{"id":1693,"date":"2026-02-08T15:56:54","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T15:56:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/?p=1693"},"modified":"2026-02-08T15:56:54","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T15:56:54","slug":"remember-meggie-cleary-from-the-thorn-birds-this-is-her-today-age-68","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/?p=1693","title":{"rendered":"Remember Meggie Cleary from \u2018The Thorn Birds\u2019? \u2014 this is her today, age 68"},"content":{"rendered":"<p data-start=\"92\" data-end=\"480\">Rachel Ward, 65, is best known for her breakout role as Meggie Cleary in the 1983 miniseries <em data-start=\"185\" data-end=\"202\">The Thorn Birds<\/em>. Though over 200 actresses auditioned, Ward was chosen for her ability to portray Meggie from a na\u00efve young girl to a mature woman. The ten-hour series, based on Colleen McCullough\u2019s novel, was watched by over 30 million in the U.S., earning multiple Golden Globes and Emmys.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"482\" data-end=\"736\">Ward met her future husband, co-star Bryan Brown, on set; the couple married months later and have three children. After moving to Australia, she continued acting in films and TV, including <em data-start=\"672\" data-end=\"686\">On the Beach<\/em> and <em data-start=\"691\" data-end=\"697\">Rake<\/em>, while also producing and directing.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"738\" data-end=\"958\">Beyond her career, Ward was honored as a Member of the Order of Australia for her advocacy for disadvantaged youth. She shares a close bond with her daughter Matilda, also an actress, and recently became a grandmother.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-instagram wp-block-embed-instagram\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\"><iframe id=\"instagram-embed-1\" class=\"instagram-media instagram-media-rendered\" src=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/CJxzmV7AXDt\/embed\/captioned\/?cr=1&amp;v=14&amp;wp=640&amp;rd=https%3A%2F%2Fen.newsner.com&amp;rp=%2Fcelebrity%2Fremember-meggie-cleary-from-the-thorn-birds-this-is-her-today-age-63%2F%3Ffbclid%3DIwY2xjawP1kTlleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETFTSGtiVDdVelpQcXBrbEg2c3J0YwZhcHBfaWQQMjIyMDM5MTc4ODIwMDg5MgABHqJWtDpkJdiRue#%7B%22ci%22%3A1%2C%22os%22%3A1829.2999999523163%7D\" height=\"1132\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" data-instgrm-payload-id=\"instagram-media-payload-1\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>Rachel Ward, 65, is best known for her breakout role as Meggie Cleary in the 1983 miniseries The Thorn Birds. Though over 200 actresses auditioned, <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/?p=1693\" title=\"Remember Meggie Cleary from \u2018The Thorn Birds\u2019? \u2014 this is her today, age 68\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1694,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1693","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1693"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1693\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1695,"href":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1693\/revisions\/1695"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/viralspotlight26.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}