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One day after celebrating her 85th birthday on April 28, the Bye Bye Birdie star was honored by the USO for her years of service, having toured Southeast Asia three times.
"I have always had such a great time doing these tours," Ann-Margret told Deadline at the April 29 event, "and then to see my guys come up to me and say they saw you in Vietnam and Da Nang. And then say, 'Well, I liked you in Bye Bye Birdie and Viva Las Vegas.'"
"Those tours and all my guys mean the world to me," she said. "I remember all of them, all of them."
The Oscar nominee (born Ann-Margret Olsson) became the second recipient of the USO Challenge Coin, following famed USO entertainer and comedian Bob Hope.
The ceremony comes just a few weeks after Ann-Margret, who was married to Roger Smith from 1967 until his death in 2017, revealed that she had severely injured herself after falling at her Beverly Hills home.
"I fell the other day and broke my right elbow," she told Parade earlier this month. "It's okay... I've fallen many times." I didn't intend to, but I did! "What can I say?"
Fortunately, the Tommy actress knew she was on her way to recovery, telling the outlet, "I am." "I certainly am!"
And, as Ann-Margret herself mentioned, her recent fall far from her first or her most dangerous, as she also reflected on her fall from a 22-foot-high platform as she was about to perform at a Lake Tahoe, Nev., casino in 1972.
"I have always learned from my parents that you just get up," she replied. "You just start all over again."
Despite her ability to recover, she sustained several horrific injuries, as detailed in her 1994 autobiography Ann-Margret: My Story.
"My face had collapsed and swelled beyond recognition. Several bones in my face were broken or fractured. My jaw had broken in two places. "My left arm was broken," she wrote to Parade. "The doctors feared I'd never dance again—if I survived."
Fortunately, she returned to the stage less than ten weeks later, almost fully healed.
