Education
Orrison graduated from the Sacred Heart Convent in Cullman, Alabama and attended the Pasadena Playhouse College of Theater Arts in Pasadena, California and the American Film Institute in Beverly Hills, California.
Orrison graduated from the Sacred Heart Convent in Cullman, Alabama and attended the Pasadena Playhouse College of Theater Arts in Pasadena, California and the American Film Institute in Beverly Hills, California.
She worked in the Hollywood film industry for over twenty years as an animation checker, associate producer, production manager, art director, set decorator and costumer on films such as Miracle Mile (1988) and The Doors (1991). She also restored and decorated the Mayan Theater in downtown Los Los Angeles She was a staff writer on Cult Movies magazine for over ten years, penning articles on such subjects as Lawrence of Arabia, Editor Wood, actresses Yvonne De Carlo and Joan Woodbury, actor Bela Lugosi, the re-modeling of Cecil B. De Mille"s estate in Los Feliz, and the making of Blade Runner, to name a few.
She also contributed regularly to the Cult Movies book review column.
She appeared as a film historian on the Yul Brynner episode of, on the Canadian Broadcasting Company on the subject of Gary Cooper and on the British Broadcasting Corporation on the subject of epic films. She provided the audio commentary on both the 1923 and 1956 Digital Video Disc and Blu-ray versions of The Ten Commandments, for Paramount Pictures.
She has collaborated on several screenplays, one of which, Rave-On Macbeth, was produced in Europe in 2002. From 1968 to 1969 she was married to actor Peter Coe (1918–1992), ending in annulment.
The marriage lasted until his death in 1998 from the effects of muscular dystrophy.