Patti Davis facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Patti Davis
Davis in 1983
Born	Patricia Ann Reagan (1952-10-21) October 21, 1952 (age 71) Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Alma mater	Northwestern University University of Southern California
Occupation	Actress author
Political party	Democratic
Spouse(s)	Paul Grilley ​ ​ (m. 1984; div. 1990)​
Parents	Ronald Reagan (father) Nancy Reagan (mother)
Relatives	Ron Reagan (brother) Maureen Reagan (half-sister) Michael Reagan (adopted brother)

Patricia Ann Davis (née Reagan; born October 21, 1952) is an American actress and author. She is the daughter of U.S. president Ronald Reagan and his second wife, Nancy Reagan.

Early life

Patricia Ann Reagan was born to Ronald and Nancy Reagan on October 21, 1952, at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California. She is the older sister of Ron Reagan, and the younger adoptive sister of Michael Reagan as well as half-sister of the late Maureen Reagan. She went to grade school at The John Thomas Dye School in Bel Air, and graduated from the Orme School of Arizona in 1970. She matriculated at Northwestern University, where she studied creative writing and drama. She then attended the University of Southern California for two years. She changed her last name to her mother's maiden name, Davis, in an effort to have an independent career. She was active in the anti-nuclear movement before her father was elected president, and continued her activism through his term, stirring controversy and creating strife in the family. Unlike her father, Davis is a critic of the Republican Party, with which she has never been affiliated.

Career

In the early 1980s, Davis acted in a few television shows before getting her first publishing deal. In 1986, she published her first novel, Home Front. She used elements of her own life to create a fictional story, and because of that the book became controversial and she was widely criticized. Following her second novel Deadfall, she wrote an autobiography called The Way I See It, in which she revealed many family dramas and secrets.

When her father was diagnosed with Alzheimer's, she began writing The Long Goodbye which was published in 2004. During that time, she began writing for magazines and newspapers, including The New York Times, Newsweek and Time. Her original screenplay, Spring Thaw, became the 2007 Hallmark Channel movie Sacrifices of the Heart starring Melissa Gilbert and Ken Howard.

Personal life

In 1969, Patti Reagan applied to Ohio University and Northwestern to study journalism, and enrolled in the latter. In the 1970s, Davis lived with Eagles guitarist Bernie Leadon. By this time, her mother, Nancy Reagan, had disowned her for living with Leadon as an unmarried couple. Together, Davis and Leadon co-wrote the song "I Wish You Peace", which appeared on Eagles album One of These Nights. In the 1980s, she dated Timothy Hutton and later had a two-year relationship with Peter Strauss. In recent years, Davis has expressed her frustration about having to date with the Secret Service monitoring her as they had time limits on evening dates and monitoring her and her partners actions together, which is in part, why she rushed her relationship with her future husband, Paul Grilley. In 1984, she married Grilley, a yoga instructor and one of the founders of Yin Yoga. They divorced in 1990, without children and Davis never remarried.

Davis is a vegetarian. In 2011, she launched "Beyond Alzheimer's" at UCLA, which she still runs.

In October 2021, she expressed her disdain for John Hinckley Jr. being fully released following the 1981 assassination attempt on her father, a view that contrasted with that of Michael Reagan, the adopted son of President Ronald Reagan and his first wife, Jane Wyman, who expressed forgiveness for Hinckley.

Filmography

Film

Television

See also

In Spanish: Patti Davis para niños