'Knots Landing' Legend Donna Mills Has a New Career at 85 Years Old

Donna Mills did not simply survive the 1980s. She conquered them in blue eyeliner, shoulder pads and a procession of power suits sharp enough to draw blood. As Abby Cunningham on CBS’ Knots Landing, Mills turned ruthless ambition into appointment television, collected three awards for playing the woman viewers loved to hate and built a beauty business around her unmistakable face.

And now, according to Variety, the 85-year-old icon has found another way to capitalize on the Donna Mills experience: by officially joining OnlyFans.

But don’t let your mind go into the gutter: the octogenarian plans to use the subscription platform for snapshots of her daily life, behind-the-scenes material and more personal conversations with supporters—not the kind of content most commonly associated with the site.

“Social media has been a wonderful way to stay connected, but I’m excited to join OnlyFans because it offers the opportunity for a more personal and direct connection,” Mills said.

The pivot feels considerably less surprising when stacked against Mills’ gloriously excessive ’80s résumé. She joined Knots Landing in 1980 and promptly blew up the neighborhood. Abby Fairgate Cunningham Ewing Sumner collected husbands, lovers, businesses, and enemies while manipulating nearly everyone within country-club distance.

The character rescued Mills from years of playing imperiled women and transformed her into primetime television’s platinum blonde answer to a corporate raider. Mills won three Soap Opera Digest Awards for Outstanding Villainess before leaving the series in 1989.

But Mills was never content to keep Abby’s empire-building confined to Thursday nights. When viewers became obsessed with her meticulously applied eye makeup, she wrote, produced and starred in the 1986 VHS tutorial The Eyes Have It.

The 55-minute beauty lesson became a commercial hit and spawned a matching cosmetics line. She executive-produced television movies, appeared in miniseries and landed non-nude Playboy covers in 1987 and 1989.

Before influencers sold tutorials, makeup collections and paid access to their lives, Mills had already assembled the entire business model—with a VCR and considerably more Aqua Net.

“This is not about changing who she is,” said Andy Bachman, CEO of Creators Inc. “It is about giving her longtime fans more access to the personality, style and behind-the-scenes moments they already love.”

Bachman said Mills responded to the opportunity with, “YOLO—let’s do it.” Mills added that she intends to create “a more meaningful” connection with fans while remaining “true to who I am.”

She is not the only Hollywood veteran taking that access into her own hands. Shannon Elizabeth reportedly earned more than $1.2 million during her first seven days on OnlyFans, while Jaime Pressly joined soon afterward.