Tiffany Bolling. I watched 1975's The Wild Party not long ago and she was in that as well as the cult film The Candy Snatchers.

Gwen Welles from Nashville, California Split, and A Safe Place comes to mind.

by Anonymous

reply 1

November 2, 2022 10:07 PM

Susan Tyrell, who always struck me as a cross between Kathy Bates and Sylvia Miles.

by Anonymous

reply 2

November 2, 2022 10:08 PM

British actress Carol White, star of Len Loach's "Poor Cow".

by Anonymous

reply 3

November 2, 2022 10:11 PM

Carol White looks a bit like Sarah Ferguson is this photo. Her sons look cool, like little rockstars.

This pic was taken in the early 1970s.

Offsite Link

by Anonymous

reply 4

November 2, 2022 10:14 PM

The immortal Miss Pam Grier

by Anonymous

reply 5

November 2, 2022 10:15 PM

Two other fine Black actresses: Vonetta McGee and Rosalind Cash.

by Anonymous

reply 6

November 2, 2022 10:16 PM

Pam Grier is still around and still working, wasn't she on the L Word revamp last year?

by Anonymous

reply 7

November 2, 2022 10:17 PM

j-Lo....oh, I read "Indie or character actresses in their 70s ", sorry

by Anonymous

reply 9

November 3, 2022 12:58 PM

I feel like Shelley Duvall was Indie ish even though she became mainstream famous.

by Anonymous

reply 10

November 5, 2022 2:39 AM

A lot of these people had major careers. One has to do some work to determine the name of a character actor. I liked Dorothy Tristan. Her largest part was probably as Jane Fonda’s junkie prostitute friend, Arlyn Page, in Klute.

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by Anonymous

reply 14

November 5, 2022 5:03 AM

Dorothy Tristan was a lovely actress who had good-sized roles in END OF THE ROAD (a bad adaptation of John Barth's novel), directed by her then-husband Aram Avakian and in the mystery thriller MAN ON A SWING directed by Frank Perry and with Cliff Robertson & Joel Grey.

But her career never really went anywhere and she was married a second time to director John D. Hancock (who made BANG THE DRUM SLOWLY and LET'S SCARE JESSICA TO DEATH) and pretty much retired from acting not long afterwards.

The mention of Tristan reminds me of another fine actress named Verna Bloom, who had more of a career to be sure. Most people would remember her as Dean Wormer's wife in ANIMAL HOUSE, but she was very good in MEDIUM COOL and HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER.

by Anonymous

reply 17

November 5, 2022 4:45 PM

Carol Lynley's heyday was more in the 60s than the 70s, by which time she was starting to fade (The Poseidon Adventure notwithstanding). She wasn't an indie actress and certainly no character actress. She was barely an actress.

by Anonymous

reply 18

November 5, 2022 4:49 PM

R18 But Joan Crawford thought she was a fresh new talent.

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by Anonymous

reply 19

November 5, 2022 11:03 PM

Karen Allen? Though she was more early 80's.

by Anonymous

reply 21

November 6, 2022 2:15 AM

Did Indies as we know them really exist in the 70s though? Someone like Shelley Duvall was off center but her movies were all major studio releases.

There were no Parker Poseys of the 70s, to my knowledge.

by Anonymous

reply 22

November 6, 2022 2:20 AM

Karen Allen wouldn't count as either an indie or character actress since she was the leading lady in one of the biggest hits of the 1980s, was also the female lead in major studio films Starman and Scrooged.

by Anonymous

reply 23

November 6, 2022 6:59 AM

I always hated Karen Allen something gross about her.

by Anonymous

reply 24

November 6, 2022 6:30 AM

Barbara Harris seems like the quintessential ‘70s character actress.

She earned a well-deserved Oscar nomination for a film that’s basically been forgotten, followed up by a role in Nashville, which collected character actresses like Pokémon. She never became as famous as Lily Tomlin, but wasn’t the film equivalent of a one-hit wonder like Ronee Blakley, which puts her squarely in character actress sweet spot.

by Anonymous

reply 25

November 6, 2022 6:37 AM