Janice Rule

One of the most versatile actresses, Janice Rule was born in Norwood, Ohio, on August 15, 1931.

Janice made her screen debut in the star-studded movie Goodbye, My Fancy (1951).

She turned down the lead femme role opposite Marlon Brando in the film On the Waterfront (1954) because she preferred the dramatic stage to the Hollywood studio system where she was unhappily being promoted as a sex symbol. At the time she was earning acclaim in "Picnic" on Broadway. Kim Novak was assigned the movie role. Janice eventually lost her Warner Bros. contract due to this "misbehavior".

She played the rival for James Stewart's affections, and was driven away by witch Kim Novak, in Bell, Book And Candle (1958), a pre-Bewitched (1964) comedy.

Janice appeared in the first season of the ground-breaking science fiction series The Twilight Zone (1959) playing "Helen Foley" (named after Rod Serling's favorite teacher).

Her character, Helen Foley, in The Twilight Zone: Nightmare as a Child (1960), was the name of series creator Rod Serling's favorite and most influential real-life teacher.

In 1961, Janice married Ben Gazzara and they had one daughter, Elizabeth Gazzara (they divorced in 1979). After marrying, Janice took off a few years from movie acting, then returned to the silver screen and gave her best performances.

In a change of pace role, she was the party girl in The Chase (1966); and Janice showed a real flair for comedy as "Matt Helm"'s partner in The Ambushers (1967) with Dean Martin.

She did a wonderful job realistically portraying a frontier woman in Welcome to Hard Times (1967), and received acclaim for her performance as a disturbed artist in Three Women (1977).

Studied psychoanalysis and earned a doctorate in 1983 from the Southern California Psychoanalytic Institute. She had a private practice in New York City.