Dina Merrill Biography

Dina Merrill was an American actress best known for her movie roles in the 1950s, an aristocratic blond who appeared in Desk Set and Operation Petticoat.

Dina Merrill was born to be a New York socialite, the daughter of broker E.F. Hutton and heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post (of Post cereal fame). She ditched university for drama school at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, and made her Broadway debut in 1947.

She married, had three children, and then started back in the movies, with the Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn hit, Desk Set (1957).

For the next decade, Dina Merrill was the not-quite-leading-lady Hollywood type, appearing in comedies such as Operation Petticoat (1959, starring Cary Grant and Tony Curtis) and dramas, including The Sundwowners and Butterfield 8 (both 1960).

Married to actor Cliff Robertson in 1966, Dina Merrill’s acting career during the m1960s and ’70s was mostly in television. They divorced in 1989, and by that time, Merrill was partners with Ted Hartley in a film production company that eventually acquired the old RKO Studios.

Merrill and Hartley married in 1989 and went into to film producing, and Dina continued acting occasionally, including a cameo in Robert Altman‘s 1992 film, The Player.

Dina Merrill’s other films include Don’t Give Up the Ship (1959, starring Jerry Lewis), The Courtship of Eddie’s Father (1963), Caddyshack II (1988) and True Colors (1991, starring James Spader and John Cusack).