Derek started modeling to pay for a new
surfboard, and after a few shoots and a
deodorant advertisement, she found she had a knack for performance. She secured a
Hollywood agent, and on the audition trail met director
John Derek, 30 years her senior. John filed for divorce from his wife, actress
Linda Evans, and John and Bo moved to Germany to avoid John being charged with
statutory rape under U.S. law due to Bo's being only 16. The couple returned to America soon after Bo's 18th birthday, and they married in 1976.They remained married until his death in 1998.
Her first on screen performance was in
Fantasies (1973). She made her second film 1977's
Orca: the Killer Whale, in which her character's leg was bitten off when the whale attacked her home on a pier.
Some of Bo Derek's subsequent films were not well-received by either the public or critics. For the
1981 film
Tarzan, the Ape Man, the producers of the film were actually sued by the
Edgar Rice Burroughs Estate over the name of the film, as Derek's role and physique seemed to overshadow the focus on
Tarzan himself. She followed this film with the sexually charged
Bolero and a subsequent role in her husband's production
Ghosts Can't Do It.
She made the first of many appearances in
Playboy, starting with the March 1980 issue. Her first pictorial (among others) was photographed by then husband John, on a secluded beach along an unnamed area of the
Colorado River. The twelve page spread featured a few with her and her pet
greyhound together jogging and sunbathing, as well as her sailing and swimming in the river, all nude. She appeared on the cover in a
bikini.
Horse owner and activist
A horse lover and riding enthusiast since childhood, she is the owner of
Andalusian horses and is a spokesperson for the
Animal Welfare Institute's national campaign to end horse slaughter through passage of federal and state legislation. On February 5, 2002, she published her autobiography entitled
Riding Lessons: Everything That Matters in Life I Learned from Horses Derek currently serves on the California Horse Racing Board.
Trivia
One of four children. Her father, Paul Collins, was a boat salesman and a Hobie Cat executive. Her mother,
Norma Collins, was a make-up artist, and hairdresser to
Ann-Margret.
Listed as one of twelve "Promising New Actors of 1979" in John Willis' Screen World, Vol 31. [1979]
Mentioned in the theme song of the 1980s TV hit
"The Fall Guy" (1981).
Did fund raising work for President
George W. Bush during the 2000 election.
Measurements: 32-22-32 (at age 16 as Mary Collins), 35-23 1/2-35 1/2 (while filming "10"), 37C-22-34 (in 1983), 38-22-36 (as reported in 1985), (Source: Celebrity Sleuth magazine).
Attended Nathaniel Narbonne High School in Harbor City 1974.
Photographer for the
John Corbett tour. She shot his self-titled CD cover.
Oldest of 4 children: a brother and 2 sisters (one of whom is
Kerry Perez).
Bo and her late husband,
John Derek, formed "Svengali Productions".
Animal rights activist and supporter of the Republican Party.
Member of the NRA and a regular hunter. Close friend and vocal supporter of former NRA president
Charlton Heston.
Attended the Republican National Convention in New York in 2004 to show her support for President
George W. Bush and the Iraq war.
Is of Irish, German, Dutch and Welsh descent.
Lives on family horse ranch outside of Santa Ynez, California (between Santa Barbara and Santa Maria).
Her father Paul Collins, was the marketing and PR director at Kawasaki Motorcycles in the early 1970s.
She is a member of the California Horse Racing Board.
Named envoy to Fight Animal Trafficking by the U.S. State Dept.
Personal Quotes
"10" was amazing! I had no career before "10" and then all of a sudden I was able to do pretty much whatever I was able to do in the business.
Also there is a twist to the story as I'm being haunted and driven crazy, attacked and so on. All I seem to do is run and scream and cry in every scene.
Glorifying violence is terrible. Simulating sex is nothing - it's something so impersonal really.
I found my love when I was 17-years-old and my love is one hundred percent honest. We've never had any ugly, rocky things to overcome.
I grew up on the beaches of Southern California surfing and sailing and I've always loved horses so it was part of my dream that I was able to fulfill to have horses.
I love Spain. I go back two or three times a year usually to visit friends and ride horses.
I played a definite part in it. I guess the things that I played in films and the way the nudity and the love scenes were handled were really different.
It's been very nice. I haven't gotten out too much because we've been working a lot but other wise the people have been very nice and I've had a good time.
It's really difficult for me. Language, I am sorry that I haven't. I think I just always expected that you learn a word in place of a word and when I discovered how difficult the grammar was and learning that was very discouraging for me.
Probably some of the projects I chose to do after that had more to do with what people thought of me. The industry was very open and probably hoping that I could do anything.
There's an incredible fascination for that and that goes with violence and everything else in pictures.
We were on the island of Hawaii. I think I was there three months. It was fantastic. It is not much different than films. It depends on the television show but much of television today is as good or better than most films.
Whoever said money can't buy happiness simply didn't know where to go shopping.
Mykie's Note:
Every since i was a little boy I have had a thing for Bo Derek, But Back then she was Mary Cathleen. I think my oldest memory of Bo was maybe at 5 or 6 years old. She and my sister Patrica where besties back in high school, they both went to Norbone High and both shared a love for Horses, and in still managed to remain in touch here and there through out both there lives, funny they both ended up on ranches and farms!
Bo Derek is beautiful, you can't take that away from her, and when I see her on screen I am glued, she has a presence about her that's for sure and you like to look at her. As an actress, I think she has done some good work, i know a lot of people think she can't act her way out of a bag, but I think at the time of her major popularity, some pretty bad choices where made, one mainly that she may have let her then husband Actor/Director John Derek, make way to many decisions for her. If you look at her early work like ORCA, A Change Of Seasons, 10, you can see the talent is busting out everywhere, but then came Tarzan, Bolero, personally i love them, but critics wrote them of as soft core porn and just really ripped them to shreds. I love Bolero, and still have my copy of it on VHS. In 2003, I was asked to do makeup for a documentary on the Hayes Code during Hollywood's early days and was told that i would be working with no other then Bo Derek, well i was about ready to freak out, I just thought how amazing after all these year, that I would meet her again in a professional matter. Let me say that she is Gorgeous, simply stunning at any age. She was running late that day about an hour and was full of apologies and going out of her way to tell everyone how sorry she was to have help up the shoot, i didn't care it was Bo Derek and i got to paint this beauty's face. She was rather easy to do, i wont give away my secrets, but she did say, "wow, you knew how to do my face," and then stated that she would be taking the lip gloss with her, Mac's Entice lip glass for those in the know. By the end of the shoot O did bring up that we had met and that she and my sister new each other well, and she was like, "Wow your Patty McGuire's Little brother?"
She asked how she was and then we continues to work. Pretty much a career high for me then and still now.
as i like to do, i will include my favorite film selection of Bo Dereks. Some of them are pretty great in my books so maybe re -isited them and see what you think.
1977- Orca
1979- 10 (great)
1980- A Change Of Seasons(great)
1981-Tarzan, The Ape Man (better then you think)
1984- Bolero (guilty pleasure)
1990- Ghost Can't Do It (kinda funny)
1995- Tommy Boy (hilarious)
Lips
