June Fairchild

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June Fairchild
Born June Edna Wilson
(1946-09-03)September 3, 1946
Manhattan Beach, California, U.S.
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Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Cause of death liver cancer
Nationality American
Occupation Actress
Years active 1966-1978
Spouse(s) Tommy Lee Mull (1980 -?) (divorced) (1 child)
Children Megan Mull[1]

June Edna Fairchild (September 3, 1946 – February 17, 2015) was an American actress and dancer. Fairchild starred or co-starred in more than a dozen major notable film roles before her addictions to drugs and alcohol effectively ended her professional acting career.

Life

Fairchild was born June Edna Wilson on September 3, 1946,[2] in Manhattan Beach, California.[3] Her father was a musician who specialized in writing gospel songs and music.[2] Fairchild was raised in Manhattan Beach and graduated from Aviation High School in Redondo Beach.[2] She was hired as a member of the Gazzarri Dancers on the 1960s syndicated variety show, Hollywood A Go-Go, after graduating from high school.[2]

Year of success

During the 1960s, Fairchild lived with her then-boyfriend, Danny Hutton, the lead singer of Three Dog Night for several years.[2] Fairchild conceived the band's name, Three Dog Night, after reading that indigenous Australian aborigines judged the coldness of a night by the number of dingos they had to curl up with to stay warm.[2]

In the late 1960s and 1970s Fairchild had a successful acting career. She co-starred in Head, which was a vehicle for The Monkees, in 1968; Drive, He Said, which was directed by Jack Nicholson, in 1971; Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, which starred Clint Eastwood and Jeff Bridges, in 1974; and the 1978 Cheech & Chong film, Up in Smoke, in which she appeared as a drug addict who snorts Ajax soap powder.[2]

Decline

In her later life Fairchild lived on the streets of Los Angeles' Skid Row due to her addictions.[2]

In 2001, a reporter for the Los Angeles Times ran a story about Fairchild's past career in Hollywood and her present life on the streets of Los Angeles.[4] Fairchild was selling newspapers outside a Los Angeles courthouse at the time in an attempt to earn enough money for a single-room occupancy hotel room.[2] On February 21, 2001, the same day that her story was published in the Los Angeles Times, police stopped her in Van Nuys for carrying an open container. A police officer recognized her picture from the newspaper and arrested her for failure to complete her community service from a past drunk driving conviction. Fairchild was sentenced to 90 days in prison.[2] In 2002, Fairchild told the Los Angeles Times that her prison sentence had triggered a pledge of sobriety.[2] Friends told reporters that Fairchild remained sober until her death in 2015.[2]

Fairchild spent the later years of her life living in single-room hotels in downtown Los Angeles using her Social Security disability payments.[2]

Death

Fairchild died from liver cancer at a convalescent home in Los Angeles on February 17, 2015, at the age of 68.[2] She was survived by her daughter, Megan Mull; a 2-month-old grandson; and her brother, Jerry Wilson. Fairchild had divorced twice.[2]

Partial filmography

References

  1. http://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-june-fairchild-20150219-story.html
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  5. Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. open access publication - free to read

External links