Kate McNeil

Kate McNeil (born August 7, 1958) is an American actress. She starred in the CBS daytime soap opera As the World Turns from 1981 to 1984, and in 1983 had the leading role in the slasher film The House on Sorority Row. McNeil was also the female lead in the 1988 horror film Monkey Shines.

Early years

The daughter of the president of the U.S. Cocoa Corporation, McNeil grew up in Gladwyne, a suburb in Lower Merion Township, of Montgomery County, west of Philadelphia, in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. In high school, she said, "I was in a lot of plays, and I was a bit wild." She went on to study theater further at Ithaca College, in Ithaca, New York.

Career

McNeil began her acting career on the daytime soap opera As the World Turns in 1981. The following year of 1982, she appeared in the low-budget comedy Beach House. The next year, she starred in the slasher / horror film The House on Sorority Row. 1985, saw Kate McNeil appearing in the TV miniseries Kane & Abel and afterwards in 1986 she was featured in another miniseries, the historical epic about the American Civil War (1861-1865), the sequel / second of three in the series, North and South Book II, based on the thick three-volumes set of historical fiction books North and South by acclaimed author John Jakes (1932-2023). She later co-starred in director George A. Romero's horror film Monkey Shines two years afterwards in 1988. In the 1990s, Kate McNeil appeared as Janet Gilchrist, fiance and then wedded wife of famous TV teen-ager character of the 1970s, now older and more mature main character "John Boy" Walton (Richard Thomas, born 1951), in the final three of subsequent six sequel / reunion made-for-TV films aired in the 1990s (1993, 1995 and 1997), following the long-running The Waltons TV series of 1971/1972 to 1981.

Also in the early 1990s, McNeil was a cast member of two television shows, WIOU and Bodies of Evidence. McNeil has also made numerous individual television episodes with guest appearances. She has appeared on Amazing Stories (1985), Simon & Simon, Designing Women, Midnight Caller, Quantum Leap (1989), The X-Files, Murder, She Wrote, Babylon 5, Diagnosis Murder, Veronica Mars, Bones, The Mentalist, and Mad Men.