Born in Los Angeles in 1937, Hayward is the eldest of three children born to agent turned film, television, and stage producer
Leland Hayward and actress
Margaret Sullavan. Brooke Hayward is a great-granddaughter of
Monroe Hayward, former U.S. Senator-elect from Nebraska, and the granddaughter of Colonel
William Hayward, who led the United States'
369th Infantry Regiment, aka the "Harlem Hellfighters", the first regiment composed entirely of African-American soldiers during the First World War. She is also a descendant of
Mayflower passenger William White, and
Puritan colonist
Robert Coe. Hayward had a younger sister, Bridget, who died of a drug overdose, and a brother, producer William Hayward III, known as "Bill Hayward", who died by suicide. When Hayward was seven years old, the family moved to a farm in
Brookfield, Connecticut. Hayward's parents divorced in April 1948. The following year, Hayward's father married
Nancy "Slim" Hawks (later known as Slim Keith). After his divorce from Slim Hawks, Leland Hayward married
Pamela Harriman. Her mother married importer and producer
Kenneth Wagg in 1950. Nine months later, on October 17, 1960, Hayward's younger sister Bridget was found dead of a drug overdose in her apartment in New York City. Bridget left what was described as an "incoherent note", the contents of which never were made public. Her death was ruled a suicide. Hayward's brother Bill died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound on March 9, 2008. Hayward attended
Vassar College and studied acting with
Lee Strasberg at the
Actors Studio. ==Career==