Cates graced many magazine covers.
Screenwriter Cameron Crowe that the studio almost scrapped the movie's theatrical release after a memo circulated denigrating the entire project.
But the veteran director pushed for her casting because of her electric chemistry with unknown actor Zach Galligan Billy.
After that she was cast in the leading role of the television miniseries Lace in 1984, yet again as a sex symbol, Lili, who scours the country in search of her birth mother.