Actress Janice Rule Dies at 72

Stage and film actress Janice Rule, who appeared on Broadway in a number of shows including the original production of William Inge’s Picnic opposite Paul Newman, died on Friday at her home in Manhattan at age 72.

Rule was born in Ohio. She studied acting at the Chicago Professional School and danced in nightclubs in Chicago and New York before making her Broadway debut in Irving Berlin’s Miss Liberty. Subsequently, she appeared on Broadway in such plays as The Flowering Peach and The Night Circus, and in such musicals as Great to Be Alive! and The Happiest Girl in the World. Among her film credits are Starlift, Goodbye, My Fancy with Joan Crawford and Robert Young, and Bell, Book, and Candle with James Stewart and Kim Novak.

She became interested in psychoanalysis in the 1960s and received a Ph.D. in that field from the Southern California Psychoanalytic Institute in the early 1980s; she practiced both in New York and Los Angeles while continuing to act occasionally.

Rule married and divorced Ben Gazzara, N. Richard Nash, and Robert Thom. She is survived by two daughters, three sisters, and a brother.