It’s been decades since Jennifer Salt was last seen in front of a camera.
But on Monday, July 20, photographs obtained by Wonderwall.com show the ’70s scream queen out and about in Los Angeles.
The 81-year-old looked nearly unrecognizable from her acting days in the 1972 cult classic horror film Sisters.
Los Angeles outing
Salt was spotted dressed down in light blue joggers and a white T-shirt featuring two seahorses. She kept her accessories simple, opting for a long black necklace and colorful trainers.
She wasn’t alone for the outing, walking hand in hand with a young girl whose identity has not been revealed.
Although Salt tends to keep her family life private, she is known to have one son, Jonah Greenberg, who has reportedly been married for several years.
Cult horror icon
The rare sighting comes more than 30 years after Salt left acting behind. The last time fans saw her on screen was in 1990, when she appeared in an episode of the TV series Lifestories.
Before retiring from performing, Salt began her career in the late 1960s with appearances in short films. It wasn’t until 1972, when she starred alongside William Finley in Sisters, that she got her big break.
Over the next three decades, she continued working in theater, television and film, including a recurring role on the hit sitcom Soap from 1977 to 1981.
Leaving acting behind
By the time Soap ended in 1981, Salt was nearing 40, and acting opportunities were starting to slow down. She continued booking occasional roles, including an episode of Magnum, P.I. and a guest appearance on Murder, She Wrote.
But the momentum she’d once had was gone. “All of a sudden, I really couldn’t bear my life,” she told The New York Times in 2010, reflecting on that period.
Salt knew being on camera wasn’t for her anymore. “I wanted more than anything in the world to get out of acting,” she said.
Screenwriter career
Rather than giving up on Hollywood, Salt pivoted to screenwriting in 1990.
“Mostly I decided to try writing because I didn’t have to be young and beautiful and thin to do it,” she told the newspaper. “But I was utterly shocked at how fun it was once I got started. I loved that I was in charge of my own intelligence.”
She began by writing unproduced theatrical screenplays alongside movies for broadcast television. That work led to credits on Sins of the City for USA Network and Nero Wolfe Mysteries for A&E.
Salt found even greater success at FX, where she wrote and produced eight seasons of Nip/Tuck and five seasons of American Horror Story. She also teamed up with Ryan Murphy to cowrite the screenplay for Eat Pray Love, based on the Elizabeth Gilbert memoir.
