Catherine Bell

Someone Else’s Body and a Detour from UCLA

Catherine Bell was Isabella Rossellini’s body before anyone knew her name. In 1992, she worked as a lighting and body double on Death Becomes Her because her measurements were identical to those of the Italian actress. It wasn’t a medical student’s dream job, but it paid the bills in Los Angeles.

She was born in London to a mix of Scottish and Iranian heritage. Her mother was a nurse and her father an architect. She moved to California at just two years old, and grew up with a practical mindset that led her to enroll at UCLA. But an offer from a modeling agency to work in Japan derailed her academic plans midway through her sophomore year.

And the gamble paid off.

After returning from Asia, she decided that acting was a more viable path than the operating room. She enrolled at the Beverly Hills Playhouse to study with Milton Katselas while working as a masseuse to support herself. Her first speaking role came in 1994 in the comedy Men of War, where she shared the set with Dolph Lundgren on location in Thailand.

The Uniform as a Second Skin

In 1995, she landed a small role in the season one finale of JAG. She played an officer who was murdered. It was a brief appearance, but enough for series creator Donald P. Bellisario to take notice of her. When the show moved from NBC to CBS, they needed a new female lead.

Bell auditioned for the role of Major Sarah MacKenzie, even though the character had died in the show months earlier. The producers overlooked that technicality and gave her the part. She played the role for 206 episodes until the series ended in 2005. Her portrayal of a Marine with a troubled history of alcoholism gave her the kind of global visibility few TV actors achieve.

It was a twist of fate.

In 2007, she traded the Marine Corps for domestic drama in Army Wives. She played Denise Sherwood, a woman dealing with domestic violence and the loss of a child on a military base. The series aired until 2013, and Bell was one of the few actresses who stayed in the main cast for all seven full seasons.

The Happily Ever After Factory

Her relationship with the Hallmark Channel began in 2008 with a modest movie titled The Good Witch. Bell played Cassie Nightingale, a woman who arrives in a small town and raises suspicions with her apparent magical abilities. The movie was such a ratings hit that the network made six direct sequels before turning the story into a weekly series.

The episodic version of Good Witch premiered in 2015, with Bell also serving as an executive producer. Having control over the content allowed her to shape a wholesome, family-friendly show that dominated Saturday nights in the United States. The franchise generated millions in revenue and continued for seven more years before finally ending.

But her career didn't stop in the idyllic world of Middleton. In 2019, she revived her role as Sarah MacKenzie for several episodes of NCIS: Los Angeles, rekindling the chemistry with her former co-star David James Elliott. It was a nostalgic move that fans of the military franchise had been waiting fourteen years for.

In 2022, she starred in the TV movie Jailbreak Lovers for Lifetime, playing Toby Dorr, a real-life woman who helped a convict escape prison inside a dog food box. The production, directed by Katie Boland, was shot entirely on location in Georgia with an estimated budget of two million dollars.