In 1976, actress Jaclyn Smith became one of the most famous women in Hollywood after landing a leading role on the television series “Charlie’s Angels.”
Fifty years later, Smith recalls her stardom in the enchanting autobiography “I Once Knew a Guy Named Charlie: A Memoir.” Not unlike her “Charlie’s Angels” character, Smith comes across as a warm, spunky, and pragmatic individual.
Road to Stardom
Smith was the only member of the “Charlie’s Angels” starring trio who had to audition for the show. Her colleagues, Kate Jackson and Farrah Fawcett, were better-known actresses; they were hired based on the attention they’d received from the TV shows “The Rookies” and “Harry O,” respectively. However, Smith’s stardom was hardly an overnight happening.
“I wasn’t born the day I first put on Kelly Garrett’s tiny white bikini,” Smith writes, referring to the now-classic publicity photo that introduced her character on “Charlie’s Angels.” A Houston native, Smith began her show-business focus at the age of 4 when her mother enrolled her in ballet school. Shortly before she turned 20 in 1965, her parents financed her dream to pursue a show business career in New York City.
The most invigorating section of Smith’s book involves her early years in the Broadway entertainment scene. Unsuccessful auditions piled up while promising leads fizzled, but she sought to leverage these failures with a positive attitude.
“Rejection carried instruction,” she writes. “Everyone taught me something about where I belonged and where I did not.”
Through serendipitous encounters with entertainment industry figures, she secured acting lessons which were paid for by Paramount Pictures, playing bit parts in their films “Goodbye, Columbus” (1969) and “The Adventurers” (1970).
During a foray into Central Park, she retrieved a ball that rolled away from a playground and returned it to the children who’d lost it. Their father was Harry Abrams, a commercial agent, who offered to represent Smith.
Thanks to Abrams, Smith became a ubiquitous presence in early 1970s television commercials for prominent consumer brands. A Breck shampoo commercial caught the eye of TV writer Glen A. Larson, who sought her for a small role on the series “McCloud.”
Other TV jobs followed, where Smith says she was often cast “as a model or a hapless drug smuggler, or both.” After she appeared on the 1975 detective series “Switch,” the show’s star Robert Wagner recommended Smith to producers Aaron Spelling and Leonard Goldberg, who were casting “Charlie’s Angels.”
A Problematic Production
While viewers enjoyed “Charlie’s Angel” for its glamour and campy action, Smith details a rough behind-the-scenes environment. Workdays stretched up to 18 hours, and the stars found themselves hounded by deranged stalkers and scandal-sniffing tabloids.
The “Charlie’s Angels” rigorous schedule limited the stars’ ability to accept other roles. Smith was forced to pass on the James Bond epic “Moonraker” (1979) due to her commitment to the series. At the end of the first season, Farrah Fawcett abruptly announced that she was quitting to pursue more lucrative endeavors in film acting.
Smith bonded quickly with Fawcett’s replacement, Cheryl Ladd, but Kate Jackson wasn’t as friendly with the new actress. While the show’s ratings remained strong for its second and third seasons, Jackson’s enthusiasm for the production frayed. She openly referred to the scripts as garbage before quitting at the end of the third season.
Shelley Hack replaced Jackson in the fourth season. Smith respected Hack’s input and was upset when the producers fired her following a decline in the show’s ratings. Hack was replaced in the fifth and final season by Tanya Roberts, with whom Smith didn’t connect.
Even more upsetting to Smith than the casting turnover was the increased use of cocaine by the show’s crew. “It simply wasn’t fun, as an actor or otherwise, for me to be surrounded by people who were impaired,” she writes, adding that she wound up isolating herself from this toxic setting when not required on camera.
Life After ‘Angels’
Following the end of the series, Smith starred in made-for-television films and miniseries throughout the 1980s and 1990s, most notably the 1988 adaptation of “The Bourne Identity” opposite Richard Chamberlain. She received a Golden Globe nomination for playing the title character in the 1981 TV film “Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy.”
Smith’s career took an unexpected turn in 1985 when the discount retailer Kmart contacted her to develop a clothing line. The actress was surprised by the offer, but the retailer explained that she was sought out because she was “something familiar and reliable to consumers.”
Despite having no background in fashion design or merchandising, Smith worked with Kmart to create a line that matched her sense of style. Her branded apparel became the retailer’s top-selling line for many years. When her contract ended in 2021, she was signed as a commercial branding partner by the Home Shopping Network.
Despite being a star in her own right, the author is constantly awestruck in her professional encounters with many Hollywood legends. She also happily recounts crossing paths with up-and-coming actors who went on to great fame, including future Oscar winners Kim Basinger, Tommy Lee Jones, and Hilary Swank.
Smith writes frankly about the multiple issues that have impacted her personal life, including the breakdown of her first three marriages and the happiness she found with her fourth husband, surgeon Dr. Brad Allen. She calmly details her successful bout against breast cancer and writes with great sensitivity on Farrah Fawcett’s death from anal cancer.
Smith is an engaging raconteur with a great life story. Her maturity, gentle humor, and graciousness makes her autobiography a book that’s truly worth cherishing.
‘I Once Knew a Guy Named Charlie: A Memoir’
By Jaclyn Smith
Gallery Books: Sept. 8, 2026
Hardcover, 320 pages
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