The Young and The RestlessJennifer Leak Dead at 76: Young & Restless’ Hooker-Turned-Nun Gwen Sherman

The Young and the Restless

The Young and The RestlessJennifer Leak Dead at 76: Young & Restless’ Hooker-Turned-Nun Gwen Sherman

  • by John
  • Posted on April 2, 2024

It’s a sad day for fans of The Young and the Restless who remember the soap’s early days. Jennifer Leak, who in the 1970s played hooker Gwen Sherman,

passed away at age 76 on March 18. For nearly a decade, the New York Times reports, she had suffered from progressive supranuclear palsy,

a rare neurological disease that hinders a patient’s coordination, thinking and more.

The actress began her showbiz career in the ’60s but really hit her stride in the subsequent decade, owing to soap roles on Ryan’s Hope, Another World and The Young and the Restless. The role of Gwen, in particular, made an impression. The streetwalker character fell for Greg Foster (Wings Hauser, whose real-life son is Yellowstone’s Cole Hauser, aka Rip) before swearing off men altogether to become a nun.

Leak also famously replaced Mary Tyler Moore’s Mary Richards in a memorable 1974 episode of the hit sitcom The Mary Tyler Moore Show. She didn’t play the protagonist who could turn the world on with her smile, of course, but her replacement, Erica Jordan.

Post-Young & Restless, Leak appeared on One Life to Live and, in her final credit, Loving (scrubbing in as a doctor for two episodes in ’92).

Pay your respects to Leak and the other soap vets 2024 has taken from us by perusing the below photo gallery of the deaths the year has dealt out. Heartbreakingly, it includes everyone from a daytime legend to a heartthrob who was as famous for his body as his body of work.

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It’s a sad day for fans of The Young and the Restless who remember the soap’s early days. Jennifer Leak, who in the 1970s played hooker Gwen Sherman, passed away at age 76 on March 18. For nearly a decade, the New York Times reports, she had suffered from progressive supranuclear palsy, a rare neurological disease that hinders a…