Gail Strickland

Gail Strickland is an American actress born on May 18, 1945, in Birmingham, Alabama, who built a career spanning Broadway, film, and television before retiring due to a medical condition. She is one of five children born to Theodosia and Lynn Strickland, whose family operated a large tire dealership. As a tall child who felt overlooked socially, Strickland channeled her energy into writing and performing plays as a means of gaining attention.

Strickland attended Brooke Hill School in Birmingham before enrolling at Florida State University, where she was a gymnast and became the first female clown in the university's circus program. She also earned a teaching certificate in English during her time there and spent her college summers performing in community theater in Sarasota, Florida. After graduating, she spent two months working as a governess in Spain, then took a job as a waitress on Cape Cod before relocating to New York. There she worked as a receptionist at an advertising agency while studying improvisational acting, and later attended Sanford Meisner Drama School. During this period she took on roles in commercials and soap operas.

Her stage career brought her to Broadway between 1973 and 1996. She starred in I Won't Dance and appeared in productions of The Father and Status Quo Vadis. Her Broadway work earned her the Drama Desk Award for Most Promising Performer in 1973.

On screen, Strickland accumulated a substantial body of film work, with supporting roles in The Drowning Pool (1975), Bound for Glory (1976), Who'll Stop the Rain (1978), Norma Rae (1979), and Protocol (1984). In 1995 she played Esther MacInerney, the wife of Martin Sheen's presidential chief of staff character, in The American President.

Her television credits were equally extensive. In 1973 she appeared as Sister Ann in a season four episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show. She played Captain Helen Whitfield, a nurse dealing with alcoholism, on M*A*S*H, and appeared in two episodes of The Bob Newhart Show as Courtney, a love interest for Jerry Robinson. Strickland appeared in the pilot episode of Night Court as the public defender and guest-starred in a first-season episode of Cagney & Lacey. She portrayed nurse practitioner Marilyn McGrath in the 1988 series HeartBeat, a role recognized as one of the earliest depictions of a lesbian character on American network television. From 1993 to 1994 she appeared in 11 episodes of Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman as Olive Davis, and guest-starred in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Paradise" as Alixus. During the 1994–95 season she appeared in two episodes of Seinfeld as Mrs. Landis of Doubleday. Additional television credits include the JAG first-season episode "War Cries," in which she played U.S. Ambassador Bartlett, a role in the ER season six episode "The Peace of Wild Things" as Dr. Rene Spielman, and a recurring part in the short-lived 2002 CBS series First Monday, where she played an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court.

In her personal life, Strickland married Neil Baker, with whom she has a daughter named Maisy. She also has a stepson named Chris Baker. In the early 1990s she was diagnosed with spasmodic dysphonia, a condition affecting her speech. Strickland continued working for approximately 15 years after the diagnosis before the condition made it too difficult for her to deliver lines, ultimately leading to her retirement from acting.