Leigh Taylor-Young as Katherine Crane

Emmy Award-winning actress and international personality Leigh Taylor-Young portrays Katherine Crane, the ethereally beautiful and elegant ex-wife of the wicked and ruthless Alistair. Katherine's son and daughter, Julian and Sheridan, believed their mother died over twenty years ago. Her return to Harmony shocked the entire town.

Taylor-Young has over fifteen feature films to her credits including "I Love You, Alice B. Toklas" with Peter Sellars, "Jagged Edge" with Glenn Close and Jeff Bridges, "Looker" with Albert Finney, "The Gang that Couldn't Shoot Straight" with Robert DeNiro, "Soylent Green" with Charlton Heston and "The Horsemen" with Omar Shariff. Her television credits include "Peyton Place," "Dallas," "Beverly Hills 90210," "The Pretender" and the critically acclaimed "Picket Fences," for which she won an Emmy.

In addition to her film and television work, Taylor-Young has a special passion for theater. She had the unique privilege of performing in one of Samuel Beckett's last works, "The Beckett Plays," directed by Alan Schneider at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, the Harold Clurman Theatre in New York, the Donmar Warehouse Theatre in Covent Garden, London and the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland. Her other theatre credits include "Three Bags Full," "Knives" and "Sleeping Dogs."

In 1995, Taylor-Young was the Goodwill Ambassador from the United Nations for ICEBRIDGE: First Arctic Environmental Forum. She has also worked for Ted Turner's Better World Society, and she is the voice for The Course in Miracles' "Search for Serenity" series of audio meditations. As an ordained minister in the Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness, she works closely with John Roger, an educator and Wayshower. Taylor-Young has been active on behalf of the environment as a Special Advisor in Arts and Media for the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), as well as a representative for the Institute for the Study of Individual and World Peace.

Born to a diplomatic family in Washington, D.C., she began her formal education as an Economics major at Northwestern University. She soon changed to Theatre and studied under the renowned teacher, Alvina Krause. She subsequently continued her studies in New York City with Sanford Meisner, at the Neighborhood Playhouse.

Taylor-Young resides in Los Angeles, CA. She has one son, Patrick, a sportscaster. Her birthday is January 25.