Mariette Hartley, was born Mary Loretta Hartley on June 21, 1940 in Weston, Connecticut to Paul and Mary "Polly" Hartley. She is an American actress, best known for her work in television, but who began her career on stage coached and mentored by the legendary Eva Le Gallienne in her teens.

She launched her film career in Ride the High Country, a classic western with Randolph Scott, Joel McCrea and directed by Sam Peckinpah.

One of her early television guest appearances was in the next-to-last classic Star Trek episode, All Our Yesterdays.

She co-starred in the 1980s situation comedy Goodnight, Beantown alongside Bill Bixby. She had previously made a memorable guest appearances on Bixby's 1970s TV series, The Incredible Hulk.

During the late 1970s she also appeared with James Garner in an extremely popular series of television commercials advertising Polaroid cameras. The two actors worked so well together that it was often erroneously suggested that they were married in real life. Her bio contains a photo of her in a T-shirt proclaiming, "I am NOT Mrs. James Garner". Hartley also guest-starred in an episode of Garner's TV series The Rockford Files during this period. The script required them to kiss at one point. Unknown to them, a paparazzo was photographing the scene from a distance. The photos were run in a tabloid trying to provoke a scandal, causing a great deal of trouble.

She has spoken in public about her experience of bipolar disorder, and was a founder of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.

She is the author of Breaking The Silence with Anne Commire and has her one-woman show, If You Get to Bethlehem, You've Gone Too Far currently running in Los Angeles.

Trivia

• Hartley is a granddaughter of American psychologist John B. Watson through Watson's daughter from his first marriage.

Awards and recognition

• Won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series for the episode "Married" of The Incredible Hulk (1978)