Pamela Sue Martin: What the 'Nancy Drew' and 'Dynasty' Star Has Been Up to in Recent Years

As the savvy title character in The Nancy Drew Mysteries and the bratty heiress Fallon Carrington in Dynasty, Pamela Sue Martin held the rare distinction of playing iconic parts in beloved series of both the '70s and the '80s. The sweet-faced, blue-eyed star went from playing a likable role model to a gloriously nasty rich girl, and after showing her range, she shocked audiences when she left Dynasty in 1984 and took a step back from the spotlight.

Here's a look back at Pamela Sue Martin's rise to fame, and what the now 71-year-old actress has been up to since her time as everyone's favorite TV starlet.

From teen model to TV heroine

With her doe-eyed, approachable beauty, it's no surprise that Martin got her start as a teen model. While she found success appearing in magazines and commercials, she got bored with modeling after a while and sought to make to switch to acting. She didn't have any formal training, but was able to land land her debut role starring as a pregnant teen in the 1972 film To Find a Man through the strength of her charisma alone.

From there, Martin was cast in the blockbuster The Poseidon Adventure that same year. She had an auspicious start to her career, and after a few '70s TV movies, she got her big break when she was cast as the teen detective Nancy Drew in The Nancy Drew Mysteries in 1977. The show introduced the classic character to a new audience and made Martin into a teen idol. A generation of girls looked up to her character thanks to her intelligence and charm.

While the show was a hit with young viewers, Martin left the mystery series in 1978, once it merged with the related Hardy Boys series and her role was reduced.

The year she left, she caused a stir by appearing on the cover of Playboy, posing sexily in a trench coat and holding a magnifying glass for a feature titled "TV's Nancy Drew Undraped." In her interview, she talked about her reasons for leaving the show and highlighted her interest in environmental causes.

Becoming an '80s soap opera diva

Martin went from from '70s teen ingenue to '80s soap opera diva when she was cast as Fallon Carrington, the daughter of Joan Collins' privileged and villainous Alexis Carrington, on Dynasty. Fallon couldn't have been more different from Martin's previous role, and the actress excelled at playing an archetypal good girl and an archetypal bad girl.

Dynasty became one of the biggest hits of the decade, thanks to its over-the-top drama and fabulous costuming, but after a few years Martin grew tired of the show and she voluntarily left it just as she had voluntarily left Nancy Drew before it.

Martin said goodbye to Dynasty in 1984, at the end of season four. The show was becoming a pop culture phenomenon, and viewers were surprised by her decision to leave, but as she described it in an interview, she was unhappy with the screenplays, "It started out with a sort of satirical quality — a cut above intellectually. Then the writers were replaced by more traditional soap writers."

As she put it, "I was not happy with the direction that my character took . . . It became a trashy soap opera. If you were strong, you were a bitch; if you were weak, you were a victim. For me, coming out of the women’s movement of the ’70s, I didn’t take to that very well."

After leaving Dynasty, Martin appeared in a handful of TV movies in the '80s, '90s and '00s, and she showed up in episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents and That '70s Show. Her final appearance was in an episode of the 2019 Nancy Drew series, which made for a full-circle moment.

Pamela Sue Martin today

Martin has no regrets about leaving the glamorous TV world behind. In a 2023 interview with Closer, she said, "Some of the decisions I made seemed wrong to other people at the time, but I’d had my fill and just enough money to move on down the road. And I’ve never really looked back. I wanted to be with animals, ride horses, travel a bit and have a family. I was able to do all that by leaving."

After Dynasty, Martin moved to Hailey, Idaho, and she divides her time between that residence and a primary residence in Mexico. She's been married four times and has a grown son, and lives a quiet but creative life, spending her days painting, riding horses, gardening and directing local plays.

Martin's life today couldn't be further from Fallon Carrington's — and it seems that's just the way she likes it.