Ann-Margret Interview (May 5, 1990)

Ann-Margret Olsson (born April 28, 1941) is a Swedish–American actress, singer, and dancer. As an actress and singer, she is credited as Ann-Margret.

She is known for her roles in Pocketful of Miracles (1961), State Fair (1962), Bye Bye Birdie (1963), Viva Las Vegas (1964), The Cincinnati Kid (1965), Carnal Knowledge (1971), The Train Robbers (1973), Tommy (1975), Magic (1978), The Villain (1979), The Return of the Soldier (1982), 52 Pick-Up (1986), Newsies (1992), Grumpy Old Men (1993), Grumpier Old Men (1995), Any Given Sunday (1999), Taxi (2004), The Break-Up (2006) and Going in Style (2017). She has won five Golden Globe Awards and been nominated for two Academy Awards, two Grammy Awards, a Screen Actors Guild Award, and six Emmy Awards. In 2010, she won an Emmy for her guest appearance on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.

Her singing and acting careers span six decades, starting in 1961. Initially, she was billed as a female version of Elvis Presley. She has a sultry, vibrant contralto voice.[2][3] She had a Top 20 hit song in 1961 and a charting album in 1964, and she scored a disco hit in 1979. She recorded a critically acclaimed gospel album in 2001 and an album of Christmas songs in 2004.

Ann-Margret Olsson was born in Valsjöbyn, Jämtland County, Sweden, the daughter of Anna Regina (née Aronsson) and Carl Gustav Olsson, a native of Örnsköldsvik. She described Valsjöbyn as a small town of "lumberjacks and farmers high up near the Arctic Circle".[4] Her father had emigrated to the USA but returned to Sweden in 1937 and married Anna Aronsson. After Ann-Margret's birth, Gustav wanted to emigrate again with the family. His wife hesitated and Gustav emigrated alone but was joined by his wife and daughter in 1946.[5]

Ann-Margret took her first dance lessons at the Marjorie Young School of Dance, showing natural ability from the start, easily mimicking all the steps. Her parents were supportive, and her mother made all of her costumes by hand. To support the family, Ann-Margret's mother became a funeral parlor receptionist[6] after her husband suffered a severe injury on his job.[7] While a teenager, Ann-Margret appeared on the Morris B. Sachs Amateur Hour, Don McNeill's Breakfast Club, and Ted Mack's Amateur Hour.

She attended New Trier High School in Winnetka, Illinois, and continued to star in theater. In 1959, she enrolled at Northwestern University in nearby Evanston, Illinois, and she was a member of the sorority Kappa Alpha Theta.

She was part of a group known as the Suttletones, which went to the Dunes in Las Vegas, which also headlined Tony Bennett and Al Hirt at that time. George Burns heard of her performance, and she auditioned for his annual holiday show, in which she and Burns performed a softshoe routine. Variety proclaimed that "George Burns has a gold mine in Ann-Margret ... she has a definite style of her own, which can easily guide her to star status".

Ann-Margret began recording for RCA Victor in 1961. Her first RCA Victor recording was "Lost Love". Her debut album, And Here She Is: Ann-Margret, was recorded in Hollywood, arranged and conducted by Marty Paich. Later albums were produced in Nashville with Chet Atkins on guitar, the Jordanaires (Elvis Presley's backup singers), and the Anita Kerr Singers, with liner notes by mentor George Burns. She had a sexy, throaty contralto singing voice,[9] and RCA Victor attempted to capitalize on the 'female Elvis' comparison by having her record a version of "Heartbreak Hotel" and other songs stylistically similar to Presley's. She scored the minor success "I Just Don't Understand" (from her second LP), which entered the Billboard Top 40 in the third week of August 1961 and stayed six weeks, peaking at number 17.The song was later performed by The Beatles and was recorded during a live performance at the BBC (recorded on July 16, 1963, and broadcast on August 20, 1963). Her only charting album was Beauty and the Beard (1964), on which she was accompanied by trumpeter Al Hirt. Ann-Margret appeared on The Jack Benny Program in 1961 (season 11, episode 24). She also sang at the Academy Awards presentation in 1962, singing the Oscar-nominated song "Theme from Bachelor in Paradise." Her contract with RCA Victor ended in 1966.

In 1962, Ann-Margret was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best New Artist.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, she had hits on the dance charts, the most successful being 1979's "Love Rush," which peaked at number eight on the disco/dance charts.

In 2001, working with Art Greenhaw, she recorded the album God Is Love: The Gospel Sessions. The album went on to earn a Grammy nomination (forty years since her first) and also a Dove Award nomination for best album of the year in a gospel category. Her album Ann-Margret's Christmas Carol Collection, also produced and arranged by Greenhaw, was recorded in 2004.
In 1961, she filmed a screen test at 20th Century Fox and was signed to a seven-year contract.