Celebrity Then and Now: Jayne Kennedy
April 28, 2017
“One thing Hollywood has taught me to live with is rejection. But I have also learned that rejection has nothing to do with me. It’s about business.” There isn’t much that the gorgeous Jayne Kennedy can’t do from sports broadcasting and acting to producing, modeling and writing. She starred alongside her former husband, Leon Isaac Kennedy, in the 1981 film Body and Soul and earned an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actress in a Motion Picture. Afterward, she remarried and once again teamed up with her husband for the award-winning musical, The Journey of the African American, which earned Kennedy an NAACP Theater Award for Best Producer. Beyond acting and producing, she’s also proven her talents as a sports broadcaster with Emmy Award-winning coverage of the Rose Parade as well as providing a stellar commentary on the 1980 NBC series, Speak Up America, where she covered soldiers in South Korea’s demilitarized zone. Of course, her beauty is another matter entirely as a former pageant queen who, at 65 years old, is as gorgeous as ever and proudly holds onto her crown as one of the greatest sex symbols of the 20th century and as Coca Cola USA’s “Most Admired Black Woman in America.” What an honor!
One of six children raised in Wickliffe, Ohio by Herbert and Virginia Harrison, Jayne Harrison was born on October 27, 1951 in Washington, D.C. She was five years old when she first developed an interest in sports after her father was hospitalized and a relative’s boyfriend—a player for the Cleveland Browns—came to visit, bringing her an ice cream cone and making a lasting impression on the youngster. Her interest in sports blossomed from there as she often talked with her mother about athletes, movie stars and celebrities as The Washington Post wrote, “[Virginia] would curl her daughter’s long hair to look like Shirley Temple’s and recalls talk of movie stars.”
Attending Wickliffe High School where she was a cheerleader and a member of the National Honor Society and the State Junior Olympics as well as president of her class, Kennedy participated in the mock-government program for the American Legion’s Girls State and was elected senator and then vice president, the first African American vice president in Girls State history. Along the way, she entered various beauty pageants and was crowned Miss Ohio USA in 1970, which confirmed her spot in history as the first African American woman ever crowned. She then entered the 1970 Miss USA Pageant and made history when she made it to the top 15 in the semi-finals.
Still dreaming of making it big, Kennedy was only 18 years old when she fell in love with and married DJ and nightclub promoter Leon Isaac Kennedy, who also shared her dreams of becoming an actor. The newlyweds moved to Los Angeles and Kennedy launched her career as a dancer on the sketch comedy series Rowan and Martin’s Laugh In before joining Bob Hope with his Bases Around the World Christmas Tour. Traveling around the world to countries like Thailand, Cuba and Vietnam, Kennedy was quickly making a name for herself when she was hired as one of the Ding-A-Ling Sisters on The Dean Martin Show, which gave her the chance to perform as a singer and dancer in nightclubs throughout the United States.
By the end of the 1970s, Kennedy was tired of life on the road and started looking for opportunities closer to home when she auditioned to be a sportscaster with CBS who was looking for, as associate director of talent Linda Sutter said, “a feminine combination of sports and entertainment.” Kennedy had the perfect mix of sports knowledge, beauty, brains and charm as she beat out 70 actresses and models to become the first female and African American to take a host’s seat on The NFL Today. By then, Kennedy was unstoppable. Going on to become the only woman to ever host the syndicated series Greatest Sports Legends, Kennedy found opportunity at every step as her beauty, talent and fame took her to new heights. She appeared on covers of Essence, Jet and Ebony magazines and made cameos in television hits and films like Wonder Woman, Police Story, The Six Million Dollar Man, The Rockford Files and Starsky and Hutch. In 1981, she gave her biggest film performance when she joined her husband in Body and Soul, which earned Kennedy an NAACP Image Award and later became a cult classic. Eventually divorcing Leon Kennedy and marrying actor Bill Overton, Kennedy spent the rest of the 1980s writing and producing her own series of exercise videos called Love Your Body. She was also hired by American Airlines to produce their first exercise program for flyers titled A Aerobics. Meanwhile, she signed on to become a spokeswoman for big brands like Bankers Systems, Coca-Cola, Butterick Patterns, Revlon and Esoterica. But, even amid the success, she worked diligently to build her reputation as a talented and hard worker rather than just a pretty face. “I like it when someone says you are intelligent or pretty but, universally, I value an appreciation of my talent,” Kennedy told The Washington Post. “I did an episode of Police Woman and I played an inmate, wore no makeup and had my hair pulled in a ponytail. And the producer said, ‘I like you because you want to work, you want to be good.’ And that’s the nicest thing anyone could say.” Since the 1990s, Kennedy has spent most of her time outside the spotlight and focusing on life at home with Overton and their four daughters—Cheyenne, Savannah, Kopper and Zaire. During this time, she’s ventured more into philanthropy and advocacy by promoting equality for women in sports. She’s also raised over $1 billion for children’s hospitals around the world for the Children’s Miracle Network. Living up to her promise to set a good example, Kennedy says, “I don’t necessarily preach my desires to my kids, but I try to live them every day.” What a great role model!
