Joan Van Ark was born in the year 1943 and she is American actress who is known for the roles she played like Valene Ewing at Knots Landing soap opera. She is a life member to The Actors studio and started to appear on Broadway in the year 1966. It was in the Barefoot in the Park. In the year 1971, she got Theater World Award and got nominated for the Tony Award as Best Featured Actress in a Play while playing at The School for Wives.

She got famous roles in the year 1978; it was at CBS series called Dallas and the spin- off of the knots Landing. For the role, she got Soap Opera Digest Award two times. She got Daytime Emmy Award when she was the host of Tournament of Roses at CBS. She appeared in The Young and The Restless soap opera.

Joan Van Ark was born in the city of New York. Her mother is Dorothy Jean Van Ark and her father is Carroll Van Ark. Her father was working as Public relations consultant and advertiser. He was living in Holland of Michigan and had Dutch ancestry. Her paternal grandfather was born in Holland. Her parents were writers and she grew up in the city of Colorado and was born with other three children who are Dexter, Mark and Carol.

When she was only 15 and still a student, she met and interviewed Julie Harris and she recommended her to go to the Yale School of Drama. While attending the school, she was the youngest student who had attended this school under scholarship. She was one of the few people who went to this school but without having the degree first. She attended this school for just one year.

Julie Harris was the youngest person to ever attend the Yale School of Drama that time. The two developed friendship that lasted many years and they were co-stars in CBS television series called Knots Landing. In Off-Broadway, she performed in Love Letters where she was opposite of John Rubenstein. The recent job she had was in Three Tall Women. She was in Macbeth where she appeared like Lady Macbeth. She appeared in the Williamston Theater Festival Production for Night of the Iguana, the Little Night Music and in Legend of Oedipus.

She had also appeared in comedies like We’ve Got Each Other and Temperature Rising. She appeared on The Early Show of CBS in the year 2009 for the reunion of Knots Landing cast. She got a regular role in the year 2004 at the Young and The Restless and also joined the cast of My Name is Earl of NBC. From her biography, she married once to a former reporter at KNBC-TV in the year 1966. They have given birth to one child, a daughter called Vanessa Marshal and she is a singer, model and voice actress.