Yvonne Joyce Craig was born on May 16, 1937 in Taylorville, Illinois. As a young teenager, Yvonne showed such promise as a dancer that she was accepted to Denham's Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo. Her training progressed until she left the company in 1957 over a disagreement on casting changes. She moved to Los Angeles hoping to continue her danci...
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Yvonne Joyce Craig was born on May 16, 1937 in Taylorville, Illinois. As a young teenager, Yvonne showed such promise as a dancer that she was accepted to Denham's Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo. Her training progressed until she left the company in 1957 over a disagreement on casting changes. She moved to Los Angeles hoping to continue her dancing, but was soon cast in movies. At first, Yvonne had small roles in movies such as Gidget (1959) and The Gene Krupa Story (1959). After that, her film career just bumped along. As Yvonne was dating Elvis Presley at the time, she did have a supporting role in the two Elvis movies, It Happened at the World's Fair (1963) and Kissin' Cousins (1964).But her fame would come with the cult television series Batman (1966) in which she played Commissioner Gordon's daughter, Barbara. Her secret identity was Batgirl and as the Commissioner's daughter, she had access to all the calls of trouble that was taking place in Gotham City. Her character, Batgirl, was part of the 1967-68 season, which was the end of the run for the series. After Batman (1966), she also appeared on other television series such as Star Trek (1966) and The Six Million Dollar Man (1974). As her career wound down, Yvonne went into the real estate business. Yvonne Craig died at age 78 of breast cancer at her home in Pacific Palisades, California on August 17, 2015. Show less «
I meet young women who say Batgirl was their role model. They say it's because it was the first time...Show more »
I meet young women who say Batgirl was their role model. They say it's because it was the first time they ever felt girls could do the same thing guys could do, and sometimes better. I think that's lovely. Show less «
One of the reasons I did the Batman (1966) series was so people would attach a name to my face. Befo...Show more »
One of the reasons I did the Batman (1966) series was so people would attach a name to my face. Before that, I had done a lot of television, but all people would say was, "Oh, that's um, um, what IS her name?". Show less «
[on the cancellation of Batman (1966)] When we were canceled by ABC, we wondered if we could get ano...Show more »
[on the cancellation of Batman (1966)] When we were canceled by ABC, we wondered if we could get another network. When it looked like we couldn't, they came with a bulldozer and bulldozed the whole set. Then two weeks later NBC said, "Listen, we'd like to take a shot at Batman if you still have the sets." They didn't want to start from scratch and build them because the set cost $800,000. So it was too late, nothing came of it. Show less «
I meet women today who tell me that they grew up viewing Batgirl as an important role model. If they...Show more »
I meet women today who tell me that they grew up viewing Batgirl as an important role model. If they choose to know me in that context, well, I'll take it. Show less «