Jane Wyman, an Academy Award winner for her performance as the deaf rape victim in "Johnny Belinda," star of the long-running TV series "Falcon Crest" and Ronald Reagan's first wife, died Monday morning in California at age 93.
Wyman died at her Palm Springs home, said Richard Adney of Forest Lawn Memorial Park and Mortuary in Cathedral City. No other details were immediately available.
Wyman's film career spanned from the 1930s, including "Gold Diggers of 1937," to 1969's "How to Commit Marriage," co-starring Bob Hope and Jackie Gleason. From 1981 to 1990 she played Angela Channing, a Napa Valley winery owner who maintained her power with a steely will on CBS' "Falcon Crest."
Her marriage in 1940 to fellow Warner Bros. contract player Reagan was celebrated in the fan magazines as one of Hollywood's ideal unions. While he was in uniform during World War II, her career ascended, signaled by her 1946 Oscar nomination for "The Yearling."
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The couple divorced in 1948, the year she won the Oscar for "Johnny Belinda."
After Reagan became governor of California and then president of the United States, Wyman kept a decorous silence about her ex-husband, who had married actress Nancy Davis.
A few days after Reagan died on June 5, 2004, Wyman broke her silence, saying: "America has lost a great president and a great, kind and gentle man."
It was 1936 when Warner Bros. signed Wyman to a long-term contract.
Warner Bros. was notorious for typecasting its contract players, and Wyman suffered that fate. She recalled in 1968: "For 10 years I was the wisecracking lady reporter who stormed the city desk snapping, 'Stop the presses! I've got a story that will break this town wide open!' "
In 1937, Wyman married a wealthy manufacturer of children's clothes, Myron Futterman, in New Orleans. The marriage was reported as her second, but an earlier marriage was never confirmed. She divorced him in November 1938, declaring she wanted children and he didn't.
The actress became entranced by Reagan, a handsome former sportscaster who was a newcomer to the Warner lot. She wangled a date with him, and romance ensued.
They were married on Jan. 26, 1940. The following year she gave birth to a daughter, Maureen. They later adopted a son, Michael. They also had a daughter who was born several months premature in June 1947 and died a day later. Maureen died in August 2001 from cancer.
In Reagan's autobiography "An American Life," the index shows only one mention of Wyman, and it runs for only two sentences, including the wording that their marriage "didn't work out."
Early in their marriage, Reagan's career grew with "Knute Rockne — All American" and "King's Row," while Wyman languished as "Joan Blondell of the B's." That changed after Reagan joined the Army.
Wyman, who was born Sarah Jane Fulks in St. Joseph, Mo., escaped B-pictures by persuading Jack Warner to loan her to Paramount for "The Lost Weekend." The film won the Academy Award for 1945 and led to another loanout — to MGM for "The Yearling." The actress received her first Oscar nomination.
After 40 films at Warner Bros., Wyman achieved her first acting challenge with "Johnny Belinda."
Her first entry into television came with "The Jane Wyman Show," an anthology series that appeared on NBC from 1955 to 1958. She introduced the shows, half of them starring herself, half with other actors.
In 1952, Wyman married Fred Karger, a studio music director. They divorced, later remarried and divorced the second time in 1965.
When Wyman received the script for "Falcon Crest," she was undecided about undertaking the nasty, power-mad Angela Channing, so different from the self-sacrificing characters of her movie days.
But she liked the idea that Angela "runs everything.
Riding the wave of prime-time soap operas that made "Dallas" and "Dynasty" national sensations, "Falcon Crest" lasted nine seasons.
