Cybill Shepherd Biography: Movies & TV Shows, Age, Husband, Kids, Height, Net Worth, Parents, Ethnicity

Cybill Shepherd, born Cybill Lynne Shepherd, is an American actress, singer, and former model. She first drew national attention as a teenage beauty queen and model before making an acclaimed screen debut in Peter Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show (1971).

She reached a new generation of viewers as Maddie Hayes opposite Bruce Willis in Moonlighting, winning two Golden Globes, and later headlined her own sitcom, Cybill, which earned her a third Golden Globe.

She remains a distinctive presence in American entertainment, equally known for her candor, her activism, and her resilience across five decades.

Cybill Shepherd
Wiki Facts & About Data
Real Name:	Cybill Lynne Shepherd
Stage Name:	Cybill Shepherd
Born:	18 February 1950 (age 76 years old)
Place of Birth:	Memphis, Tennessee, United States
Nationality:	American
Height:	1.73 m
Parents:	William Jennings Shepherd, Patty Shobe
Siblings:	Bill Shepherd, Terry Shepherd
Spouse:	David Ford (m. 1978–1982), Bruce Oppenheim (m. 1987–1990)
Children:	Clementine Ford, Molly Ariel Shepherd-Oppenheim, Cyrus Zachariah Shepherd-Oppenheim
Occupation:	Actress, singer, model
Net Worth:	$40 million

Early Life and Education

Cybill Shepherd was born on 18 February 1950 in Memphis, Tennessee. Of white American heritage and raised in a Christian household, she is the daughter of William Jennings Shepherd, who managed a home appliance business, and Patty Shobe, a homemaker.

She grew up with an older sister, Terry, and a younger brother, Bill, and her parents divorced in 1968. Shepherd attended Memphis East High School, where she excelled in sports, and she sang in the choir of the Holy Communion Episcopal Church, eventually earning solo parts.

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From the age of sixteen she studied voice with a coach for the Metropolitan Opera Chorus, later continuing her training in Los Angeles and Rome.

While working as a model, she took courses at Hunter College in New York (1969), the College of New Rochelle (1970), Washington Square College (1970), the University of Southern California (1972), and New York University (1973).

Career

Cybill Shepherd’s career began in modeling after she won the Miss Teenage Memphis contest in 1966 and the Model of the Year competition in 1968, becoming a familiar face on magazine covers and a spokesperson for L’Oréal.

Her screen debut came in 1971 when Peter Bogdanovich cast her in The Last Picture Show, a performance that earned her a Golden Globe nomination for Most Promising Newcomer and established her as one of the defining young actresses of the era.

She followed with The Heartbreak Kid (1972) and a pivotal role in Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver (1976), though a string of less successful films, including Daisy Miller (1974) and At Long Last Love (1976), led her to step away from Hollywood at the end of the 1970s.

Her television comeback arrived in 1985 when she was cast as Maddie Hayes in Moonlighting opposite Bruce Willis. The romantic-comedy series became a cultural phenomenon and earned Shepherd two Golden Globe Awards for Best Actress in a Television Series – Comedy or Musical, in 1986 and 1987, along with an Emmy nomination.

A decade later she returned to series television with Cybill (1995–1998), a self-titled sitcom in which she also served as executive producer.

The role brought her a third Golden Globe in 1996, three additional Emmy nominations, and a Screen Actors Guild Award nomination, cementing her status as a durable television leading lady.

In the years since, Shepherd has worked steadily across television and film, earning praise for her portrayals in the docudramas Martha, Inc.: The Story of Martha Stewart (2003) and Martha Behind Bars (2005), and appearing as Phyllis Kroll on The L Word.

She has also pursued a parallel career as a jazz and pop singer, releasing several albums, and has remained an outspoken advocate for gay rights and abortion rights, receiving a National Ally for Equality award from the Human Rights Campaign in 2009. Her memoir, Cybill Disobedience, published in 2000, offered a candid account of her life and career.

Social Media

• Instagram Handle: @cybillshepherd

Personal Life

Cybill Shepherd has never remarried and is currently single. She was first married to auto parts dealer and bartender David Ford from 19 November 1978 until their divorce in 1982; the couple share one daughter, actress Clementine Ford, born in June 1979.

She then married chiropractor Bruce Oppenheim on 1 March 1987, and the couple had twins, Ariel and Cyrus, born on 6 October 1987, before divorcing in 1990.

Before her marriages, she had a high-profile eight-year relationship with director Peter Bogdanovich from 1970 to 1978 and a brief romance with Elvis Presley in 1972. In 2012 she became engaged to psychologist Andrei Nikolajevic, though the engagement later ended.

Filmography

• The Last Picture Show (1971)
• The Heartbreak Kid (1972)
• Daisy Miller (1974)
• At Long Last Love (1976)
• Taxi Driver (1976)
• Moonlighting (1985–1989)
• Cybill (1995–1998)
• Martha, Inc.: The Story of Martha Stewart (2003)
• Martha Behind Bars (2005)
• The L Word (2007–2009)
• The Other Side of the Wind (2018)
• How to Murder Your Husband: The Nancy Brophy Story (2023)
• Somewhere in Time (1980)
• Chances Are (1989)
• Alice (1990)
• Once Upon a Texas Train (1988)

Net Worth

Cybill Shepherd has an estimated net worth of approximately $40 million. Her primary income sources include her extensive acting career across film and television, most notably her leading roles in Moonlighting and Cybill, along with residuals from those series, film earnings, record sales from her jazz and pop albums, and revenue from her memoir and public appearances.

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