Amelia Marshall (born April 2, 1958) is an American actress. She is best known for playing the roles of Gilly Grant Speakes on the CBS soap opera Guiding Light (1989 to 1996), Belinda Keefer on the ABC soap opera All My Children, (1996 to 1999), and Liz Sanbourne on the NBC soap opera Passions (2001 to 2007).
Early life
Marshall was born in Albany, Georgia and lived in Atlanta, Georgia and Amityville, New York before her family settled in Houston, Texas. Her mother was a math teacher and her father was an executive for a large insurance company. She has an older sister and a younger brother. She was named after her great-aunt.
A friend talked Marshall into trying out for the vocal department at the Kinder High School for the Performing and Visual Arts in Houston. Even though she had little training, she auditioned at age thirteen by singing "Ave Maria." She was accepted and decided to take Survey of Dance as an elective.
Marshall appeared as a dancer in Robert Klein on Broadway, a 1986 special. She performed at the Kennedy Center in Duke Ellington's Queenie Pie, and at the Houston Grand Opera in Scott Joplin's Treemonisha. She also performed in national tours of Cats and West Side Story.
She was cast as Gillian "Gilly" Grant Speakes on the CBS soap opera Guiding Light in 1989. Marshall worked as a day player on the show for more than a year before she was put on contract. Marshall was dismissed from the series, last airing in July 1996. She said she was let go because of changes in the show's writing staff and a lack of interest in writing for Gilly.
In 1997, she starred Off-Broadway, playing Diane Gardner in Minor Demons at the Century Center for the Performing Arts.
On September 27, 2001, Marshall made her first appearance on Passions in the role of the villainess Liz Sanbourne, sister of Dr. Eve Russell. Marshall was on contract for four and a half years, until she was dismissed from the soap in July 2007 as a result of budget cuts.
In 2001 and 2002, she appeared in the films Stuart Little 2 and According to Spencer. On television, she guest-starred on Lizzie McGuire and The District. They dated for five years prior to getting married.
Marshall married Kent Schaffer in 1997 and they divorced in 2001.