, 1961.
Chloe Malle
Daughter
Born in 1985.

Companions

Terry Melcher
Companion
Record producer. Involved in the late 1960s.
Bert Schneider
Companion
Producer. Together from 1971 to March 1974.
Louis Malle
Husband
Director. Married from September 27, 1980 until his death on November 23, 1995; born on October 30, 1932.
Marshall Rose
Husband
Real estate developer. Dating as of fall 1998; married on June 15, 2000.

Bibliography

"Knock Wood"
Candice Bergen, Linden Press (1984)

Notes

Awarded honorary doctorate degree from alma mater University of Pennsylvania (1992).

She holds the record for most Emmy wins (five) for lead actor in a single series.

Bergen became spokesperson for SPRINT long-distance service in 1990.