Pilar Seurat was a Filipina

Filipino people

The Filipino people or Filipinos are an Austronesian ethnic group native to the islands of the Philippines. There are about 92 million Filipinos in the Philippines, and about 11 million living outside the Philippines ....

-American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 film and television actress in the 1960s.

Life and career

Born as Rita Hernandez in Manila

Manila

Manila is the capital of the Philippines. It is one of the sixteen cities forming Metro Manila.Manila is located on the eastern shores of Manila Bay and is bordered by Navotas and Caloocan to the north, Quezon City to the northeast, San Juan and Mandaluyong to the east, Makati on the southeast,...

, Seurat began her Hollywood career as a dancer in Ken Murray

Ken Murray (entertainer)

Ken Murray was an American entertainer and author.-Vaudeville:Murray was born Kenneth Doncourt in New York City to a family of vaudeville performers. According to Murray's autobiography , he changed his name because he did not want to ride the coattails of his father's success; he wanted to make a...

's "Blackouts", the popular postwar variety show at the El Capitan Theatre

El Capitan Theatre

El Capitan Theatre is a fully restored movie palace at 6838 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood. It is owned by Pacific Theatres and operated by the Walt Disney Company. It serves as the venue for many of Walt Disney Pictures' movie premieres...

. Though she primarily essayed Asian characters, Seurat was adept at playing various nationalities; her breakthrough role was as Louisa Escalante, the blind murder victim's sister in John Frankenheimer

John Frankenheimer

John Michael Frankenheimer was an American film and television director known for social dramas and action/suspense films...

's The Young Savages

The Young Savages

The Young Savages is a 1961 crime drama film directed by John Frankenheimer, starring Burt Lancaster, and written by Edward Anhalt from a novel by Evan Hunter....

.

Seurat was frequently cast on 1960s television shows that sought exotic beauties for Asian, Hispanic, or Native American roles including The Fugitive

The Fugitive (TV series)

The Fugitive is an American drama series produced by QM Productions and United Artists Television that aired on ABC from 1963 to 1967. David Janssen stars as Richard Kimble, a doctor from the fictional town of Stafford, Indiana, who is falsely convicted of his wife's murder and given the death...

, The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, Hawaiian Eye

Hawaiian Eye

Hawaiian Eye is an American television series that ran from October 1959 to September 1963 on the American Broadcasting Company television network.-Premise:...

, The Virginian

The Virginian (TV series)

The Virginian is an American Western television series starring James Drury and Doug McClure, which aired on NBC from 1962 to 1971 for a total of 249 episodes. Filmed in color, The Virginian became television's first 90-minute western series...

, Maverick

Maverick (TV series)

Maverick is a western television series with comedic overtones created by Roy Huggins. The show ran from September 22, 1957 to July 8, 1962 on ABC and stars James Garner as Bret Maverick, a cagey, articulate cardsharp. Eight episodes into the first season, he was joined by Jack Kelly as his brother...

, Bonanza

Bonanza

Bonanza is an American western television series that both ran on and was a production of NBC from September 12, 1959 to January 16, 1973. Lasting 14 seasons and 430 episodes, it ranks as the second longest running western series and still continues to air in syndication. It centers on the...

, Star Trek

Star Trek

Star Trek is an American science fiction entertainment franchise created by Gene Roddenberry. The core of Star Trek is its six television series: The Original Series, The Animated Series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Enterprise...

, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea

Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (TV series)

Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea is a 1960s American science fiction television series based on the 1961 film of the same name. Both were created by Irwin Allen, which enabled the movie's sets, costumes, props, special effects models, and sometimes footage, to be used in the production of the...

, The Wild Wild West

The Wild Wild West

The Wild Wild West is an American television series that ran on CBS for four seasons from September 17, 1965 to April 4, 1969....

, Hawaii Five-O

Hawaii Five-O

Hawaii Five-O is an American police procedural drama series produced by CBS Productions and Leonard Freeman. Set in Hawaii, the show originally aired for twelve seasons from 1968 to 1980, and continues in reruns. The show featured a fictional state police unit run by Detective Steve McGarrett,...

, I Spy

I Spy

I Spy is an American television secret-agent adventure series. It ran for three seasons on NBC from 1965 to 1968 and teamed Robert Culp as international tennis player Kelly Robinson with Bill Cosby as his trainer, Alexander Scott...

, and The Man from U.N.C.L.E.

The Man from U.N.C.L.E.

The Man from U.N.C.L.E. is an American television series that was broadcast on NBC from September 22, 1964, to January 15, 1968. It follows the exploits of two secret agents, played by Robert Vaughn and David McCallum, who work for a fictitious secret international espionage and law-enforcement...

She married producer Don Devlin in 1959 and the two were divorced in 1963. The couple's son is the successful film producer Dean Devlin

Dean Devlin

Dean Devlin is an American screenwriter, producer, television director and former actor. He is the founder of the production company Electric Entertainment.-Personal life:...

. In 1970, she married writer Don Cerveris and shortly afterwards retired from acting and began using the name Pilar Cerveris. The two were divorced in 1981.

She passed away of lung cancer

Lung cancer

Lung cancer is a disease characterized by uncontrolled cell growth in tissues of the lung. If left untreated, this growth can spread beyond the lung in a process called metastasis into nearby tissue and, eventually, into other parts of the body. Most cancers that start in lung, known as primary...

 in 2001. The 2002 horror-comedy film Eight Legged Freaks

Eight Legged Freaks

Eight Legged Freaks is a 2002 comedy horror directed by Ellory Elkayem and stars David Arquette, Kari Wührer and Scott Terra. The plot concerns a collection of spiders that are exposed to toxic waste, causing them to grow to gigantic proportions and begin killing and harvesting...

(produced by her son Dean) was dedicated to her.

Seurat's interment was in Forest Lawn - Hollywood Hills Cemetery

Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills)

Forest Lawn – Hollywood Hills Cemetery is part of the Forest Lawn chain of Southern California cemeteries. It is at 6300 Forest Lawn Drive in the Hollywood Hills neighborhood in the Hollywood district of Los Angeles, California, on the lower north slope at the far east end of the Santa Monica...

.

External links