Patty Shepard

Shepard was born in Greenville, South Carolina, in 1945.^[3] Shepard first arrived in Spain with her father, Air Force Brigadier General Leland C. Shepard Jr., who was stationed at an airbase in Torrejón de Ardoz.^[3] She moved to Madrid in 1963 to pursue studies in philosophy.^[3] However, she soon began modeling and appearing in Spanish television commercials, including a campaign for a brand of brandy.^[3] The roles would lead to more serious acting parts and she remained in Spain for the rest of her life.^[3]

Her early television credits led to a small, debut film role in La ciudad no es para mí (The City is Not For Me) in 1966, which launched her film career.^[3] She appeared in more than fifty films in Spain and Italy over the next twenty years, before retiring in 1988.^[3]

Shepard played the vampire countess in the iconic 1970 Paul Naschy film, La Noche de Walpurgis (the film which is credited with kickstarting the entire Spanish horror film industry of the 1970s). She also played the lead role in Hannah, Queen of the Vampires (a.k.a. Crypt of the Living Dead, and a 1972 Italian giallo named My Dear Killer.^[4] She returned briefly to the horror genre in 1987 with such films as Slugs and Edge of the Axe, then retired in 1988 at age 43.

Shepard married Spanish actor Manuel de Blas in 1967; the couple had met while filming the 1967 movie, Cita en Navarra (A Date in Navarra).^[5] They were still married 46 years later at the time of her death.^[6]

Her younger sister Judith Chapman is a television actress in the U.S. and had roles in Murder, She Wrote and The Young and the Restless.

Shepard died from a heart attack at her home in Madrid, Spain, on January 3, 2013, at the age of 67.^[3]