Tanya Roberts

Theodor was born in Vienna, Austria and immigrated to New York in 1904.

Oscar earned a bachelor's degree from Cornell University in 1934 and was a first year student in the medical college there.

In 1940, Tanya's father was working as an assistant manager for a music publishing house in New York City.

He married in 1945 in Weymouth, England, to Dorothy Leigh Smith from Oldham, England.

At age 22 Dorothy arrived in New York City in April 1945.

In 1948, Dorothy returned to New York from a trip to England with Tanya's two-year-old sister, Barbara.

Tanya's father was of Jewish descent and her mother was of English or Irish descent.

It has also been reported that her father was of Irish descent and her mother was Jewish.

She had one older sister, Barbara.

Tanya Roberts (born Victoria Leigh Blum; October 15, 1949 – January 6, 2021) was an American actress.

Tanya Roberts was born Victoria Leigh Blum in 1949 (although long given as 1955) in Manhattan, New York City, to Oscar Blum and his wife Dorothy (née Smith).

Oscar Maximilian Blum was born in New York City.

Oscar's father, Theodor Blum, has been called "The most outstanding oral surgeon in America" for his pioneering work in local anesthesia and the use of x-rays in dental care.

The 1950 U.S. Census shows that, as of April 1950, the Blum family lived in the hamlet of Hewlett in Hempstead, NY and that Oscar Blum was a sales executive for a pen manufacturer.

Tanya's parents purchased the Scarsdale home new in March 1951 and sold it in January 1958 to buy a property in Greenburgh, New York that same month.

In 1956, Tanya and her sister lived in Scarsdale, New York in a home built in 1950.

Tanya's father sold the Greenburgh property on his own in July 1961.

After meeting psychology student Barry Roberts while waiting in line for a movie, Victoria Blum proposed to him in a subway station and they were soon married.

While Barry pursued a career as a screenwriter, she began to study at the Actors Studio with Lee Strasberg and Uta Hagen under the name Tanya Roberts.

Roberts began her career as a model in TV ads for Excedrin, Ultra Brite, Clairol, and Cool Ray sunglasses.

She played serious roles in the off-Broadway productions Picnic and Antigone.

She also supported herself as an Arthur Murray dance instructor.

Her film debut was in The Last Victim (1975).

This was followed by the comedy The Yum-Yum Girls (1976).

In 1977, as Barry Roberts was securing his own screenwriting career, the couple moved to Hollywood.

Roberts was then cast in The Private Files of J. Edgar Hoover (1977) and the following year, participated in the drama Fingers.

Roberts was featured in several television pilots which were not picked up: Zuma Beach (a 1978 comedy), Pleasure Cove (1979), and Waikiki (1980).

In 1979 Roberts appeared in the cult film Tourist Trap, Racquet, and California Dreaming.

Some of her credits include playing Julie Rogers in the final season of the television series Charlie's Angels (1980–1981), Stacey Sutton in the James Bond film A View to a Kill (1985), Sheena in Sheena: Queen of the Jungle (1984), Kiri in The Beastmaster (1982) and Midge Pinciotti on That '70s Show (1998–2004).

In the summer of 1980, Roberts was chosen from some 2,000 candidates to replace Shelley Hack in the fifth season of the detective television series Charlie's Angels.

Roberts played Julie Rogers, a streetwise fighter who used her fists more than her gun.

Producers hoped Roberts's presence would revitalize the series's declining ratings and regenerate media interest in the series.

Before the season's premiere, Roberts was featured on the cover of People magazine with a headline asking if Roberts would be able to save the declining series from cancellation.

Despite the hype of Roberts's debut in November 1980, the series continued to draw dismal ratings and was canceled in June 1981.

Roberts played Kiri, a slave rescued by protagonist Dar (Marc Singer) in the adventure fantasy film The Beastmaster (1982), which became a cult film.

She was featured in a nude pictorial in Playboy to help promote the film, appearing on the cover of the October 1982 issue.

In 1983, Roberts filmed the Italian-made adventure fantasy film Hearts and Armour (also known as Paladini-storia d'armi e d'amori and Paladins — The Story of Love and Arms), based on the medieval novel Orlando Furioso.

She portrayed Velda, the secretary to private detective Mike Hammer, in the television film Murder Me, Murder You (1983), based on crime novelist Mickey Spillane's iconic Mike Hammer private detective series.

The two-part pilot spawned the syndicated television series Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer.

She declined to continue the role in the Mike Hammer series to work on her next project, the 1984 fantasy film Sheena: Queen of the Jungle, in which she played the main character.