Jane Seymour Biography

Birth Name : Joyce Penelope Wilhelmina Frankenberg

Date of Birth : 15 February 1951, Hayes, Hayes and Harlington, Middlesex, England, UK

Height : 5' 4" (1.63 m

Occupation : Actress

Actress. Born Joyce Penelope Wilhemina Frankenberg on February 15, 1951 in Wimbledon, England, Seymour is best known for her performances in made-for-television dramas. Seymour earned considerable popular acclaim for her portrayal of Dr. Michaela Quinn, a Boston physician who moves to the post-Civil War frontier, on the hit CBS series Dr. Quinn: Medicine Woman.

Seymour, the eldest of three daughters, was raised on the outskirts of London. Her father, John Frankenberg, was a Polish obstetrician and her mother, Mieke, a former Red Cross nurse. Her first love was ballet and she trained rigorously toward a career in that field. She made her professional debut at the age of 13 with the London Festival Ballet. She then entered the Arts Educational Trust to receive additional instruction. Three years later, after a performance with the Kirov Ballet, Seymour suffered knee injuries that effectively ended her dancing career.

From her early TV starring roles, Bathsheba in "The Story of David" (1976), Eva Meyers in "Seventh Avenue" (1977), undercover journalist Laura Cole in "Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders" (1979) and Cathy and Kate Ames in "East of Eden" (1981), Seymour frequently played the classy tart. She continued her persona of the gilded harlot in the 1980s as a French ambassador's wife in the miniseries "Crossings" (1986), opposite Michael Caine in the CBS mini "Jack the Ripper" (1988) offered a star turn as Natalie in the follow-up to "The Winds of War", "War and Remembrance" (1988 and 1989), and played an amnesia victim in "Sidney Sheldon's Memories of Midnight" (1991). Her film work has been somewhat lackluster in comparison, beginning with such action, science fiction and fantasy genre projects, such as a comely princess in 1977's "Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger" and 1980's cult classic time-travel romance "Somewhere in Time" opposite Christopher Reeve (she later named one of her twin sons, Kris, after her close friend Reeve), but later floundering in ABC's 1978 sci-fi series "Battlestar Galactica" (as Apollo's doomed paramour Serina); 1980s' "Oh Heavenly Dog" opposite Chevy Chase and canine superstar Benji; and the Tom Selleck heist film "Lassiter" (1984).