Sharon Acker, Star of ‘The Bold Ones’ & ‘Executive Suite,’ Dies at 87
Sharon Acker, who racked up dozens of TV appearances in the 1970s and 1980s, has died at 87 years old.
The actor died in her hometown of Toronto on March 16, nearly three decades after retiring from her acting career, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Acker got her start in the mid-1950s, appearing, for example, in a 1956 CBC production of Anne of Green Gables. That same year, she joined the Stratford Shakespeare Festival company and teamed up with future Star Trek star William Shatner for a production of The Merry Wives of Windsor.
In another Shakespeare adaptation, she costarred with Sean Connery in a 1961 CBC production of Macbeth.
She made her mark in American cinema in 1967 with a role as Lee Marvin’s onscreen wife in the cult crime flick Point Blank.
In 1970, she and Hal Holbrook graced the cover of TV Guide Magazine in promotion of their NBCpolitical drama The Bold Ones: The Senator.
In 1973, she starred as Della Street in CBS’ short-lived The New Perry Mason, sharing the screen with Monte Markham as the titular defense attorney, as seen here.
Sherman Weisburd/TV Guide/Courtesy: Everett Collection
And from 1976 to 1977, Acker starred as Mitchell Ryan’s onscreen wife in the CBS primetime soap Executive Suite.
Other roles in the 1970s included appearances on the TV shows Alias Smith and Jones, Gunsmoke, Mission: Impossible, Barnaby Jones, The Love Boat, and The Rockford Files.
In the 1980s, Acker appeared in Galactica 1980, The Incredible Hulk, Quincy M.E., Knight Rider, and Murder, She Wrote, among other guest-starring gigs.
She also played Judith Wheeler in dozens of episodes of the NBC daytime drama Texas, and she played Pamela Fouchier in several installments of the same network’s Days of Our Lives.
Her final screen appearance came in 1992, when she recurred as Dr. Grace Sundell in CBS’ The Young and the Restless. She retired from acting in 1994 and moved back to Canada with second husband Peter Elkington, who died in 2001.
Acker is survived by children Kim and Gillian, stepchildren Kim and Caitlin, granddaughter Alexis, and great-granddaughter Berkeley.
Top TV Sleuths of the '70s
It's no mystery that TV detectives ruled the airwaves in the 1970s.
Buy This Issue