Barbara Eden

The forbidden belly button and the NBC contracts

Barbara Jean Morehead was born in Tucson during the summer of 1931. Before becoming the most famous genie in a lamp on television, she sang in nightclubs in San Francisco for very little money. Her mother taught her to project her voice in the neighborhood church.

In 1956 she signed her first contract with 20th Century Fox. But the industry didn't quite know what to do with a blonde who didn't fit the femme fatale mold. She co-starred with Elvis Presley in Flaming Star during 1960. The singer wanted her as his real-life partner, but she preferred to keep a professional distance.

Sidney Sheldon cast her in I Dream of Jeannie in 1965 because he didn't want a brunette actress who looked like the star of Bewitched. The success was both immediate and suffocating.

Network censors of the era banned showing her belly button on screen. Network executives were obsessed with Eden's anatomy and monitored every costume fitting. The costume's fabric was raised two centimeters above the mark to avoid fines from federal regulators.

And the gamble paid off.

Jeannie was more than just a pretty face in silk pants. Eden brought a physical comedy rhythm she had learned by watching silent film classics. She worked on the first season's shoots while pregnant with her only son.

The price of the crystal bottle

She was heavily typecast after the series was canceled in 1970. Eden tried to break the mold with The 7 Faces of Dr. Lao, a fantasy film now studied for its special effects. But audiences only wanted to see her with the high ponytail and the pink outfit.

In 1978 she starred in Harper Valley P.T.A. The film made so much money that it became a television series shortly afterward. It was one of her last major commercial hits in American popular culture before she turned to musical theater.

Personal tragedy struck in 2001. Her son Matthew Ansara died of an accidental overdose at age 35. Eden stepped away from the public eye for months to grieve in privacy at her home in Beverly Hills.

She wrote her memoir in 2011 under the title Jeannie Out of the Bottle. The book debuted on The New York Times Best Seller list and revealed the difficulties of working in a Hollywood dominated by men.

She never disowned her past in television.

She took a voice role in the animated series Shimmer and Shine in 2016. She voiced Empress Caliana, a direct nod to viewers who grew up watching her emerge from a bottle of knockoff liquor. Her career came full circle in a way.

In 2019, she appeared in the Christmas film My Adventures with Santa. The production had a tight budget and was shot entirely on location in Connecticut.

The film was released directly to home video and digital platforms on November 1 that year.