Marjorie Wallace - TV Career

TV Career

After the overdose, life appeared to improve for the troubled beauty queen. According to imdb.com, Wallace won TV acting roles on some of the top shows of the 1970s, including Baretta with Robert Blake and Get Christie Love! with Teresa Graves. Wallace also appeared as a panelist on the smash daytime TV game show, Match Game 73.

By 1976, Wallace was back in the news in a celebrity romance. She moved into the Los Angeles apartment of eight-time Grand-Slam tennis champ Jimmy Connors following the destruction of his high-profile relationship with 18-time Grand-Slam winner Chris Evert, according to the Miami News.

“Marji (sic) and I don’t even have to talk to each other if we don’t feel like it,” Connors reportedly said. “But I feel I have found someone to share the things I like, and that makes it all worthwhile.” Connors, Wallace said, was “a fantastic person. A very different person off the court.”

The relationship with the tennis star didn't last long. After the breakup, Wallace moved to New York where she auditioned for TV sportscasting positions with ABC and CBS, according to People. She also appeared in TV commercials for Ultra Brite toothpaste, Wella products and American Express.

In the summer of '77 Marjorie met film producer Michael Klein at a Beverly Hills party, People reported. They didn't hit it off at the beginning. Wallace told the magazine, "I thought, 'Here is the epitome of the kind of guy I can't stand—a guy who dates a new girl every three days.'"

People quoted Klein saying he was turned off by Wallace's fur coat, red boots and heavy makeup. "She looked like a magazine cover, and I had no interest in going out with a magazine cover," Klein told People.

By May 1978 they were wed. Parade magazine reported Klein's father was Eugene V. Klein, owner of the NFL's San Diego Chargers. The marriage yielded a son named Adam.