Catherine Marchal: Movies & Box Office

Catherine Bach (born Catherine Bachman on 1954-03-01) is an American actress best remembered for her iconic role as Daisy Duke in the 1970s television series The Dukes of Hazzard. Born in Warren, Ohio, she is the daughter of Norma Jean Kucera (née Verdugo), an acupuncturist with Mexican‑Californio ancestry, and Bernard P. Bachman, a rancher of German descent. Her childhood was marked by time spent on a South Dakota ranch and visits to her grandparents in Faith, South Dakota, before graduating from Stevens High School in Rapid City in 1970. She briefly pursued drama studies at UCLA, where she supported herself by sewing clothes for friends and theater groups. Bach’s professional debut came as a child in a stage production of The Sound of Music, and her first screen role was the murder victim Natalie Claiburn in the 1973 Burt Lancaster thriller The Midnight Man. She quickly followed with a part as Melody in the 1974 film Thunderbolt and Lightfoot. When the producers of The Dukes of Hazzard sought a Dolly Parton look‑alike, Bach impressed them with her confidence and self‑made costume—a homemade T‑shirt, cut‑off denim shorts, and high heels—leading to her casting as Daisy Duke, a character whose short shorts inspired the enduring fashion term “Daisy Dukes.” The show’s promotional poster, featuring Bach in the role, sold five million copies and even caught the eye of First Lady Nancy Reagan. During the series, her legs were famously insured for $1,000,000, and she later modeled for the figurehead of the schooner Californian in 1985. After the series ended, Bach appeared in low‑profile films, starred in the Canadian series African Skies (1992‑1994), guest‑starred on Monk, and had a cameo in You Again (2010). In 2012 she joined the CBS soap The Young and the Restless as Anita Lawson, and she launched a diamond jewelry line at Debenhams in 2002. Bach married David Shaw in 1976 (divorced 1981) and later entertainment lawyer Peter Lopez in 1990, with whom she had two daughters before his death in 2010. A practicing Catholic, she remains active in the entertainment industry to the present day.