A former Bond girl and Charlie's angel, Bronx-born Tanya Roberts hit her stride in the early 1980s and then treaded water for a number of years in direct-to-video erotic dramas before landing a role as foxy free-thinking mom Midge Pinciotti on the acclaimed Fox sitcom "That '70s Show" (1998- ). Throaty-voiced, tall and lithe, Roberts exuded a sexiness that was innate. She spent her early years in the business paying her way with work in commercials while she studied under such notable acting tutors as Uta Hagen and Lee Strasberg. The actress did pilot work and had featured roles in unmemorable films and smaller parts in movies including "The Private Files of J. Edgar Hoover" and "Fingers" (both 1977) before landing her breakthrough role as a regular on ABC's stylized crime drama "Charlie's Angels". An Aaron Spelling production that was as much a showcase of the detective's good looks and fashion sense as their crime solving skills, the "Charlie's Angels" team consisted of three young women, Roberts was the last entry to the cast, replacing Shelly Hack (who had previously replaced Kate Jackson) for the final season (1980-81), playing private investigator Julie Rogers. Although Roberts' added a lacking sultriness to the series and her presence returned the show to the original one blonde (Cheryl Ladd) two brunette (Jaclyn Smith and Roberts) ratio of its original Smith, Jackson, Farrah Fawcett lineup, the ingenue's stilted acting failed to add much to the already faltering series.
While the role may not have won Roberts accolades, it certainly won her notice, and she would go on to star in the popular horror feature "The Beastmaster" (1982), a role that captured the attention of many a genre fan and made her somewhat of a cult icon. This status was cemented with her starring role in the 1984 queen of the jungle feature "Sheena". A female Tarzan, Sheena was as scantily clad as her male counterpart and not much more articulate, which didn't help Roberts to be taken very seriously as an actress. The movie also didn't do much box office business and critics savaged it, but "Sheena" displayed Roberts' unquestionable physical assets, an unveiling that would win her more roles, but lead to stereotyping. In 1985 she was the leading lady to James Bond in "A View to a Kill", Roger Moore's last outing. While being chosen as a Bond girl should have been a boost for her career, the character of Stacey Sutton was not the most interesting or brightest of the bunch, and most audience members left the theater forgetting Roberts and remembering wild, androgynous co-star Grace Jones.
A starring role in 1991's "Legal Tender", penned by her husband Barry Roberts marked a somewhat bright spot in a career that had descended into a spate of uninspired erotic thrillers like "Inner Sanctum" (1991). The frequent cable airings of direct-to-video soft-core fare like "Almost Pregnant" threatened to take Roberts on a Shannon Tweed-like trajectory, but she slowed down her appearances in these releases and instead did some guest work on series television (e.g., "Burke's Law" in 1994). She played herself in a segment of the Showtime TV-movie "National Lampoon's Favorite Deadly Sins" (1995) before hitting a new high with a regular role on the Fox's "That '70s Show". Still a strikingly attractive woman, Roberts played Midge Pinciotti on the hit comedy, a naive but forward-thinking bombshell mom, unaware of her good looks and intrigued and excited by feminism, psychoanalysis and any number of new and trendy movements and opportunities the 1970s introduced into popular culture. Married to the wacky and chauvinistic but loving Bob (Don Stark) and mother of down-to-earth and well-adjusted Donna (Laura Prepon), Midge was an example of the show's worthy efforts to portray multifaceted adult as well as teenage characters. Roberts' portrayal was skilled and appropriately just this side of over-the-top, making her character delightfully zany, endearing and sympathetic.