Tanya Roberts may not be one of the best-known of the Charlie's Angels stars, but she was actually one of the most accomplished actors to turn up in the series. On top of that, she also went onto become a Bond girl - not bad for someone who quit school at 15 to go a-wandering around the United States...

Angel: Julie Rogers Tanya Roberts played Julie Rogers, the streetwise Angel with the darkest and most turbulent history. She actually entered the series as a suspect in a case the existing Angels were working on - after proving herself innocent, she was recruited by Charlie to replace Angel Tiffany Welles (Shelley Hack). By contrast with the elegant and almost aristocratic Tiffany, Julie was a gritty, no-frills kind of gal. Which isn't surprising, given that she was raised by an alcoholic mother and once wound up in jail for petty theft. She managed to leave all that behind her by starting afresh as a model, and - on becoming an Angel - proved one of Charlie's best ever agents. As a streetwise fighter Julie used her fists more than her gun, breathing new life into the series with her sexy looks and charisma.

Tanya Roberts Profile

Tanya was actually born Victoria Leigh Blum in New York on October 15, 1955, where she was raised in the gritty Bronx area of the city. She was the daughter of an Irish pen salesman and a Jewish mother. She was a highly independent youngster – perhaps too independent, dropping out of school at 15 to hitchhike around the States with a boy she'd fallen in love with (much to the mortification and shock of both their parents). Eventually she returned to New York to work as a model and then as a dance teacher, eager to rise in the show business ranks. She met psychology student, Barry Roberts, in a New York movie line. A few months later she proposed to him in a subway station, and they were married – taking on the surname Roberts, and changing her first name from Victoria to the less formal-sounding Tanya. Well, you've got to do whatever it takes to get noticed in the cutthroat world of show business...

The Trained Luvvie An important turning point came when Tanya started studying under the legendary Lee Strasberg – the highly influential acting guru who had overseen the early careers of everyone from James Dean to Marilyn Monroe to Robert De Niro. Strasberg's influence led to Tanya appearing in a variety of plays in New York. She appeared in off-Broadway productions of Picnic and Antigone and in television commercials for Ultra Brite, Clairol, and Cool Ray sunglasses. While studying she supported herself as an Arthur Murray dance instructor and then modeling but she eventually decided to move to LA to try to crack Hollywood – it was not for nothing that she'd had five years of voice training to lose her distinctive Bronx accent.

After experience as a model and off-Broadway actress, curvaceous Tanya Roberts began appearing in various films. Her film debut was the thriller Forced Entry (1975, Jim Sotos) together with Nancy Allen. This was followed by the comedy The Yum-Yum Girls (1976, Narry Rosen). In 1977, while her husband was securing his own screenwriting career, the couple moved to Hollywood to continue working there. In 1978 Tanya filmed the drama Fingers (by James Toback) co-starring Harvey Keitel, Tisa Farrow, Jim Brown and Danny Aiello. This movie had a high-profile cast  but sadly didn't result in Tanya being "discovered". In fact, the majority of her scenes were all cut for television showings. Yes, there is that bathroom rape scene... Most of her film roles relied almost exclusively on her physical attributes (she was 5' 8" (1.73 m). In 1979's cult  Tourist Trap (by David Schmoeller), for example, the camera took a near-fetishist interest in her long and well-toned legs. She also appeared in the movies Racket (1979, by David Winters) with Bjron Borg, and California Dreaming (1979, by John Hancock). Roberts also featured in several television pilots that were never picked up: Preasure Cove, the comedy Zuma Beach (1978, by Lee H. Katzin, co-written by Halloween director John Carpenter) and Waikiki (1980).

Angels and Afterwards In 1980, Roberts was chosen among other 2,000 candidates to replace Shelley Hack in Charlie's Angels in what later turned out to be the last season of the series. In the show, Roberts interpreted her character Julie Rogers as a streetwise fighter who used her fists more than her gun, breathing new life into the series then suffering from banal scripts and fan indifference with her sexy looks and charisma. Tanya's presence was not enough to save the show, but she at least presented us with a different kind of Angel, a bit more tough and streetwise. An overnight star, she found herself gracing magazine covers and being touted as one of the top TV stars (and sex symbols) of her day. While the role may not have won Roberts accolades, it certainly won her notice, and she would go on to star in other popular features.

Tanya successfully made a name for herself and got the attention of some producers for more higher profile projects, the first being "The Beastmaster" (by Don Coscarelli, creator of the Phantasm franchise). The Beastmaster enjoyed good publicity, mainly when Playboy magazine proposed an article on Tanya (and some sexy pictures), in the November 1982 issue. To this day, The Beastmaster remains a top cult movie and her role captured the attention of many a genre fan and made her somewhat of a cult icon. Tanya went on to star in an Italian production, "Hearts and Armor," an adventure film not very well-known in USA but worth a look. Tanya Roberts also exhibited an engaging flair for self-parody as luscious secretary Velda in the made-for-TV Mike Hammer: Murder Me, Murder You (1983) costarring with  Stacy Keach but when time came to develop the film into a series, Roberts had other commitments, and was replaced by Lindsay Bloom.