Angel Tompkins Biography

After a few seasons' work as a model in the Chicago area, golden-haired Angel Tompkins began showing up in supporting roles on such TV series as Dragnet. In 1970, Tompkins was honored with the "most promising newcomer" Golden Globe Award for her performance as Elliott Gould's mistress Helen Donnelly in I Love My...Wife (1970). Her nude scenes as gangster moll Clarabelle in Prime Cut (1972) earned Tompkins a three-page spread in Playboy magazine; around the same time, she was cast as telemetry specialist Gloria Harding on the TV weekly Search. She spent much the mid-1970s headlining such tickle-and-tease exploitationers as The Teacher (1974). Some of her best work during this period can be found in Little Cigars (1973), an underrated crime caper which cast her as the "brains" behind a gang of crooked midgets! Briefly retiring from show business in 1976, Tompkins made a comeback in the John Sayles-scripted terrorfest Alligator (1980); since that time, she has been seen as one of psycho killer Carrie Snodgress' victims in Murphy's Law (1985), and in a self-mocking cameo in Amazon Women of the Moon (1987). ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi