Here’s What Really Happened To Lee Majors, The Six Million Dollar Man’s Steve Austin

With his dashing good looks and footballer physique – he nearly went pro in the sport before turning to acting – Majors was a natural fit for the role of Austin. The Six Million Dollar Man’s hero was an astronaut-turned-special-agent who’s “rebuilt” with bionics after his rocket ship explodes. Ironically, it made a multi-millionaire of Majors and catapulted him to super-stardom. But as we all know, that often doesn’t last forever.

Sure, it was hammy; sure, some of the action sequences were laughably poor by today’s standards. But heck, was The Six Million Dollar Man entertaining! Like The A-Team and its ilk, the show spawned a massive cult following that eagerly snapped up a plethora of Million Dollar merchandise. But believe it or not, Majors was a star before the show turned him into its bionic leading man.

Yes, the actor had already won attention for his role in western television series, The Big Valley, which ran from 1965 to 1969. Claims of being the “new James Dean” and comparisons to Elvis – not too shabby! – came after Majors’ turn as Heath Berkley in the show. And he’d beaten off competition from the likes of Burt Reynolds to get the part. Impressive!

His co-star in The Big Valley was acting legend Barbara Stanwyck, who became a sort of mentor to Majors. In 2013 he told Fox News how the veteran actress “took [him] under her wing,” adding, “She was a disciplinarian and taught me...to be on time, know your lines, hit your mark, and keep your mouth shut.”

Majors did well to make it into the business at all, though, given the tragic circumstances of his upbringing. Not long before he was born, his father was killed in a workplace accident. Then, before Majors turned two, his mother was struck by a drunk driver and killed.

Left an orphan, Majors was brought up by his uncle and aunt but wouldn’t learn of his parents’ deaths until he was a teenager. Rather than feeling sadness or bitterness, though, this revelation made the future star all the more determined to be a success. According to the Lee Majors Biography website, he said, “I made up my mind right then that my stepparents would never regret having adopted me. I set out to prove myself.”

That steely resolve saw the talented sportsman win a football scholarship first to Indiana University and then Eastern Kentucky State College. But misfortune would strike again, as a back problem rendered him paralyzed. Thankfully, Majors was able to walk again. But his football career was over before it had begun. So, even though he had a physical education degree, he decided to follow a new dream of becoming an actor.

While he was at college, Majors married a woman named Kathy Robinson in 1961. A son – called Lee after his dad – arrived a year later. They then relocated to LA, and Majors began working at North Hollywood Park. But sadly, the marriage didn’t last, and his ex-wife left California with their child. It was the latest in a string of heartbreaks for the star.

After rubbing shoulders with filmmakers in Tinseltown, Majors was spurred on to pursue his acting career. He enrolled in a class coached by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s Estelle Harman and quickly earned minor TV roles. And around this time, Majors – who by the by, was born Harvey Lee Yeary – took on his current moniker in honor of his football icon Johnny Majors.

Shortly afterwards, the actor secured his breakthrough role in The Big Valley. And starring alongside future Dynasty star Linda Evans in the popular TV Western sent Majors rocketing to fame. He also landed a role alongside silver-screen legend Charlton Heston in the 1968 movie Will Penny. The following year he was the lead in TV movie The Ballad of Andy Crocker (1969). So the rising star’s career was gathering momentum.

Majors nearly took the part eventually played by Jon Voight in 1969’s much-lauded Midnight Cowboy. But his commitments on The Big Valley meant that he had to pass up the role. When that show ended shortly afterwards, Universal Studios offered Majors a deal. He starred in neo-noir The Liberation of L.B. Jones in 1970, before turning his attention back to TV. Parts in Western serial The Virginian and legal drama Owen Marshall: Counselor at Law followed.

This success paved the way for Majors scoring his biggest and most memorable role – as Austin in The Six Million Dollar Man. The bionic special agent, with his super-strong arm and ultra-fast legs, captured the imaginations of a generation of kids. That iconic slow-motion run and shuh-nuh-nuh-nuh sound effect would be mimicked again and again. Want to know something a little troubling, though? Majors wasn’t a fan of the shuh-nuh-nuh-nuh.

Yes, the star admitted in an interview with Vanity Fair in 2010 that he didn’t care for some aspects of the show – including its signature sound effect. “I didn’t even like it,” Majors admitted, adding, “It’s silly.” I know – we’re crushed, too. The actor also confessed, “I never liked doing scenes where I was showing my chest. It was just uncomfortable. It was the same way in The Big Valley. I always felt embarrassed doing that kind of stuff.”

Though Majors might have felt coy at times, a legion of fans adored him, and the actor became an icon. He kept up his movie work, too, with appearances on the big screen throughout the 1970s — some better received than others. Majors played the titular role to good effect in Francis Gary Powers: The True Story of the U-2 Spy Incident (1976). But he was scoffed at for his turns in Viking romp The Norseman (1978) and the schlocky Killer Fish (1979).

Along with spin-off The Bionic Woman, The Six Million Dollar Man ended in 1978 after its audience waned. But Majors bounced back in 1981 as Colt Seavers in the very popular The Fall Guy. As well as playing Hollywood stuntman-cum-bounty-hunter Seavers, Majors showcased his other talents on the show, too. Not only did he try his hand at co-producing and directing episodes, but his vocals were also heard on the theme tune!

The Fall Guy was a huge hit and lasted for five seasons before getting the axe in 1986. Majors’ career has been one of definite highs and lows. Much like his love life — which took a huge upturn in the late 1960s when he met Farrah Fawcett. The couple fell hopelessly in love and went on to get married. But sadly, their relationship wouldn’t last forever, either.

Majors had just found fame in The Big Valley when he met Fawcett, who’d eventually achieve stardom in Charlie’s Angels — as well as become renowned for her coveted golden tresses. She was a newcomer to Hollywood when Majors was introduced to her by an agent. In a bold and possibly brash move, the Six Million Dollar Man star called Fawcett’s hotel and told her that they’d be having dinner together.

The Charlie’s Angels actress reportedly didn’t take too kindly to Majors’ cocky approach, but she agreed to go out with him anyway. And love blossomed quickly. Majors recalled his first impressions of Fawcett when speaking to the Daily Express in 2007. “She was very different then,” he said. “Gorgeous, obviously, but very unsophisticated and naïve, too. She would walk down Hollywood Boulevard and say ‘Hi’ to everybody because she was so friendly.”

The loved-up pair became the "It" couple of the era and wed in 1973. Fawcett even made a series of cameos in The Six Million Dollar Man, before scoring the part that would catapult her to fame, Jill Munroe in Charlie’s Angels. This breakthrough role secured the actress’s place alongside her husband on the A-list. But soon, the couple were being hounded by the paparazzi, and their busy work schedules began forcing them apart.

“We were the Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston of our day,” Majors told the Daily Express. And we all know what happened to them, of course. The actor added, “When both our careers were going really well, there was a point when we saw each other for a total of just two weeks in an entire year.”

“There’s no way a marriage can survive when you’re apart for that length of time,” Majors continued. “And when we did get together, it was impossible just to go out and have a quiet dinner because the paparazzi would descend on us. That kind of thing puts pressure on a couple, too.” And as we know, when a marriage is in trouble, a third party can be the final nail in the coffin.

We saw this with Brad and Jennifer — enter Angelina Jolie — and it happened to Majors and Fawcett, too. The third party in this instance was The Big Valley star’s close friend, actor Ryan O’Neal. Yikes. And to rub salt into Majors’ wounds, it was him who’d introduced the pair and suggested that they spend some time together. Double yikes.

While Majors had been away filming, he’d encouraged his friend O’Neal to keep his wife company back in Los Angeles. As O’Neal recalled in 2012’s Both of Us: My Life with Farrah, Majors asked, “Why don’t you take her to dinner one night?” It’d probably be the biggest mistake of the star’s life. Because from that dinner date onwards, O’Neal and Fawcett began to fall in love.

Although he and O’Neal are no longer friends, Majors seemingly bears no grudges. “I don’t blame him, because it would have probably happened anyway,” Majors told the Daily Express. “Because Farrah and I were separated for such long periods of time. If anything it was down to Farrah.” The couple divorced in 1983, while Fawcett and O’Neal went on to have a rocky yet enduring relationship spanning 30 years.

Majors has admitted, though, that the pain of losing his second wife ran deep. “The divorce broke my heart,” he revealed. “But any divorce gives you a certain heartache, although that one probably gave me more than the others. I was with her one way or another for about 12 years and, even though we went through a trial separation beforehand, I still thought there was a chance we could get back together. But that’s life.”

There would be more misfortune to follow, too. Majors’ third marriage, to former Playboy bunny Karen Velez, also failed. And the couple parted ways in 1994. In the several years that they were together, they had a daughter, Nikki, and twin sons, Dane and Trey. It seemed as though the Six Million Dollar Man star was cursed when it came to finding lasting love.

To add to his romantic woes, Majors started having health problems as well. Years of running — it wasn’t really in slow motion! — as Steve Austin and the stunt-filled action scenes as Colt Seavers have taken their toll on the star. “I’m paying for it these days,” he told CBS News in 2011. “Both knees are kind of down to the bone, and [I have]...back problems.”

The actor also had a thyroid cancer scare and in 2003 underwent emergency heart surgery. A routine check-up revealed a serious problem with one of Majors’ arteries. And there were further complications. Speaking to the National Enquirer in 2003, a friend of the star explained, “Doctors found the blockage was at the bottom of the artery, which made it difficult to clean out.”

The friend added, “So they decided to do a heart bypass.” What should’ve been a serious-but-routine operation turned into a medical emergency, though, when Majors started hemorrhaging after the bypass. Doctors rushed to perform further surgery and thankfully managed to stop the bleeding. “He’s more than thankful that a simple physical check-up may have saved his life,” the actor’s pal revealed.

But while matters of the heart have caused Majors lots of pain — in more ways than one — over the years, he has one thing to be thankful for. And that’s his career. You see, the star has never stopped working! Yes, while you may not have heard so much about him since his glory days in the 1970s, he’s been in steady demand as an actor.

As well as reprising his Six Million Dollar Man role in a series of TV movies, Majors popped up on the big screen in Circle of Two (1981) and festive cult classic Scrooged (1988). He also played the lead in the 1990 crime flick Keaton’s Cop and had a part in the 1997 rom-com turkey, Trojan War. Probably the less said about that one, the better!

As well as countless minor movie roles over the past couple of decades, Majors has been a regular feature on the small screen. You just might have missed him! He was Coach Ross in The Game on the CW network from 2006 to 2009. Then in 2010 he showed up as a sailing teacher in cult comedy Community. Majors was also in a couple of 2013 episodes of Dallas and then appeared in the 2019 Magnum PI reboot.

Now that Majors is in his 80s, you’d probably think he’d be ready to retire. Nope! From 2019-2020 he was the voice of Jeff Tracy in the Amazon Prime revival of Thunderbirds Are Go. And the star just added yet another film credit to his lengthy resume. You can catch him as Dallas Chapman in the 2021 action movie Narco Sub.

Things are finally looking good in the actor’s love life, too. Majors has admitted to going off the rails a little and drinking too much after the collapse of his third marriage. But then he met another blonde beauty — not unlike former love Fawcett — by the name of Faith Cross. Despite the significant age gap — Cross is in her 40s — the couple married in 2002 and certainly seem to be living happily ever after.

Speaking about his fourth wife, Majors told the Daily Express, “When you’ve been married before and they’ve not worked out, you get scared of committing yourself all over again. But when you find the right one, there’s nothing you can do about it.” And it would seem that the star has indeed found the right one — how fitting that her name should be Faith.

Majors continued, “I was very put off marriage initially, just because I’d already been through three. But now I know how Tom Cruise felt, jumping on the couch with joy. I was a bit concerned about the age difference, but I feel comfortable knowing that, after I’m gone, she’ll be taken care of financially.”

“I feel pretty healthy, too,” the actor added. “I stopped smoking and drinking about four years ago. I got back in shape and discovered that I didn’t need alcohol to enjoy myself. For the first time in my life, I married my best friend — I don’t think I was ever best friends with any of my previous wives.”

Clearly, Majors and his fourth wife have found the secret to relationship success, as they’ve been together for over 20 years. “It is a record in Hollywood,” he joked to People in 2019. But what of the star’s former flame, Fawcett? Did they ever become friends again after that bitter divorce in the 1980s?

Well, as we know, Fawcett and O’Neal stayed together for a long while. In 1985, they had a child: Redmond James Fawcett O’Neal. Sadly, though, Redmond would go on to lead a troubled life, building up a rap sheet that includes robbery, drug possession, and even attempted murder. In 2019 it was also reported that he had been diagnosed with schizophrenia.

And Fawcett seemingly endured struggles of her own, too. Both before and after the birth of Redmond, the actress found herself into the public eye – and she apparently didn’t like it at all. In fact, the star devised subtle ways to hide from the spotlight. “I said, ‘Why do you wear your hair like that?’” O’Neal told Vanity Fair in 2009. “[Fawcett] said, ‘I can’t see to the right or left, and that way I don’t have to see people looking at me.’”

Such an admission may have come as a surprise to the many people who idolized Fawcett’s hair. For a while, after all, the “Farrah flip,” which she sported to great effect on Charlie’s Angels, was all the rage. Some fashionistas even think that the style is making a comeback.

It’s been suggested that Fawcett was a victim of her own good looks. “She was beautiful and likable, which is a hard combination to find. I had never seen anyone have an impact like Farrah did,” Leonard Goldberg, who was a co-producer on Charlie’s Angels, told Vanity Fair in 2009.

And Fawcett herself believed that sex appeal had made Charlie’s Angels a hit. “When the show was number three, I thought it was our acting,” the actress told TV Guide magazine in 1977. “When we got to be number one, I decided it could only be because none of us wears a bra.”

Fawcett quit Charlie’s Angels that same year — perhaps in a bid to be taken more seriously as an actress. After she branched out, though, the critics didn’t go easy on her. In certain circles, Fawcett’s next film, Somebody Killed Her Husband, was even given a rather cruel nickname: “Somebody Killed Her Career.”

And during the same period, O’Neal’s professional life was seemingly also taking a hit. He had starred in Stanley Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon in 1975, and the actor believed that the movie’s mixed reception had affected his reputation for years afterwards. O’Neal’s estranged son, Griffin, has also maintained that his father began cheating on Fawcett at around this point.

During an in-depth interview with Larry King in 2009, Griffin described the relationship between O’Neal and Fawcett. “It was bombastic at times. There were great times, [and] there [were] very hard times. By the time [Redmond] was five, they lived in separate rooms in a very large house,” he claimed.

And when King asked Griffin if there had been any infidelity in Fawcett and O’Neal’s relationship, Griffin described his father as “faithless.” He also went on to detail an incident that he claimed Fawcett herself had told him about. “She walked in on him, and he was with some other woman… I know this for a fact,” Griffin said.

O’Neal admitted to that liaison when speaking to Vanity Fair in 2009. He implied, too, that there had been plenty of difficulties between himself and Fawcett. “She was very high-maintenance. She took a long time getting ready to go anywhere, and that started to drive me nuts,” he said.

And Fawcett getting older apparently didn’t help matters, either. “I believe Farrah was going through some kind of change,” O’Neal added. He went on, “I didn’t have a change of life; I was always a jerk. But they’re hard work, these divas. I was sick of it, and I was unappreciated. I just don’t think she liked me very much. So, I excused myself, and I was lucky enough to meet this young girl.”

Yes, O’Neal confessed that he had embarked on an affair with an actress called Leslie Stefanson – a tryst Fawcett found out about when she walked in on the pair. “It was terrible,” O’Neal told Vanity Fair. “Leslie dived under the covers. I thought Farrah was going to attack her, but she said, ‘What’s your name?’ Leslie said, ‘Leslie.’ And Farrah walked out.”

Perhaps unsurprisingly, said incident spelled the temporary end of the Fawcett-O’Neal romance. Then in 1997 Fawcett began a relationship with director James Orr that also went on to make headlines. After Fawcett had left Orr the following year, you see, he was convicted of assaulting her and handed a three-year probation sentence.

In fact, it took a serious illness to bring Fawcett and O’Neal back together. In 2001 the actor was given a diagnosis of leukemia, and this apparently triggered a reconciliation between the pair. “[Fawcett] came right to my side, which I loved her for,” O’Neal told Barbara Walters in 2009. “And we gradually started to rebuild our relationship.”

O’Neal would also recount memories from this part of his life to Vanity Fair in 2009. “Leslie was gone, and Farrah came to me. We started over again, and this time we built [a relationship] in a way that had foundation and trust,” he explained. “Farrah had her home here, and I had my home at the beach, and she would only come on the weekends.”

But while the romance between Fawcett and O’Neal was seemingly back on, there were more troubles ahead for the pair. Firstly, Fawcett’s sister, Diane, died of lung cancer in 2001. “[Diane]’ll have a bout of chemotherapy, and then she’ll go out with a friend and have a drink. She’s so strong. She’s amazing,” Fawcett told The Daily Telegraph a few months before her sibling passed away. The actress knew plenty about the illness, too, having been a chairwoman for the American Cancer Society’s ‘Women Against Cancer’ campaign in 1980.

Then a few years after Diane’s death, Fawcett’s mother, Pauline, also passed away. She was 91 years old and left behind her husband and two grandchildren as well as Fawcett herself. Pauline had also appeared in her daughter’s reality show, Chasing Farrah, and clips from the series were subsequently shown at her funeral.

And, unfortunately, Fawcett’s son, Redmond, would run into trouble. In 2008, when Redmond was 23, both he and O’Neal were arrested for the alleged possession of methamphetamine. At the time, the younger man was already serving a three-year probation stint related to a different drug possession case.

But while O’Neal and Fawcett stuck together throughout all of these trials, life would take yet another terrible turn for the couple in 2007. After fighting cancer the previous year, Fawcett thought that she may have beaten the disease. Unfortunately, though, the cancer came back – and this time it had spread to her liver. In fact, it soon became devastatingly obvious that she wasn’t going to survive the battle.

And although Fawcett tried many different procedures to stop the progression of her illness — including chemotherapy, chemoembolization, laser ablation and “alternative” treatments — none of these properly took hold. In May 2009, then, it was reported by news outlets that Fawcett was spending her last days with O’Neal at their home.

And when this news reached Majors, he felt the urge to contact his ex-wife. According to US Weekly, “They had a 40-minute phone conversation about her life, and the cancer and it was such a lovely moment for the two of them.”

Remarkably, Fawcett openly shared her battle with the disease with the world. With the help of her friend Alana Stewart, she ensured that almost every detail of her ordeal was recorded for a documentary. Even some of the most saddening and personal moments of Fawcett’s fight — such as the actress finally having to shave off her famous hair — were immortalized on camera.

And before Fawcett became too ill to communicate, she recorded a opening segment in which she states her intentions for the film. “Why is there not more research into certain types of cancer? Why doesn’t our health system embrace alternative treatments that have proved successful in other countries? I have got cancer, but I’m alive. What are you fighting for?” she asked.

The in-depth look into Fawcett’s fight was all the more notable for discussing a stigmatized variant of the disease. You see, the star had anal cancer, which is understandably difficult to talk about for some people. And sufferers of this kind of the illness appreciated that a famous and beautiful woman was bringing their difficult experiences to light.

Then, just before Fawcett died, O’Neal spoke to People magazine about how devastated he was at her prospects. “It’s a love story. I just don’t know how to play this one. I won’t know this world without her,” he said. “Cancer is an insidious enemy.” He also explained that Fawcett’s treatment had “pretty much ended” in May.

And O’Neal revealed that, for a while, he had been optimistic the treatments would work. “There were times when there seemed to be positive results. Farrah was even playing tennis,” he said to People. “[But] at about the halfway point in our trips, the news started to get darker and darker and darker. The hope started to fade.”

The movie star added that Fawcett hadn’t been too concerned in the end about losing her iconic locks. “I have [the cut hair] at home,” he told the magazine. “She didn’t care. I rub her head. It’s kind of fun, actually, this great, tiny little head. How she carried all that hair I’ll never know. She doesn’t have a vanity about it.”

And O’Neal didn’t shy away from expressing his sadness in the interview, either. “I can’t hear a song. I can’t pass places that we were together without being stabbed in the heart,” he said. “A week ago, Farrah said to me, ‘Am I going to make it?’ I said, ‘Yes, you’ll make it. And if you don’t, I’ll go with you.’”

Fawcett passed away on June 25, 2009, after her life support was switched off. And according to the people who were with the actress as she died, her final word was the name of her son. “She was saying his name, ‘Redmond,’” friend Mela Murphy told People in 2019. “That was the last thing she said.”

And O’Neal later explained that he had wanted to finally tie the knot with his lifelong partner when she was on her deathbed. Tragically, though, it didn’t work out that way. “I’ve asked her to marry me again, and she’s agreed… The priest at St. John’s Hospital arrives to marry us but administers the last rites instead,” he wrote in his 2012 autobiography Both of Us: My Life With Farrah.

And this heartbreaking story has been backed up by Stewart, too. “I think they would’ve married if [Fawcett] had made it, because [O’Neal] asked her to marry him in the hospital, and she said yes,” she told People in 2019. “But she took a turn for the worse. This was just a few weeks before the end, so perhaps it wasn’t realistic.”

June 2019 saw the ten-year anniversary of Fawcett’s death, and the occasion was marked by her nearest and dearest sharing memories of the late actress. Murphy, for instance, told People that O’Neal had remained by Fawcett’s bedside, speaking to her in her final hours. At that time, the star had been so close to death that she hadn’t even been able to drink unaided.

“The night before [Fawcett] died, [O’Neal] was talking and talking, leading up to the story of when he first met Farrah,” Murphy revealed. “It was his way of telling her how much he loved her. She looked over at me and rolled her eyes, and then she smiled.”

But perhaps the most moving memories of Fawcett’s final days belong to O’Neal. “She was in and out of consciousness,” he told People after her death in 2009. “I talked to her all through the night. I told her how very much I loved her. She’s in a better place now.”

Ten years on, O’Neal naturally hasn’t forgotten the woman he adored; in fact, it’s said that he hasn’t enjoyed another significant romance since her passing. And in June 2019 the actor seemingly summed up his and Fawcett’s life together in a beautiful way, telling People, “There was never a day I didn’t love her.”