Ann Jillian

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Ann Jillian (born January 29, 1950) is an Lithuanian - American actress whose career began as a child actress in the 1960s.

She is possibly best known for her role as the vampy Cassie Cranston on the 1980s sitcom It's a Living.

Personal life

Jillian gave birth to her only child, a son, Andrew Joseph Murcia, in 1992. She continued to act, with ten TV movie roles throughout the 1990s, although her television and film credits became sporadic since the late 1990s, as she decided to devote herself to raising her son and to promoting breast cancer issues. Today, she mostly works as a motivational speaker and also performs as a singer in corporate and symphony "pops" circles, conducted by Judith Morse. She is an occasional guest columnist for the website TheColumnists.com. She resides with her family in the Greater Los Angeles area.

On September 12, 2015, Jillian was inducted into the National Lithuanian American Hall of Fame.

Before resuming production on It's a Living in 1985, Jillian (then 35) made headlines when she was diagnosed with breast cancer, and she became a vocal advocate for cancer research and prevention. Leaving It's a Living after the 1985–86 season, she focused on beating her cancer, with treatment including a double mastectomy. Her battle with cancer was chronicled in the top-rated made-for-TV film, The Ann Jillian Story (1988), in which Jillian portrayed herself. The film required two years to be produced, due to conflicts in tone, the degree of medical information included, and the relatively limited, realistic reaction portrayed by Jillian and her stage husband, before and after her surgery. Jillian received her third Emmy Award nomination, for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or a Special, and won a 1989 Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for TV.

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Early life and career

Jillian was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1950 to Lithuanian immigrant parents Juozas and Margarita Nauseda (later George and Margaret Nauseda) and speaks Lithuanian fluently. Jillian was raised as a devout Roman Catholic.

She began her career as a child actress in 1960 when she played Little Bo Peep in the Disney film Babes in Toyland. Jillian appeared as Dainty June in the Rosalind Russell-Natalie Wood movie version of Gypsy (1962). She had several television appearances in the 1960s and 1970s, notably becoming a regular on the 1960s sitcom Hazel (1965-66 season) and appearing in the 1963 Twilight Zone episode "Mute" (where she was given screen credit as "Ann Jilliann") as the mute telepath Ilse Nielson. In 1983, Jillian was honored by the Young Artist Foundation with its Former Child Star "Lifetime Achievement" Award recognizing her achievements within the entertainment industry as a child actress.

Jillian moved on to voice roles, for Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! and Sealab 2020 in the early 1970s, but — told she was too old to play youthful roles of the day and too young to play a leading lady — there was no more work for her in Hollywood. She took a department store job and studied psychology, but heeded the advice of casting director Hoyt Bowers and Walt Disney who had told her, "Whatever you do, keep working at your craft".

Jillian married Andy Murcia, a Chicago police sergeant, on March 27, 1978, and shortly thereafter Murcia retired to manage his wife's career. Murcia later partnered with Joyce Selznick in management of Ann Jillian until Joyce died of breast cancer shortly after.

In the late 1970s, she toured in musical comedies including Sammy Cahn's Words and Music. After appearing with Mickey Rooney in the play Goodnight Ladies in Chicago, the producers cast Ann Jillian to appear in the original company of Sugar Babies on Broadway with Rooney and Ann Miller in 1979. She also starred in I Love My Wife at the Drury Lane Theatre in Chicago.

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