Cathy Rigby

Cathy Rigby, born Cathleen Roxanne Rigby on December 12, 1952, in Los Alamitos, California, is a former competitive gymnast, stage and television actress, and public speaker. She is best known for her decades-long association with the title role of Peter Pan and for her achievements as one of the most prominent American gymnasts of the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Rigby first gained national attention at the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City, where she became the highest-scoring American gymnast in the competition. Her performances helped bring widespread popularity to gymnastics in the United States. Two years later, at the 1970 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships, she became the first American woman to win a medal at that event, earning silver on the balance beam. She went on to claim the U.S. national championship in both 1970 and 1972. Rigby competed again at the 1972 Summer Olympics but was hampered by injury and did not win a medal, retiring from the sport following those Games. A multiple-exposure photograph of Rigby performing on the balance beam was later selected for inclusion on the Voyager Golden Record as a representation of the range of human motion. In 1998, she was inducted into the International Gymnastics Hall of Fame.

Following her retirement from gymnastics, Rigby transitioned into acting. In 1974, producers of a theater-in-the-round production of Peter Pan offered her the title role, which she accepted despite having no prior theatrical experience. She discovered an affinity for the part and would go on to play Peter Pan for more than 30 years. During the mid-1970s, she became the first celebrity to endorse a menstrual hygiene product, appearing in a series of television commercials for Stayfree maxi pads. She subsequently spent 18 years as a commentator for ABC Sports and appeared in made-for-television movies. In 1976, she guest-starred as a Russian gymnast in an episode of The Six Million Dollar Man. In 1981, she starred as Dorothy in a production of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, and her other theatrical credits include Annie Get Your Gun and Meet Me in St. Louis.

Rigby's Broadway career spanned from 1990 to 2011. She first appeared on Broadway as Peter Pan in 1990, a performance that earned her a Tony Award nomination for Best Actress in a Musical in 1991. She returned to the role on Broadway in 1998 and 1999, and that production received a Tony Award nomination for Best Revival of a Musical in 1999. Her Broadway credits also include Seussical and Annie Get Your Gun. In 2004, she received a Distinguished Lifetime Service Award from The Broadway League.

Beyond Broadway, Rigby continued to tour extensively in the role of Peter Pan. She played the part again in touring productions in 2004 and 2005, which she billed as a farewell to the role, and returned to it in 2008 at the Benedum Center in Pittsburgh and in 2009 at the Mansion Theater in Branson, Missouri. In August 2011, she launched another Peter Pan tour at the age of 60, which ran through 2013, concluding on April 28 of that year. In 2002 and 2003, she played the Cat in the Hat in the touring production of Seussical. In August 2015, she reprised Peter Pan in a limited 15-day engagement at the Pacific National Exhibition in Vancouver. In 2012, she appeared in the American Girl film McKenna Shoots for the Stars as McKenna's gymnastics coach.

In her personal life, Rigby married professional football player Tommy Mason in 1972; the two had two sons before divorcing in 1981. While performing in The Wizard of Oz, she met Tom McCoy, whom she later married and credited with helping her overcome bulimia nervosa, an eating disorder she struggled with for 12 years. She and McCoy have two daughters, Theresa and Kaitlin. Beginning in the 1980s, Rigby began speaking publicly about her experiences with eating disorders, and she has continued to work as a public speaker on that subject.