Candice Patricia Bergen (born May 9, 1946) is an Academy Award-nominated and Golden Globe and Emmy Award-winning American actress and former fashion model, known primarily for her roles in sitcoms and television. She is currently best known for her starring role on the television situation comedy Murphy Brown, and as William Shatner's legal partner, Shirley Schmidt, on the ABC hit comedy-drama, Boston Legal.
She was born in Beverly Hills, California, the daughter of Frances Westerman (1922 - October 2, 2006) — who was known professionally as Frances Westcott when she was a Powers model — and ventriloquist Edgar Bergen. Her paternal grandparents, Johan Henriksson Berggren and Nilla Svensdotter Osberg, were Swedish-born immigrants who Anglicized their surname. As a child Candice was often referred to as Charlie McCarthy's little sister, which irritated her (Charlie McCarthy being her father's star dummy).
Candice first appeared at age 11½ with her father on Groucho Marx's quiz show You Bet Your Life in 1958 as Candy Bergen. She said that when she grew up she wanted to design clothes.
Bergen has written articles, a play, and a memoir. She has also studied photography and worked as a photojournalist. Considered one of Hollywood's most beautiful women, Bergen worked as a fashion model but soon began acting. Despite initial rocky reviews, she appeared in such films as Carnal Knowledge and Starting Over, for which she received Oscar and Golden Globe nominations for best supporting actress.
On Murphy Brown, Bergen played a tough television reporter. Although the show was a successful comedy, it tackled important issues: Murphy Brown, a recovering alcoholic, became a single mother and later battled breast cancer. In 1992, then Vice President Dan Quayle criticized prime-time TV for showing the Murphy Brown character "mocking the importance of fathers by bearing a child alone and calling it just another lifestyle choice."While his remarks became comedic fodder, they paved the way for a subsequent episode to explore the subject of family values within a diverse set of families. Remaining true to the show's humor, Murphy arranges for a truckload of potatoes to be dumped in front of Quayle's residence (a reference to an infamous incident in which Quayle misspelled the word potato as potatoe.) In real life, however, Bergen agreed with at least some of Quayle's observations, saying Quayle's speech was "a perfectly intelligent speech about fathers not being dispensable and nobody agreed with that more than I did," according to the Associated Press. Bergen's run on Murphy Brown was extremely successful; between 1989 and 1995 she was nominated for an Emmy Award seven times and won five. After her fifth win, she declined future nominations for her role as Murphy Brown.
After playing the role of the successful journalist, Bergen was offered the chance to work as a real-life journalist. After the run of Murphy Brown ended in 1998, CBS gave her the opportunity to cover some stories for 60 Minutes, an offer she declined. She expressed that acting was her profession, journalism was meant for her television character, and should not cross over into her own professional life.
After Murphy Brown, Bergen hosted Exhale with Candice Bergen on the Oxygen network. She also appeared in character roles in films, most notably Miss Congeniality as the sweet-yet-demented pageant host Kathy Morningside; she also portrayed the mayor of New York in Sweet Home Alabama. In 2003, she appeared in the movie View from the Top. In January 2005, Bergen joined the cast of Boston Legal as Shirley Schmidt, a founding partner in the law firm of Crane, Poole & Schmidt. Bergen received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for her performance in Boston Legal in 2006.
She has also done guest appearances on many TV shows, including Seinfeld (playing Murphy Brown), Law & Order, Family Guy, Will & Grace (playing herself), and Sex and the City, where she played Enid Frick, Carrie Bradshaw's editor at Vogue. She is also well-known for starring in a long-running "Dime Lady" ad campaign for the Sprint phone company.
Candice attended the University of Pennsylvania, but acknowledges that her failure to take her education seriously resulted in her being asked to leave. Bergen and then boyfriend Terry Melcher lived at 10050 Cielo Drive in Los Angeles, which was later occupied by Sharon Tate and her husband, Roman Polanski. Tate and four others were later murdered in the home. A political activist, Bergen accepted a date with Henry Kissinger but was unable to influence his views. In 1981, she married French film director Louis Malle. They had a daughter, Chloe Malle, in 1985, and were married until his death by cancer in 1995. Their daughter currently attends Brown University.
Bergen has traveled extensively and speaks French fluently. She is a vegetarian and is now married to New York real estate magnate and philanthropist Marshall Rose.
Bergen is a sister of Kappa Kappa Gamma
