Biography for
Jennifer O'Neill (I) More at IMDbPro »

Date of Birth

20 February 1948, Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Height

5' 8" (1.73 m)

Mini Biography

Jennifer O'Neill was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on February 20, 1948. Her father Oscar (deceased 2009 at age 91) was of Irish-Spanish descent, and her mother Irene ("Rene") was English. Whereas Elvis was riding high on the fame of his hit record "Blue Suede Shoes" in 1956, when she was nine years old in 1957, schoolmates humiliated her over a pair of pink suede shoes. Things got worse when her parents refused to buy her a horse (she has always loved horses), and got her a cat instead. At age fourteen, she attempted suicide with her mother's pills; her parents only saw this as an attempt for attention. Jennifer continued to ride horses every chance she could. However, at age fifteen, she broke her back and neck in three places when a horse she was riding fell on her. There would be no more horseback riding when her family moved from Connecticut to New York City soon after. O'Neill started her highly-successful modeling career in New York City and later in Paris when she was only fifteen as a means to make money to buy her own horse. She was a student at Dalton School in Manhattan, and she got into New York's Neighborhood Playhouse for aspiring actors.

Her first film was 'For Love of Ivy (1968)'. Although it was a small start, she did attract the interest of director 'Howard Hawks', who cast her to star opposite John Wayne in 'Rio Lobo (1970)'. Her agent fought hard to get her an audition for the main role in the surprise sleeper 'Summer of '42 (1971)'. This movie gave her national recognition; unfortunately, she would never have such a great role or film again. She continued to appear in profitable, though less critically acclaimed movies, from 'Lady Ice (1973)' through 'Scanners (1981)'. In 1976, she was briefly in Europe, where she appeared in 'The Flower in His Mouth' as a school teacher Elena, her only European film where where she appeared totally nude. She also worked with Italian director 'Luchino Visconti', and gave an award-winning performance in his last film _L'innocente (1976)). At age 49, she appeared in the 1997 Playboy Channel cable TV Movie 'The Corporate Ladder'.

However, she is most remembered for her decades-long "Cover Girl" campaign - in an industry where some models are "over the hill" at age 25, she had a 30 year run with this makeup product. Due to this long standing contract to her credit, she is listed in the Smithsonian Institute's American Museum of History, Center for Commercial Advertising.

O'Neill has had her ups and downs, successes and failures, marriages and divorces, and tragedies. She married her first husband at age seventeen in 1964, had a daughter, Aimee and was divorced in 1971. During her first marriage, she checked herself into a mental hospital for treatment for mental stress, and underwent electroshock therapy. O'Neill got her first divorce, and had an abortion before she married her second husband in 1972, this time to a former advertising executive and novelist and student of Eastern philosophy, Joseph Roster, which also ended in a divorce in 1974.

O'Neill then married her third husband in 1975 Nick De Noia, her producer and choreographer; he was also the original choreographer for the Chippendale dancers, and divorced him in 1976; he was later found shot to death with a large caliber handgun in April of 1987.

O'Neill married husband number four in 1978, Jeff Barry, a British drummer, singer and song writer ('Leader of the Pack'; 'I'm a Believer'; Sugar, Sugar'), but later divorced him in 1979.

O'Neill then married her manager, John Lederer, husband number five in 1979, and he gave her a son, Reis. However, he also went through all her money. O'Neill knew at the time of the marriage that he was a convicted felon, but married him anyway, and Lederer was subsequently was convicted of sexually abusing her daughter Aimee for a number of years. O'Neill divorced Lederer in 1983.

She amassed money again, and had a son, Cooper, with husband number six, Richard A. Alan, her limo driver with whom she went on a blind date and married him in 1984. Alan was unfaithful to her with prostitutes, and she divorced him in 1987 but, re-married him in 1993 but Alan later divorced her.

At age forty-four O'Neill then married husband number seven, Neil L. Bonin, in December of 1992 in Travis, Texas during a cross country car trip, O'Neill's five year old son serving as the best man. O'Neill had met Bonin in a New York restaurant and he was eleven years her junior; O'Neill had the marriage annulled in May of 1993 after just five months.

O'Neill then she married Mervin Sidney Louque a music producer (her 8th husband, 9th marriage) in 1996, and is still married to him.

In a 2008 interview, O'Neill stated that she had four grandchildren.

At age 34, O'Neill also suffered a gunshot wound. Police officers in Bedford, New York who interviewed the actress at her twenty-five room mansion, report that on October 23, 1982 O'Neill said that had she shot herself accidentally in the navel with her then husband John Lederer's .38 caliber revolver in the bedroom of her twenty-five room Bedford mansion while she was trying to determine if it was loaded.

She describes many of her life experiences, including her marriages and career, getting shot, the sexual abuse of her daughter, and the drug abuse of one of her children, to her move to her Tennessee farm in the late 1990s in her 1999 autobiography ''Surviving Myself''.

Despite personal tragedies, O'Neill is a loving and giving person - she has served as chairperson for the American Cancer Society being a breast cancer survivor herself (benign tumor), and worked for other charitable causes, such as the March of Dimes, the National Right to Life, the Retinitis Pigmetosa Foundation and the Arthritis Foundation, and the Silent No More national campaign. She is a tireless and ardent pro-life advocate for healing for post abortion women, having experienced an abortion and nine miscarriages during the course of having her three children.

She wrote her autobiography "Surviving Myself" in 1999, is the author of ten books, and remains active as a motivational speaker. O'Neill and her husband live in Nashville, Tennessee,where she can at last ride horses to her heart's content at her horse ranch called Hillenglade.

IMDb Mini Biography By: Anonymous

Spouse

Mervin Sidney Louque, Jr.	(1997 - present)
Richard A. Alan	(9 December 1993 - 1996) (divorced) 1 child
Neil L. Bonin	(9 December 1992 - 7 May 1993) (annulled)
Jeff Barry	(1988 - 1991) (divorced)
Richard A. Alan	(1984 - 1987) (divorced)
John Lederer	(1977 - 1983) (divorced) 1 child
Nick De Noia	(1975 - 1976) (divorced)
Joseph Roster	(1972 - 1974) (divorced)
Dean Rossiter	(1965 - 1971) (divorced) 1 child

Trivia

Married 9 times to 8 husbands, 3 children, 4 grandchildren, 9 miscarriages, 1 abortion.

Broke back and neck as youth when a horse she was riding fell on her.

Accidentally shot herself in the abdomen in 1983.

Lives on a farm in Nashville, Tennessee

Married to her eighth husband Mervin Sidney Louque, a music producer; it is her ninth marriage (husband number six Richard A. Alan she married twice).

Has her own Official Website and is busy still acting, directing, and producing.

Spokesperson for her own skin care line "Firm & Lift".

has 1 daughter: Aimee; and 2 sons: Reis and Cooper.

A former Ford model, for 30 years she was the face and spokeswoman for Cover Girl cosmetics, and is catalogued in the Smithsonian Institute's American History Museum, Center for Commercial Advertising.

Her father was Oscar O'Neill (1919-2009), a WWII bomber pilot who flew the B-17 and once had his plane shot down over Germany where he survived a prison camp. After the war he went back to England to marry Irene ("Rene").

Became an overnight film star and made an immediate "older woman" impact on young boys everywhere in the coming-of-age film Summer of '42 (1971), despite the fact that she was only in the movie for 12 minutes.

Was engaged to Elliott Gould in 1974.

Grandfather: Oscar O'Neill Sr. Banker. President of the Bank of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Father: Oscar O'Neill Jr. Medical supplies exporter. Mother: Irene O'Neill. English; met O'Neill's father when he was stationed in London during WWII; married c. 1945.

Enjoys horseback riding and training, cooking, music, singing, painting, designing furniture.

Personal Quotes

I cared very much about being a good actress, and I learned over the years. But it wasn't my main motivating force in life; that was my drive for relationships. The concept of letting a great offer go for the sake of a marriage is unheard of in America. I didn't make popular decisions. I never moved to Hollywood. I didn't take my clothes off to act. Hollywood never owned me. My need for love owned me.

Where Are They Now

(1999) "Surviving Myself", New York: William Morrow & Co.

(2002) "From Fallen to Forgiven", Thomas Nelson.

(2005) "You're Not Alone: Healing Through God's Grace After Abortion", Faith Communications.

(2005) "Remarkable Women", Insight Publishing.

(2006) "A Fall Together", B&H Publishing Group.

(2007) "A Winter of Wonders", B&H Publishing Group.