JoBeth Williams continues to shine decades after establishing herself as one of the most captivating leading ladies of the 1980s, perhaps most notably for her role in Poltergeist. Now 76, the actress has been turning heads once again on Hollywood’s biggest red carpets - most recently stealing the spotlight at the 31st Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. Born in Houston, JoBeth began her career modestly, hosting the children’s show Jabberwocky before moving into daytime television with roles on Somerset and Guiding Light, setting the stage for a celebrated film and television career.
Her breakout role came in 1979’s Kramer vs. Kramer, where she played Dustin Hoffman’s free-spirited girlfriend, memorable for the now-iconic scene in which Dustin’s young son unexpectedly walks in on her.
From there, JoBeth epitomized the confident, charismatic woman of the 1980s - intelligent, relatable, and effortlessly alluring - with standout performances in Poltergeist and The Big Chill, securing her place among Hollywood’s most magnetic screen sirens. And decades later, she’s proving she’s still every bit as captivating.
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© Getty ImagesIn Poltergeist she played the part of Diane Freeling, a married mom of three living in Cuesta Verde, California. Husband Steven (Craig T. Nelson) was a successful real estate agent, while Diane looked after their three children: sixteen-year-old Dana, eight-year-old Robbie, and five-year-old Carol Anne.
© Getty ImagesOne night, their youngest daughter Carol Anne starts chatting with the television set while it displays post-broadcast static. The next night, she fixates on the television again, and a ghostly white hand emerges from the screen, followed by a violent earthquake. As the family is shaken awake by the earthquake, Carol Anne says the iconic and still-spooky line, "They're here."
In July 2024, JoBeth spoke out about the challenges of filming the horror flick in an interview with Variety.
"I'm proud of Poltergeist because it was a brutal shoot. It was physically very hard," she said. The director [Tobe Hooper] would say, 'OK, now you’re really upset so we need you all to really be screaming.' And we said, 'What are we screaming at?' And he said, 'We’re not really sure yet what it’s going to be.'"
© Ron Galella Collection via Getty"So I thought we all came through it not looking like people who didn’t know what they were doing… And also I thought it turned out to be a really good movie."
She also revealed some of the spookier things that happened on set in an interview with the podcast show Hot Flashes & Cool Topics. Describing a scene where her character falls into a muddy swimming pool filled with skeletons, she said: "I thought that the skeletons were props, I thought they were made by the prop department but I found out some years later that they were actually real skeletons, and I thought if I had known that I don’t know if I could have gotten into that mess."
JoBeth married TV and film director John Pasquin in March 1982. They have two sons: Will and Nick; and she has a stepdaughter, Sarah.
