Stella Stevens is an American actress, film producer and film director who began her acting career in 1959. She was born Estelle Caro Eggleston in Yazoo City, Mississippi on October 1, 1936 (or 1938, as some sources say), and grew up in Memphis, Tennessee.She married Noble Herman Stephens on September 1, 1954, when she was either 15 or 17 years old, by whom she had her only child, actor/producer Andrew Stevens. She and Noble Stephens divorced several years later, although she retained a variation of his surname as her own professional name.
She was first under contract to 20th Century Fox, then dropped after six months. After winning the role of Appassionatta Von Climax in Lil' Abner (1959), she got a contract with Paramount Studios and later Columbia Pictures. She shared the 1960 Golden Globe Award for "Most Promising Newcomer Female", with Tuesday Weld, Angie Dickinson, and Janet Munro.
In 1960, she was Playboy magazine's Playmate of the Month for January (and had featured pictorals in 1965 and 1968). She was listed among the 100 sexiest stars of the 20th century (#27). During the 1960s, she was one of the top ten most photographed women in the world.
In 1962, she starred opposite Elvis Presley "in Girls! Girls! Girls!. In 1963, she portrayed Jerry Lewis's love interest in The Nutty Professor. 1970 saw her featured in "The Ballad of Cable Hogue" with Jason Robards. In 1972, she appeared in Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure as Linda Rogo.
Throughout her career, she appeared in dozens of TV shows and was a regular on the 1982-1983 prime-time soap opera Flamingo Road. She teamed with the late Sandy Dennis in a touring production of an all-female version of Neil Simon's The Odd Couple, playing the messy one.
She produced and directed two films, The Ranch (1989) and The American Heroine (1979).
