Myrna Colley-Lee

Myrna Colley-Lee was born in 1941 in Hamlet, North Carolina. She earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the Women’s College of the University of North Carolina. She later got her master’s degree in scenic and costume design from Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

As a costume designer, she has worked for many television shows and movies. She has also designed costumes for theatrical productions, such as ‘The Piano Lesson,’ ‘Forest City’ and ‘Wedding Band: A Love/Hate Story in Black and White’. Besides being a costume designer, she is also an art director and set designer who has worked for numerous film and television productions. More recently, she has ventured into the field of commercial interior designing as well. In addition, she serves as a commissioner for the Mississippi Arts Commission.

Myrna Colley-Lee and Morgan Freeman dated for a while before getting married in a small ceremony on June 16, 1984. She was already a successful costume designer at the time. While it was her first marriage, Morgan had just divorced his first wife. It was a mutual friend who had set up the couple on a date.

The couple never had any biological children, but Myrna was very close to Morgan Freeman’s children from his other relationships. During their marriage, Freeman earned notoriety for having extramarital affairs, including one with a school teacher named Mary Joyce Hays. Their marriage fell apart because of Morgan’s continued infidelity and eventually Myrna filed for divorce. The divorce was finalized in 2010.

Though she hasn’t acted in any films or TV series, Colley-Lee has appeared in an episode of the TV show ’60 Minutes’. The episode, titled ‘Bridge to Gretna,’ examines a case where the refugees of hurricane Katrina were prevented from passing over a bridge by armed policemen.