Jean Dorothy Seberg was born in Marshalltown, Iowa, to Dorothy Arline Benson, a substitute teacher of English and German ancestry, and Edward Waldemar Seberg, a pharmacist of Swedish descent. Her parents' diverse backgrounds would later influence her own eclectic career path.
Just a month shy of her 18th birthday, Seberg landed the coveted title role in Otto Preminger's Saint Joan (1957),following a highly publicized contest involving a staggering 18,000 hopefuls. Although the film's failure and the moderate success of her next endeavor, Bonjour Tristesse (1958),initially stalled her career, Seberg's star would eventually rise again.
Her breakthrough role came in Jean-Luc Godard's groundbreaking film, Breathless (1960),which garnered her international recognition. Seberg's subsequent performance as a schizophrenic in the title role of Robert Rossen's Lilith (1964),opposite Warren Beatty, further cemented her status as a talented actress. Over the course of her career, she appeared in more than 30 films in Hollywood and Europe.
In the late 1960s, Seberg became increasingly involved in anti-war politics, which would ultimately lead to her being targeted by the FBI in an undercover campaign aimed at discrediting her due to her association with several members of the Black Panther Party. Her life would tragically come to a close in mysterious circumstances in Paris in 1979.
