Sue Lyon (born July 10, 1946) is an American actress best known for her performances in Lolita (1962), The Night of the Iguana (1964), The Flim-Flam Man (1967) and Evel Knievel (1971).

Biography

Suellyn Lyon was born on July 10, 1946 in Davenport, Iowa. When she was 14 years old, she was cast in the role of Dolores "Lolita" Haze, the sexually charged adolescent and the object of an older man's obsessions in Stanley Kubrick's 1962 film Lolita. She was chosen for the role partly because her curvy figure suggested that of an older adolescent. Based on the Vladimir Nabokov Lolita, Kubrick's film, though a toned-down version of the book—Lolita is only 12 at the beginning of the novel and 17 at the end—was nonetheless one of the most controversial films of its day.

Lyon was 16 when the film premiered in September 1962. She became an instant celebrity and won a Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer – Female. Despite her inexperience, she was praised for holding her own in scenes with the three top-billed stars of the film, James Mason, Shelley Winters, and Peter Sellers. Lyon recorded two songs for the film, which were released on an MGM 45 rpm record. The song "Lolita Ya Ya" (Riddle–Harris) appeared on side A, and "Turn Off the Moon" (Stillman-Harris) appeared on side B.

In 1963, Lyon was again cast as a seductive teen in John Huston's The Night of the Iguana (1964), competing for the affections of Richard Burton's defrocked preacher against the likes of Deborah Kerr and Ava Gardner. Again, controversy surrounded her because of a provocative scene in the film in which Lyon is shown emerging from the water.

In 1965, she played a mission worker in China in director John Ford's last feature film, 7 Women. Lyon played the female lead in the 1967 comedy The Flim-Flam Man and had a supporting role in 1967's Tony Rome which starred Frank Sinatra. She played the wife of daredevil Evel Knievel in the 1971 film Evel Knievel.

By the 1970s, she was relegated to mainly secondary roles. She continued to work in film and television until 1986.

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