Favorite Actresses ♚
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On November 12, 1929, Grace Patricia Kelly was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to wealthy parents. Her girlhood was uneventful for the most part, but one of the things she desired was to become an actress which she had decided on at an early age. After her high school graduation in 1947, Grace struck out on her own, heading to New York's bright lights to try her luck there. Grace worked some as a model and made her debut on Broadway in 1949. She also made a brief foray into the infant medium of television. Not content with the work in New York, Grace moved to Southern California for the more prestigious part of acting -- motion pictures. In 1951, she appeared in her first film entitled Fourteen Hours (1951) when she was 22. It was a small part, but a start nonetheless. The following year she landed the role of Amy Kane in High Noon (1952), a western starring Gary Cooper and Lloyd Bridges which turned out to be very popular. In 1953, Grace appeared in only one film, but it was another popular one. The film was Mogambo (1953) where Grace played Linda Nordley. The film was a jungle drama in which fellow cast members, Clark Gable and Ava Gardner turned in masterful performances. It was also one of the best films ever released by MGM. Although she got noticed with High Noon, her work with director Alfred Hitchcock, which began with Dial M for Murder (1954) made her a star. Her standout performance in Rear Window (1954) brought her to prominence. As Lisa Fremont, she was cast opposite James Stewart, who played a crippled photographer who witnesses a murder in the next apartment from his wheelchair. Grace stayed busy in 1954 appearing in five films. Grace would forever be immortalized by winning the Academy Award for Best Actress for her portrayal of Georgie Elgin opposite Bing Crosby in The Country Girl (1954). In 1955, Grace once again teamed with Hitchcock in To Catch a Thief (1955) co-starring Cary Grant. In 1956, she played Tracy Lord in the musical comedy High Society (1956) which also starred Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby. The whimsical tale ended with her re-marrying her former husband, played by Crosby. The film was well received. It also turned out to be her final acting performance. Grace had recently met and married Prince Rainier of the little principality of Monaco. By becoming a princess, she gave up her career. For the rest of her life, she was to remain in the news with her marriage and her three children. On September 14, 1982, Grace was killed in an automobile accident in her adoptive home country. She was just 52 years old.Favorite Role(s): To Catch a Thief (1955).
I've also seen her in: Rear Window (1954), Dial M for Murder (1954)- Actress
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Ingrid Bergman was one of the greatest actresses from Hollywood's lamented Golden Era. Her natural and unpretentious beauty and her immense acting talent made her one of the most celebrated figures in the history of American cinema. Bergman is also one of the most Oscar-awarded actresses, tied with Meryl Streep and Frances McDormand, all three of them second only to Katharine Hepburn.
Ingrid Bergman was born on August 29, 1915 in Stockholm, Sweden, to a German mother, Frieda Henrietta (Adler), and a Swedish father, Justus Samuel Bergman, an artist and photographer. Her mother died when she was only two and her father died when she was 12. She went to live with an elderly uncle.
The woman who would be one of the top stars in Hollywood in the 1940s had decided to become an actress after finishing her formal schooling. She had had a taste of acting at age 17 when she played an uncredited role of a girl standing in line in the Swedish film Landskamp (1932) in 1932 - not much of a beginning for a girl who would be known as "Sweden's illustrious gift to Hollywood." Her parents died when she was just a girl and the uncle she lived with didn't want to stand in the way of Ingrid's dream. The next year she enrolled at the Royal Dramatic Theatre School in Stockholm but decided that stage acting was not for her. It would be three more years before she would have another chance at a film. When she did, it was more than just a bit part. The film in question was The Count of the Old Town (1935), where she had a speaking part as Elsa Edlund. After several films that year that established her as a class actress, Ingrid appeared in Intermezzo (1936) as Anita Hoffman. Luckily for her, American producer David O. Selznick saw it and sent a representative from Selznick International Pictures to gain rights to the story and have Ingrid signed to a contract. Once signed, she came to California and starred in United Artists' 1939 remake of her 1936 film, Intermezzo (1939), reprising her original role. The film was a hit and so was Ingrid.
Her beauty was unlike anything the movie industry had seen before and her acting was superb. Hollywood was about to find out that they had the most versatile actress the industry had ever seen. Here was a woman who truly cared about the craft she represented. The public fell in love with her. Ingrid was under contract to go back to Sweden to film Only One Night (1939) in 1939 and June Night (1940) in 1940. Back in the US she appeared in three films, all well-received. She made only one film in 1942, but it was the classic Casablanca (1942) opposite Humphrey Bogart.
Ingrid was choosing her roles well. In 1943 she was nominated for an Academy Award for her role in For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943), the only film she made that year. The critics and public didn't forget her when she made Gaslight (1944) the following year--her role of Paula Alquist got her the Oscar for Best Actress. In 1945 Ingrid played in Spellbound (1945), Saratoga Trunk (1945) and The Bells of St. Mary's (1945), for which she received her third Oscar nomination for her role of Sister Benedict. She made no films in 1947, but bounced back with a fourth nomination for Joan of Arc (1948). In 1949 she went to Italy to film Stromboli (1950), directed by Roberto Rossellini. She fell in love with him and left her husband, Dr. Peter Lindstrom, and daughter, Pia Lindström. America's "moral guardians" in the press and the pulpits were outraged. She was pregnant and decided to remain in Italy, where her son was born. In 1952 Ingrid had twins, Isotta and Isabella Rossellini, who became an outstanding actress in her own right, as did Pia.
Ingrid continued to make films in Italy and finally returned to Hollywood in 1956 in the title role in Anastasia (1956), which was filmed in England. For this she won her second Academy Award. She had scarcely missed a beat. Ingrid continued to bounce between Europe and the US making movies, and fine ones at that. A film with Ingrid Bergman was sure to be a quality production. In her final big-screen performance in 1978's Autumn Sonata (1978) she had her final Academy Award nomination. Though she didn't win, many felt it was the most sterling performance of her career. Ingrid retired, but not before she gave an outstanding performance in the mini-series A Woman Called Golda (1982), a film about Israeli prime minister Golda Meir. For this she won an Emmy Award as Best Actress, but, unfortunately, she did not live to see the fruits of her labor.
Ingrid died from cancer on August 29, 1982, her 67th birthday, in London, England.Favorite Role(s): Spellbound (1945); Gaslight (1944).
Also: Casablanca (1942), Notorious (1946)- Actress
- Soundtrack
Luise Rainer, the first thespian to win back-to-back Oscars, was born on January 12, 1910 in Dusseldorf, Germany, into a prosperous Jewish family. Her parents were Emilie (Königsberger) and Heinrich Rainer, a businessman. She took to the stage, and plied her craft on the boards in Germany. As a young actress, she was discovered by the legendary theater director Max Reinhardt and became part of his company in Vienna, Austria. "I was supposed to be very gifted, and he heard about me. He wanted me to be part of his theater," Rainer recounted in a 1997 interview. She joined Reinhardt's theatrical company in Vienna and spent years developing as an actress under his tutelage. As part of Reinhardt's company, Rainer became a popular stage actress in Berlin and Vienna in the early 1930s. Rainer was a natural talent for Reinhardt's type of staging, which required an impressionistic acting style.
Rainer, who made her screen debut as a teenager and appeared in three other German-language films in the early 1930s, terminated her European career when the Austrian Adolf Hitler consolidated his power in Germany. With his vicious anti-Semitism bringing about the Draconian Nuremberg Laws severely curtailing the rights of Germany's Jews, and efforts to expand that regime into the Sudetenland and Austria, Hitler and his Nazi government was proving a looming threat to European Jewry. Rainer had been spotted by a talent scout, who offered her a seven-year contract with the American studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The 25-year-old Rainer took the deal and emigrated to the United States.
She made her American debut in the movie Escapade (1935), replacing Myrna Loy, who was originally slated for the part. It was her luck to have William Powell as her co-star in her first Hollywood film, as he mentored her, teaching her how to act in front of the camera. Powell, whom Rainer remembers as "a dear man" and "a very fine person," lobbied MGM. boss Louis B. Mayer, reportedly telling him, "You've got to star this girl, or I'll look like an idiot."
During the making of "Escapade", Rainer met, and fell in love with, the left-wing playwright Clifford Odets, then at the height of his fame. They were married in 1937. It was not a happy union. MGM cast Rainer in support of Powell in the title role of the The Great Ziegfeld (1936), its spectacular bio-epic featuring musical numbers that recreated his "Follies" shows on Broadway. As Anna Held, Ziegfeld's common-law wife, Rainer excelled in the musical numbers, but it is for her telephone scene that she is most remembered. "The Great Ziegfeld" was a big hit and went on to win the Academy Award as Best Picture of 1936. Rainer received her first of two successive Best Actress Oscars for playing Held. The award was highly controversial at the time as she was a relative unknown and it was only her first nomination, but also because her role was so short and relatively minor that it better qualified for a supporting nomination. (While 1936 was the first year that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences honored supporting players, her studio, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, listed her as a lead player, then got out its block vote for her.) Compounding the controversy was the fact that Rainer beat out such better known and more respected actresses as Carole Lombard (her sole Oscar nomination) in My Man Godfrey (1936), previous Best Actress winner Norma Shearer (her fifth nomination) in Romeo and Juliet (1936), and Irene Dunne (her second of five unsuccessful nominations) in Theodora Goes Wild (1936). Some of the bitchery was directed toward Louis B. Mayer, whom non-MGM Academy members resented for his ability to manipulate Academy votes. Other critics of her first Oscar win claimed it was the result of voters being unduly impressed with the great budget ($2 million) of "The Great Ziegfeld" rather than great acting. Most observers agree that Rainer won her Oscar as the result of her moving and poignant performance in just one single scene in the picture, the famous telephone scene in which the broken-hearted Held congratulates Ziegfeld over the telephone on his upcoming marriage to Billie Burke while trying to retain her composure and her dignity. During the scene, the camera is entirely focused on Rainer, and she delivers a tour-de-force performance. Seventy years later, it remains one of the most famous scenes in movie history. With another actress playing Held, the scene could have been mawkish, but Rainer brought the pathos of the scene out and onto film. She based her interpretation of the scene on Jean Cocteau's play "La Voix Humaine". "Cocteau's play is just a telephone conversation about a woman who has lost her beloved to another woman", Rainer remembered. "That is the comparison. As it fit into the Ziegfeld story, that's how I wrote it. It's a daily happening, not just in Cocteau." In an interview held 60 years after the film's release, Rainer was dismissive of the performance. "I was never proud of anything", she said. "I just did it like everything else. To do a film - let me explain to you - it's like having a baby. You labor, you labor, you labor, and then you have it. And then it grows up and it grows away from you. But to be proud of giving birth to a baby? Proud? No, every cow can do that."
Rainer would allay any back-biting from Hollywood's bovines over her first Oscar with her performance as O-Lan in MGM producer Irving Thalberg's spectacular adaptation of Pearl S. Buck's "The Good Earth", the former Boy Wonder's final picture before his untimely death. The role won Rainer her second Best Actress Award. The success of The Good Earth (1937) was rooted in its realism, and its realism was enhanced by Rainer's acting opposite the legendary Paul Muni as her husband. When Thalberg cast Muni in the role of Wang Lung, he had to abandon any thought of casting the Chinese-American actress Anna May Wong as O-Lan as the Hays Office would not allow the hint of miscegenation, even between an actual Chinese woman and a Caucuasian actor in yellow-face drag. So, Thalberg gave Rainer the part, and she made O-Lan her own. She refused to wear a heavy makeup, and her elfin look helped her to assay a Chinese woman with results far superior to those of Myrna Loy in her Oriental vamp phase or Katharine Hepburn in Dragon Seed (1944). In the late 1990s, Rainer praised her director, Sidney Franklin, as "wonderful", and explained that she used an acting technique similar to "The Method" being pioneered by her husband's Group Theatre comrades back in New York. "I worked from inside out", she said. "It's not for me, putting on a face, or putting on makeup, or making masquerade. It has to come from inside out. I knew what I wanted to do and he let me do it." The win made Rainer the first two-time Oscar winner in an acting category and the first to win consecutive acting awards (Spencer Tracy, her distaff honoree for Captains Courageous (1937) would follow her as a consecutive acting Oscar winner the next year, and Walter Brennan, Best Supporting Actor Oscar winner for Come and Get It (1936) the year Rainer won her first, would tie them both in 1937 with his win for Kentucky (1938) and trump them with his third win for The Westerner (1940), a record subsequently tied by Ingrid Bergman, Jack Nicholson, Meryl Streep, Daniel Day-Lewis, and surpassed by Katharine Hepburn.)
Rainer's career soon went into free-fall and collapsed, as she became the first notable victim of the "Oscar curse", the phenomenon that has seem many a performer's career take a nose-dive after winning an Academy Award. "For my second and third pictures I won Academy Awards. Nothing worse could have happened to me", Rainer said. A non-conformist, Rainer rejected Hollywood's values of Hollywood. In the late 1990s, she said, "I came from Europe where I was with a wonderful theater group, and I worked. The only thing on my mind was to do good work. I didn't know what an Academy Award was." MGM boss Mayer, the founding force behind the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, had to force her to attend the Awards banquet to receive her Oscar. She rebelled against the studio due to the movies that MGM forced her into after "The Good Earth".
In one case, director Dorothy Arzner had been assigned by MGM producer Joseph M. Mankiewicz (whose wife, Rose Stradner had been Rainer's understudy in the Vienna State Theater) in 1937 to direct Rainer in "The Girl from Trieste", an unproduced Ferenc Molnár play about a prostitute trying to go reform herself who discovers the hypocrisies of the respectable class which she aspires to. After Thalberg's death in 1936, Mayer's lighter aesthetic began to rule the roost at MGM. Mayer genuinely believed in the goodness of women and motherhood and put women on a pedestal; he once told screenwriter Frances Marion that he never wanted to see anything produced by MGM that would embarrass his wife and two daughters.
Without the more sophisticated Thalberg at the studio to run interference, Molnar's play was rewritten so that it was no longer about a prostitute, but a slightly bitter Cinderella story with a happy ending. Retitled by Mankiewicz as The Bride Wore Red (1937), Rainer withdrew and was replaced by Joan Crawford. In a 1976 interview in "The New York Times", Arzner claimed that Rainer "had been suspended for marrying a Communist" (Clifford Odets). This is unlikely as MGM, like all Hollywood studios, had known or suspected communists on its payroll, most of whose affiliations were known by MGM vice president E.J. Mannix. (Mannix, one of whose functions was responsibility for security at the studio, once said it would have been impossible to fire them all, as "the communists" were the studio's best writers.) The studio never took action against alleged communists until an industry-wide agreement to do so was sealed at the Waldorf Conference of 1947, which was held in reaction to the House of Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) launching a Hollywood witch hunt.
It was more likely that Rainer, fussy over her projects and wanting to use her Academy Award prominence to ensure herself better roles, withdrew on her own due to her lack of enthusiasm for the reformulated product. In the late 1990s, Rainer recalled the satisfaction of being a European stage actress. "One day we were on a big tour", she told an interviewer in the late 1990s. "We did a play by Pirandello, and Reinhardt was in the theater. I shall never forget, it was the greatest compliment I ever got, better than any Academy Award. He came to me, looked at me and said - we were never called by first names - 'Rainer, how did you do this?' It was so wonderful. 'How did you create this?' I was so startled and happy. That was my Academy Award." Rainer still is dismissive of the Academy Awards. "I can't watch the Oscars," she said. "Everybody thanking their mother, their father, their grandparents, their nurse - it's a crazy, horrible." She blames the studio and Mayer for the rapid decline in her career. "What they did with me upset me very much", she said in a 1997 interview. "I was dreaming naturally like anyone to do something very good, but after I got the two Academy Awards the studio thought, it doesn't matter what she gets. They threw all kinds of stuff on me, and I thought, no, I didn't want to be an actress."
Mayer pulled his famous emotional routines when Rainer, whom he wanted to turn into a glamorous star, would demand meatier roles. "He would cry phony tears", she recalled. Mayer had opposed her being cast as O-Lan in "The Good Earth", but Thalberg, who had a connection with MGM capo di tutti capi Nicholas Schenck, the president of MGM corporate parent Loew's, Inc., appealed to Schenck, who overrode Mayer's veto. (Mayer, who was involved in a power struggle with Thalberg before the latter's death, had opposed his filming Pearl Buck's novel. Mayer's reasoning was that American audiences wouldn't patronize movies about American farmers, so what made anyone think they'd flock to see a film about Chinese farmers, especially one with such a big budget, estimated at $2.8 million. (Upon release, the film barely broke even.) Thalberg died during the filming of "The Good Earth" (the only film of his released by MGM whose title credits bore his name, in the form of a posthumous tribute).
Rainer felt lost without her protector. She recalled that Mayer "didn't know what to do with me, and that made me so unhappy. I was on the stage with great artists, and everything was so wonderful. I was in a repertory theater, and every night I played something else." Rainer asked to play Nora in a film of Ibsen's "A Doll's House" or portray Madame Curie, but instead, Mayer - now in complete control of the studio - had her cast in The Toy Wife (1938), a movie she actually wound up liking, as she was charmed by her co-star, the urbane, intellectually and politically enlightened Melvyn Douglas. She recalls Douglas, ultimately a double-Oscar winner like herself, as her favorite leading man. "He was intelligent, and he was interested also in other things than acting."
Her problems with the culture of Hollywood, or the lack thereof, were worsening. The lack of intellectual conversation or concern with ideas by the denizens of the movie colony she was forced to work with was depressing. Hollywood was an unsophisticated place where materialism, such as the stars' preoccupation with clothes, was paramount. As she tells it, "Soon after I was there in Hollywood, for some reason I was at a luncheon with Robert Taylor sitting next to me, and I asked him, 'Now, what are your ideas or what do you want to do', and his answer was that he wanted to have 10 good suits to wear, elegant suits of all kinds, that was his idea. I practically fell under the table."
MGM teamed her with fellow Oscar-winner Tracy in Big City (1937), a movie about conflict between rival taxi drivers. The memory of the movie disgusted her. "Supposedly it wasn't a bad film, but I thought it was a bad film!" She was also cast in The Emperor's Candlesticks (1937), reteaming her with "Ziegfeld" co-star Powell, a movie she didn't like, as she couldn't understand its story. A detective tale, the script thoroughly confused Rainer, who was expected to soldier on like a good employee. Instead, she resisted.
After appearing in The Great Waltz (1938) and Dramatic School (1938), her career was virtually over by 1938. She never made another film for MGM. "I just had to get away", she said about Hollywood. "I couldn't bear this total concentration and interviews on oneself, oneself, oneself. I wanted to learn, and to live, to go all over the world, to learn by seeing things and experiencing things, and Hollywood seemed very narrow." When World War II broke out in Europe, Rainer was joined by her family, as her German-born father was also an American citizen, allowing them all to escape Hitler and the Holocaust. Even before the outbreak of war, Rainer had been very worried about the state of affairs of the world, and she could not abide the escapist trifles that MGM wanted to cast her in. When she protested, Mayer told Rainer that if she defied him, he would blackball her in Hollywood.
Disturbed by Hollywood's apathy over fascism in Europe and Asia and by labor unrest and poverty in the U.S., she decided to walk out on her contract. She and Odets returned to New York. They were divorced in 1940. "Hollywood was a very strange place", she remembered. "To me, it was like a huge hotel with a huge door, one of those rotunda doors. On one side people went in, heads high, and very soon they came out on the other side, heads hanging." Her frustration with Hollywood was so complete, she abandoned movie acting in the early 1940s, after making the World War II drama Hostages (1943) for Paramount.
She made her Broadway debut in the play "A Kiss for Cinderella", which was staged by Lee Strasberg, which opened at the Music Box Theatre on March 10, 1942 and closed April 18th after 48 performances. Rainer then worked for the war effort during World War II, appearing at war bond rallies. She went on a tour of North Africa and Italy for the Army Special Service, socializing with soldiers to build their morale, and supplying them with books. The experience changed her life, allowing her to get over the shyness she'd had all her life. It also broadened her experience, forcing her to deal with the obvious fact that there were more important things than movie acting, which had proven unfulfilling to her.
Fortunately, Rainer found happiness in a long-lived marriage with the publisher Robert Knittel, a wealthy man whom she married in 1945. The couple had a daughter and made their home mostly in Switzerland and England as Rainer essentially left acting behind, although she did do some television in the 1940s, '50s, and '60s. Her retirement from the movies lasted for 53 years, until her brief comeback in The Gambler (1997), a movie based on Fyodor Dostoevsky's eponymous story. In the film, Rainer played the role of the matriarch of an aristocratic Russian family in the 1860s who is in hock due to the family members' obsession with gambling.
Toward the end of her life, Rainer lived in a luxurious flat in Eaton Square in London's Belgravia district, in a building where Vivien Leigh once lived. Blessed with a good memory, she claimed she could not remember the 1937 Academy Awards ceremony, when she won her first Oscar. She says the glamour of the event was out of sync with her life at the time, which was one of great sadness. "I married Clifford Odets. The marriage was for both of us a failure. He wanted me to be his little wife and a great actress at the same time. Somehow I could not live up to all of that."
She had intriguing offers during her long retirement. Federico Fellini had wanted Rainer for a role in La Dolce Vita (1960), but though she admired the director, she didn't like the script and turned it down. Rainer occasionally plied her craft as an actress on the stage. She made one more stab at Broadway, appearing in a 1950 production of Ibsen's "The Lady from the Sea", which was staged by Sam Wanamaker and Terese Hayden and co-starred Steven Hill, one of the founding members of Lee Strasberg's Actor's Studio. The play was a flop, running just 16 performances. "I was living in America and was on the stage there - sporadically. I always lived more than I worked. Which doesn't mean that I do not love my profession, and every moment I was in it gave me great satisfaction and happiness."
Rainer had no regrets over not becoming the star she might have been. She outlived all of the legendary stars of her era, which likely is the best revenge for the loss of her career after bidding adieu to a company town she could not abide.Favorite Role(s): Dramatic School (1938); The Great Ziegfeld (1936).
Also in: The Good Earth (1937).- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Frances Louise McDormand was born on June 23, 1957, in Gibson City, Illinois. She was adopted by Canadian-born parents Noreen Eloise (Nickleson), a nurse from Ontario, and Rev. Vernon Weir McDormand, a Disciples of Christ minister from Nova Scotia, who raised her in the suburbs of Pittsburgh. She earned a BA in theater from Bethany College in 1979 and an MFA from Yale University in 1982. Her career after graduation began onstage, and she has retained her association with the theater throughout her career. She soon obtained prominent roles in movies as well, first starring in Blood Simple (1984), in which she worked with filmmaker Joel Coen, whom she married that year. She frequently collaborated with Coen and his brother, Ethan Coen, in their films.
McDormand's skilled and versatile acting has been recognized by both the critics and the Academy, and in addition to many critics' awards, she has been nominated for an Academy Award six times - Supporting in Mississippi Burning (1988), Almost Famous (2000), and North Country (2005), and Lead in Fargo (1996), Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017), and Nomadland (2020), winning the Oscar for the latter three. She also won a Best Picture Oscar as co-producer of "Nomadland." Keenly intelligent and possessed of a sharp wit, McDormand is the antithesis of the Hollywood starlet - rather than making every role about Frances McDormand, she dissolves into the characters she plays. Accordingly, she has expressed some reservations about the iconic recognition she has gained from her touching and amusing portrayal of Police Chief Marge Gunderson, the quintessential Minnesota Scandinavian, in Fargo (1996).
McDormand and Coen adopted a son, Pedro McDormand Coen, who was born in Paraguay, in 1994. They live in New York.Favorite Role(s): Fargo (1996).
Also: This Must Be the Place (2011), Burn After Reading (2008)- Actress
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Sigourney Weaver has created a host of memorable characters, both dramatic and comic, ranging from Ripley in Alien to Dian Fossey in Gorillas in the Mist to Gwen/Tawny in Galaxy Quest and most recently, 14-year-old Kiri in Avatar: The Way of Water. With a career spanning over 50 years, Weaver has captivated audiences and won acclaim as one of the most gifted and versatile actresses on stage and screen.
Born and educated in New York City, Weaver graduated from Stanford University and went on to receive a master's degree from the Yale School of Drama. Her first professional job was in Sir John Gielgud's production of The Constant Wife working with Ingrid Bergman.
After a walk-on in Woody Allen's Annie Hall, Weaver made her motion picture debut in Ridley Scott's 1979 blockbuster Alien. She later reprised the role of Warrant Officer Ripley in James Cameron's 1986 Aliens; her performance earned her Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations for Best Actress. In 1992, she again brought Ripley back to life in David Fincher's Alien 3, which she co-produced, and in 1997 she starred in and co-produced Alien: Resurrection for director Jean-Pierre Jeunet. In 1985, Weaver starred in Ivan Reitman's Ghostbusters alongside Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd playing Dana Barrett and her possessed counterpart Zuul.
In 1988 Weaver portrayed primatologist Dian Fossey in Gorillas in the Mist and Katharine Parker in the Mike Nichols comedy Working Girl. Both performances earned her Academy Award Nominations, and she was awarded two Golden Globes for Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture. Other films include Peter Weir's The Year of Living Dangerously (1983) with Linda Hunt and Mel Gibson, Eyewitness (1981) with William Hurt, Half Moon Street (1986) with Michael Caine, Ridley Scott's 1492: Conquest of Paradise (1992) with Gerard Depardieu, Roman Polanski's gripping film adaptation of Death and the Maiden (1994), the thriller Copycat (1995) and Paul Rudnick's comedy Jeffery (1995). Weaver also starred in Showtime's live-action film Snow White (1997) based on the original Grimm's fairy tale, which earned her an Emmy nomination and a Screen Actors Guild nomination.
In 1997 Weaver joined the ensemble of Ang Lee's critically acclaimed film The Ice Storm alongside Kevin Kline, Joan Allen, Elijah Wood and Christina Ricci. Her performance garnered her a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe nomination and a Screen Actors Guild nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She later gave a galvanizing performance in A Map of the World (1999), Scott Elliott's powerful drama based on the novel by Jane Hamilton, which earned her universal critical praise and a Golden Globe nomination for best actress. Also in 1999, Weaver appeared in the science fiction comedy Galaxy Quest directed by Dean Parisot alongside Tim Allen and Alan Rickman. She delighted audiences with her flair for comedy, and the film proved to be a hit of the 1999 holiday season. She followed this with the popular comedies Company Man (2000) written and directed by Douglas McGrath and David Mirkin's Heartbreakers (2001) opposite Gene Hackman, Jennifer Love-Hewitt and the late Ray Liotta.
In 2002 Weaver starred in the film version of The Guys, with Anthony LaPaglia, directed by Jim Simpson, and in 2003 she portrayed the cold-blooded, red-headed warden in the hit comedy Holes directed by Andy Davis. The next year, Weaver appeared in M. Night Shyamalan's The Village and received rave reviews for her performance in Imaginery Heroes written and directed by Dan Harris.
In 2006 she appeared in three films - as Babe Paley in Douglas McGrath's Infamous, in Jake Kasdan's The TV Set, and in Snow Cake opposite Alan Rickman. In the following years, Weaver lent her voice to Pixar's 2008 box office smash WALL-E as well as The Tale of Despereaux (2008) with Matthew Broderick, Dustin Hoffman and Emma Watson. She also starred in the Tina Fey/Amy Poehler comedy Baby Mama (2008) and Andy Fickman's comedy You Again (2010) with Jamie Lee Curtis. In December 2009 Weaver starred as Dr. Grace Augustine in Jim Cameron's groundbreaking film Avatar, which went on to be the highest grossing film of all time. The film won a Golden Globe for Best Picture and an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture.
Other credits include Drew Goddard's The Cabin in the Woods (2012), Miguel Arteta's Cedar Rapids (2011), Paul (2011), Amy Heckerling's Vamps (2012), and Neil Blomkamp's Chappie (2015). In December 2016 she starred in Focus Features' A Monster Calls alongside Liam Neeson, Felicity Jones and newcomer, Lewis MacDougall, followed by Lionsgate's The Assignment (2017) with Michelle Rodriguez directed by Walter Hill.
After coming to New York in the fall of 1975, Weaver performed Off-Off Broadway in Christopher Durang's The Nature and Purpose of the Universe (1974), Titanic (1976) and Das Lusitania Songspiel (1980). She and Durang co-wrote Das Lusitania which earned them both Drama Desk nominations. She has appeared in numerous Off-Broadway productions in New York, working with writers such as John Guare, Albert Innaurato, Richard Nelson and Len Jenkin. In regional repertory she has performed works by Pinter, Williams, Feydeau and Shakespeare. Weaver also appeared in the PBS mini-series "The Best of Families" (1977) and John Cheever's The Sorrows of Gin (1979), adapted by Wendy Wasserstein for PBS.
Weaver received a Tony Award nomination for her starring role in Hurlyburly (1984) on Broadway, directed by Mike Nichols. She played Portia in the Classic Stage Company of New York's production of The Merchant of Venice (1986). In 1996 Weaver returned to Broadway in the Lincoln Center production of Sex and Longing, written by Christopher Durang. In the Fall of 2012, she starred in the Lincoln Center production of Christopher Durang's Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike which moved to Broadway in 2013. That year Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike took home the Tony award for Best Play.
Weaver originated the female lead in Anne Nelson's The Guys (2001) at The Flea where it was commissioned and directed by Jim Simpson. The Guys tells the story of a fire captain played by Bill Murray dealing with the aftermath of 9/11. In 2002 she starred in Neil LaBute's play The Mercy Seat opposite Liev Schreiber - which John Lahr of The New Yorker described as offering "performances of a depth and concentration that haven't been seen in New York for many seasons." Weaver also originated roles in two A.R. Gurney world premieres, Mrs. Farnsworth (2004) at the Flea Theater (New York Times 10 Best Plays for 2004), and Crazy Mary (2007) at Playwrights Horizons.
In television Weaver received Emmy, Screen Actors' Guild and Golden Globe nominations for her role as Mary Griffith in Lifetime's "Prayers for Bobby," which was also Emmy nominated for Outstanding Made for Television Movie. In 2012 she was seen in USA Network's miniseries "Political Animals," for which she received SAG, Golden Globe, and Emmy nominations. Weaver also appeared in the Marvel series "The Defenders," released globally on Netflix in August 2017.
Ms. Weaver was honored to receive the GLAAD Media Award for her work in "Prayers for Bobby" as well as the Trevor Life Award in 2011. She has been the Honorary Chair of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund for the last 33 years. She currently serves on the Board of Trustees of the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx, and she also served on the Board of Human Rights First for 25 years. Weaver was proud to receive the National Audubon Society's Rachel Carson Award in 2009 for her environmental work. She was also a co-founder of the original Flea Theater on White Street which championed young artists and new work.
Weaver appeared in season 4 of the French television series "Call My Agent!" which was released globally on Netflix in 2021 and won the International Emmy for Comedy Series. Additionally, she starred in Philippe Falardeau's My Salinger Year which opened the 2020 Berlin International Film Festival. In April 2021 Weaver narrated James Cameron's "Secrets of the Whales," which debuted on Disney+ and garnered an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Narrator. The series also won the Emmy for Outstanding Documentary or Nonfiction Series.
Weaver's recent film work includes Phyllis Nagy's drama Call Jane alongside Elizabeth Banks, Maya Forbes and Wallace Wolodarsky's The Goos House alongside Kevin Kline. James Cameron's Avatar: The Way of Water premiered at the end of 2022 with Weaver playing Kiri, Grace Augustine's Na'vi daughter. A2 received "Best Picture" nominations for the Oscars, Golden Globe, and Critics Choice awards and has grossed almost 2.5 billion dollars. Upcoming projects include Amazon Studios' drama series, "The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart," which she also executive produced, and Paul Schrader's Master Gardener, opposite Joel Edgerton, which premiered at the 2022 Venice Film Festival.Favorite Role(s): Alien (1979); Aliens (1986), Snow White: A Tale of Terror (1997)- Actress
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Uma Karuna Thurman was born in Boston, Massachusetts, into a highly unorthodox and internationally-minded family. She is the daughter of Nena Thurman (née Birgitte Caroline von Schlebrügge), a fashion model and socialite who now runs a mountain retreat, and of Robert Thurman (Robert Alexander Farrar Thurman), a professor and academic who is one of the nation's foremost Buddhist scholars. Uma's mother was born in Mexico City, Mexico, to a German father and a Swedish mother (who herself was of Swedish, Danish, and German descent). Uma's father, a New Yorker, has English, Scots-Irish, Scottish, and German ancestry. Uma grew up in Amherst, Massachusetts, where her father worked at Amherst College.
She and her siblings all have names deriving from Buddhist mythology; and Middle American behavior was little understood, much less pursued. And so it was that the young Thurman confronted childhood with an odd name and eccentric home life -- and nature seemingly conspired against her as well. She is six feet tall, and from an early age towered over everyone else in class. Her famously large feet would soon sprout to size 11 -- and even beyond that -- and although they would eventually be lovingly filmed by director Quentin Tarantino, as a child she generally wore the biggest shoes in class, which only provided another subject of ridicule. Even her long nose moved one of her mother's friends to helpfully suggest rhinoplasty -- to the ten-year-old Thurman. To make matters worse yet, the family constantly relocated, making the gangly, socially inept Thurman perpetually the new kid in class. The result was an exceptionally awkward, self-conscious, lonely and alienated childhood.
Unsurprisingly, the young Thurman enjoyed making believe she was someone other than herself, and so thrived at acting in school plays -- her sole successful extracurricular activity. This interest, and her lanky frame, perfect for modeling, led the 15-year-old Thurman to New York City for high school and modeling work (including a layout in Glamour Magazine) as she sought acting roles. The roles soon came, starting with a few formulaic and forgettable Hollywood products, but immediately followed by Terry Gilliam's The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988) and Stephen Frears' Dangerous Liaisons (1988), both of which brought much attention to her unorthodox sensuality and performances that intriguingly combined innocence and worldliness. The weird, gangly girl became a sex symbol virtually overnight.
Thurman continued to be offered good roles in Hollywood pictures into the early '90s, the least commercially successful but probably best-known of which was her smoldering, astonishingly-adult performance as June, Henry Miller's wife, in Henry & June (1990), the first movie to actually receive the dreaded NC-17 rating in the USA. After a celebrated start, Thurman's career stalled in the early '90s with movies such as the mediocre Mad Dog and Glory (1993). Worse, her first starring role was in Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (1993), which had endured a tortured journey from cult-favorite book to big-budget movie, and was a critical and financial debacle. Fortunately, Uma bounced back with a brilliant performance as Mia Wallace, that most unorthodox of all gangster's molls, in Tarantino's lauded, hugely successful Pulp Fiction (1994), a role for which Thurman received an Academy Award nomination.
Since then, Thurman has had periods of flirting with roles in arty independents such as A Month by the Lake (1995), and supporting roles in which she has lent some glamorous presence to a mixed batch of movies, such as Beautiful Girls (1996) and The Truth About Cats & Dogs (1996). Thurman returned to smaller films after playing the villainess Poison Ivy in the reviled Joel Schumacher effort Batman & Robin (1997) and Emma Peel in a remake of The Avengers (1998). She worked with Woody Allen and Sean Penn on Sweet and Lowdown (1999), and starred in Richard Linklater's drama Tape (2001) opposite Hawke. Thurman also won a Golden Globe award for her turn in the made-for-television film Hysterical Blindness (2002), directed by Mira Nair.
A return to the mainstream spotlight came when Thurman re-teamed with Quentin Tarantino for Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003), a revenge flick the two had dreamed up on the set of Pulp Fiction (1994). She also turned up in the John Woo cautioner Paycheck (2003) that same year. The renewed attention was not altogether welcome because Thurman was dealing with the break-up of her marriage with Hawke at about this time. Thurman handled the situation with grace, however, and took her surging popularity in stride. She garnered critical acclaim for her work in Kill Bill: Vol. 2 (2004) and was hailed as Tarantino's muse. Thurman reunited with Pulp Fiction (1994) dance partner John Travolta for the Get Shorty (1995) sequel Be Cool (2005) and played Ulla in The Producers (2005).
Thurman had been briefly married to Gary Oldman, from 1990 to 1992. In 1998, she married Ethan Hawke, her co-star in the offbeat futuristic thriller Gattaca (1997). The couple had two children, Levon and Maya. Hawke and Thurman filed for divorce in 2004.Favorite Role(s): Pulp Fiction (1994), Kill Bill 1 & 2 (2003,2004).
Also: Henry and June (1990)- Actress
- Soundtrack
With prominent cheekbones, luminous skin and the most crystalline green eyes of her day, Gene Tierney's striking good looks helped propel her to stardom. Her best known role is the enigmatic murder victim in Laura (1944). She was also Oscar-nominated for Leave Her to Heaven (1945). Her acting performances were few in the 1950s as she battled a troubled emotional life that included hospitalization and shock treatment for depression.
Gene Eliza Tierney was born on November 19, 1920 in Brooklyn, New York, to well-to-do parents, Belle Lavinia (Taylor) and Howard Sherwood Tierney. Her father was a successful insurance broker and her mother was a former teacher. Her childhood was lavish indeed. She also lived, at times, with her equally successful grandparents in Connecticut and New York. She was educated in the finest schools on the East Coast and at a finishing school in Switzerland.
After two years in Europe, Gene returned to the US where she completed her education. By 1938 she was performing on Broadway in What a Life! and understudied for the Primrose Path (1938) at the same time. Her wealthy father set up a corporation that was only to promote her theatrical pursuits. Her first role consisted of carrying a bucket of water across the stage, prompting one critic to announce that "Miss Tierney is, without a doubt, the most beautiful water carrier I have ever seen!" Her subsequent roles Mrs O'Brian Entertains (1939) and RingTwo (1939) were meatier and received praise from the tough New York critics. Critic Richard Watts wrote "I see no reason why Miss Tierney should not have a long and interesting theatrical career, that is if the cinema does not kidnap her away."
After being spotted by the legendary Darryl F. Zanuck during a stage performance of the hit show The Male Animal (1940), Gene was signed to a contract with 20th Century-Fox. Her first role as Barbara Hall in Hudson's Bay (1940) would be the send-off vehicle for her career. Later that year she appeared in The Return of Frank James (1940). The next year would prove to be a very busy one for Gene, as she appeared in The Shanghai Gesture (1941), Sundown (1941), Tobacco Road (1941) and Belle Starr (1941). She tried her hand at screwball comedy in Rings on Her Fingers (1942), which was a great success. Her performances in each of these productions were masterful. In 1945 she was nominated for a Best Actress Oscar for her portrayal of Ellen Brent in Leave Her to Heaven (1945). Though she didn't win, it solidified her position in Hollywood society. She followed up with another great performance as Isabel Bradley in the hit The Razor's Edge (1946).
In 1944, she played what is probably her best-known role (and, most critics agree, her most outstanding performance) in Otto Preminger's Laura (1944), in which she played murder victim named Laura Hunt. In 1947 Gene played Lucy Muir in the acclaimed The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947). By this time Gene was the hottest player around, and the 1950s saw no letup as she appeared in a number of good films, among them Night and the City (1950), The Mating Season (1951), Close to My Heart (1951), Plymouth Adventure (1952), Personal Affair (1953) and The Left Hand of God (1955). The latter was to be her last performance for seven years. The pressures of a failed marriage to Oleg Cassini, the birth of a daughter with learning disabilities in 1943, and several unhappy love affairs resulted in Gene being hospitalized for depression. When she returned to the the screen in Advise & Consent (1962), her acting was as good as ever but there was no longer a big demand for her services.
Her last feature film was The Pleasure Seekers (1964), and her final appearance in the film industry was in a TV miniseries, Scruples (1980). Gene died of emphysema in Houston, Texas, on November 6, 1991, just two weeks shy of her 71st birthday.Favorite Role(s): Leave Her to Heaven (1945);
Also: Laura (1944), The Razor's Edge (1946), Where the Sidewalk Ends (1950), Heaven Can Wait (1943).- Actress
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Britt Ekland was born in Sweden and grew up to be the poster girl for beautiful, big-eyed Scandinavian blondes. She attended a drama school and then joined a traveling theater group. With her looks as her passport, Britt entered films and became a star in Italy. When Peter Sellers met her in a hotel, he fell hard for her and they soon married. The combination of Sellers' stardom and her stunning beauty contributed to her fame (the fact that Sellers suffered a heart attack in bed on their wedding night did not hurt, either). She appeared in two films with her husband: After the Fox (1966), written by Neil Simon, and the forgettable The Bobo (1967). Her claim to fame would come as the young girl who invented the striptease in The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968). After that, she appeared in a string of movies that were built around her looks and not much else. She did appear in some first-rate productions over the years, though, two of them being Get Carter (1971) and the cult classic The Wicker Man (1973). The high point in her career would be her role as Bond girl Mary Goodnight in The Man with the Golden Gun (1974). After her much publicized breakup with rocker Rod Stewart in 1977, Britt continued to make movies--both features and made-for-TV films--and tried the stage. By that time, the quality of her film projects had decreased markedly, and she was reduced to appearing in things like Fraternity Vacation (1985) and Beverly Hills Vamp (1989).Favorite Role(s): The Wicker Man (1973).
Also: The Man with the Golden Gun (1974).- Actress
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Lillian Diana Gish was born on October 14, 1893, in Springfield, Ohio. Her father, James Lee Gish, was an alcoholic who caroused, was rarely at home, and left the family to, more or less, fend for themselves. To help make ends meet, Lillian, her sister Dorothy Gish, and their mother, Mary Gish, a.k.a. Mary Robinson McConnell, tried their hand at acting in local productions. Lillian was six years old when she first appeared in front of an audience. For the next 13 years, she and Dorothy appeared before stage audiences with great success. Had she not made her way into films, Lillian quite possibly could have been one of the great stage actresses of all time; however, she found her way onto the big screen when, in 1912, she met famed director D.W. Griffith. Impressed with what he saw, he immediately cast her in her first film, An Unseen Enemy (1912), followed by The One She Loved (1912) and My Baby (1912). She would make 12 films for Griffith in 1912. With 25 films in the next two years, Lillian's exposure to the public was so great that she fast became one of the top stars in the industry, right alongside Mary Pickford, "America's Sweetheart".
In 1915, Lillian starred as Elsie Stoneman in Griffith's most ambitious project to date, The Birth of a Nation (1915). She was not making the large number of films that she had been in the beginning because she was successful and popular enough to be able to pick and choose the right films to appear in. The following year, she appeared in another Griffith classic, Intolerance (1916). By the early 1920s, her career was on its way down. As with anything else, be it sports or politics, new faces appeared on the scene to replace the "old", and Lillian was no different. In fact, she did not appear at all on the screen in 1922, 1925 or 1929. However, 1926 was her busiest year of the decade with roles in La Bohème (1926) and The Scarlet Letter (1926). As the decade wound to a close, "talkies" were replacing silent films. However, Lillian was not idle during her time away from the screen. She appeared in stage productions, to the acclaim of the public and critics alike. In 1933, she filmed His Double Life (1933), but did not make another film for nine years.
When she returned in 1943, she appeared in two big-budget pictures, Commandos Strike at Dawn (1942) and Top Man (1943). Although these roles did not bring her the attention she had had in her early career, Lillian still proved she could hold her own with the best of them. She earned an Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actress for her role of Laura Belle McCanles in Duel in the Sun (1946), but lost to Anne Baxter in The Razor's Edge (1946).
One of the most critically acclaimed roles of her career came in the thriller The Night of the Hunter (1955), also notable as the only film directed by actor Charles Laughton. In 1969, she published her autobiography, "The Movies, Mr. Griffith, and Me". In 1987, she made what was to be her last motion picture, The Whales of August (1987), a box-office success that exposed her to a new generation of fans. Her 75-year career is almost unbeatable in any field, let alone the film industry. On February 27, 1993, at age 99, Lillian Gish died peacefully in her sleep at her Manhattan apartment in New York City. She never married.Favorite Role(s): Night of the Hunter (1955).
Also: Intolerance (1916), Orphans of the Storm (1921), Broken Blossoms (1919)- Actress
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Jeanne Crain was born in Barstow, California, on May 25, 1925. The daughter of a high school English teacher and his wife, Jeanne was moved to Los Angeles not long after her birth after her father got another teaching position in that city. While in junior high school, Jeanne played the lead in a school production which set her on the path to acting. When she was in high school Jeanne was asked to take a screen test to appear in a film by Orson Welles. Unfortunately, she didn't get the part, but it did set her sights on being a movie actress.
After high school, Jeanne enrolled at UCLA to study drama. At the age of 18, Jeanne won a bit part in Fox Studio's film entitled The Gang's All Here (1943) and a small contract. Her next film saw Jeanne elevated to a more substantial part in Home in Indiana (1944) the following year, which was filmed in neighboring Kentucky. The movie was an unquestionable hit. On the strength of that box-office success, Jeanne was given a raise and star billing, as Maggie Preston, in the next film of 1944, In the Meantime, Darling (1944). Unfortunately, the critics not only roasted the film, but singled out Jeanne's performance in particular. She rebounded nicely in her last film of the year, Winged Victory (1944). The audiences loved it and the film was profitable.
In 1945, Jeanne was cast in State Fair (1945) as Margie Frake who travels to the fair and falls in love with a reporter played by Dana Andrews. Now, Jeanne got a bigger contract and more recognition. Later that year, Jeanne married Paul Brooks on New Year's Eve. Although her mother wasn't supportive of the marriage, the union lasted until her husband's death and produced seven children. The year 1947 was an off year for Jeanne, as she took time off to bear the Brooks' first child.
In 1949, Jeanne appeared in three films, A Letter to Three Wives (1949), The Fan (1949), and Pinky (1949). It was this latter film which garnered her an Oscar nomination as Best Actress for her role as Pinky Johnson, a nurse who sets up a clinic in the Deep South. She lost to Olivia de Havilland for The Heiress (1949). Jeanne left Fox after filming Vicki (1953) in 1953, with Jean Peters. She had made 23 films for the studio that started her career, but she needed a well-deserved change. As with any good artist, Jeanne wanted to expand her range instead of playing the girl-next-door types.
She went briefly to Warner Brothers for the filming of Duel in the Jungle (1954) in 1954. The film was lukewarm at best. Jeanne, then, signed a contract, that same year, with Universal Studios with promises of better, high profile roles. She went into production in the film Man Without a Star (1955) which was a hit with audiences and critics. After The Joker Is Wild (1957) in 1957, Jeanne took time off for her family and to appear in a few television programs. She returned, briefly, to film in Guns of the Timberland (1960) in 1960. The films were sporadic after that. In 1967, she appeared in a low-budget suspense yarn called Hot Rods to Hell (1966). Her final film was as Clara Shaw in 1972's Skyjacked (1972).
Jeanne died of a heart attack in Santa Barbara, California, on December 14, 2003. Her husband Paul Brooks had died two months earlier.Favorite Role(s): Leave Her to Heaven (1945); Pinky (1949).
Also: A Letter to Three Wives (1949).- Actress
- Producer
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Dame Helen Mirren was born in Queen Charlotte's Hospital in West London. Her mother, Kathleen Alexandrina Eva Matilda (Rogers), was from a working-class English family, and her father, Vasiliy Petrovich Mironov, was a Russian-born civil servant, from Kuryanovo, whose own father was a diplomat. Mirren attended St. Bernards High School for girls, where she would act in school productions. After high school, she began her acting career in theatre working in many productions including in the West End and Broadway.Favorite Role(s): "The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover" (1989) was brilliant.
Also, she showed up at the Oscars in 2016 dressed in a purple lace gown and a Prince tattoo on her decollete. Why can't all modern-day actresses be as classy as Helen?- Actress
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Ida was born in London to a show business family. In 1932, her mother took Ida with her to an audition and Ida got the part her mother wanted. The picture was Her First Affaire (1932). Ida, a bleached blonde, went to Hollywood in 1934 playing small, insignificant parts. Peter Ibbetson (1935) was one of her few noteworthy movies and it was not until The Light That Failed (1939) that she got a chance to get better parts. In most of her movies, she was cast as the hard, but sympathetic woman from the wrong side of the tracks. In The Sea Wolf (1941) and High Sierra (1940), she played the part magnificently. It has been said that no one could do hard-luck dames the way Lupino could do them. She played tough, knowing characters who held their own against some of the biggest leading men of the day - Humphrey Bogart, Ronald Colman, John Garfield and Edward G. Robinson. She made a handful of films during the forties playing different characters ranging from Pillow to Post (1945), where she played a traveling saleswoman to the tough nightclub singer in The Man I Love (1946). But good roles for women were hard to get and there were many young actresses and established stars competing for those roles. She left Warner Brothers in 1947 and became a freelance actress. When better roles did not materialize, Ida stepped behind the camera as a director, writer and producer. Her first directing job came when director Elmer Clifton fell ill on a script that she co-wrote Not Wanted (1949). Ida had joked that as an actress, she was the poor man's Bette Davis. Now, she said that as a director, she became the poor man's Don Siegel. The films that she wrote, or directed, or appeared in during the fifties were mostly inexpensive melodramas. She later turned to television where she directed episodes in shows such as The Untouchables (1959) and The Fugitive (1963). In the seventies, she made guest appearances on various television show and appeared in small parts in a few movies.Favorite Role(s): Road House (1948), and respect for her as a female director in film-noir era Hollywood - a rarity.- Actress
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One of the world's most famous and distinguished actresses, Dame Maggie Smith was born Margaret Natalie Smith in Essex. Her Scottish mother, Margaret (Hutton), worked as a secretary, and her English father, Nathaniel Smith, was a teacher at Oxford University. Smith has been married twice: to actor Robert Stephens and to playwright Beverley Cross. Her marriage to Stephens ended in divorce in 1974. She was married to Cross until his death in 1999. She had two sons with Stephens, Chris Larkin and Toby Stephens who are also actors.
Maggie Smith's career began at the Oxford Playhouse in the 1950s. She made her film debut in 1956 as one of the party guests in Child in the House (1956). She has since performed in over sixty films and television series with some of the most prominent actors and actresses in the world. These include: Othello (1965) with Laurence Olivier, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969), California Suite (1978) with Michael Caine and Jane Fonda, A Room with a View (1985), Richard III (1995) with Ian McKellen and Jim Broadbent, Franco Zeffirelli's Tea with Mussolini (1999) with Judi Dench, Joan Plowright and Cher and Gosford Park (2001) with Kristin Scott Thomas and Clive Owen, directed by Robert Altman. Maggie Smith has also been nominated for an Oscar six times and won twice, for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969) and California Suite (1978).
Smith later appeared in the very successful 'Harry Potter' franchise as the formidable Professor McGonagall as well as in Julian Fellowes' ITV drama series, Downton Abbey (2010) (2010-2011) as the Dowager Countess of Grantham.Favorite Role(s): Downton Abbey (2010-2015), Gosford Park (2001), and Murder by Death ("Where's my Dickie?"... lol).- Actress
- Make-Up Department
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Ruth Elizabeth Davis was born April 5, 1908, in Lowell, Massachusetts, to Ruth Augusta (Favor) and Harlow Morrell Davis, a patent attorney. Her parents divorced when she was 10. She and her sister were raised by their mother. Her early interest was dance. To Bette, dancers led a glamorous life, but then she discovered the stage, and gave up dancing for acting. To her, it presented much more of a challenge.
After graduation from Cushing Academy, she was refused admittance to Eva Le Gallienne's Manhattan Civic Repertory. She enrolled in John Murray Anderson's Dramatic School and was the star pupil. She was in the off-Broadway play "The Earth Between" (1923), and her Broadway debut in 1929 was in "Broken Dishes". She also appeared in "Solid South". Late in 1930, she was hired by Universal, where she made her first film, called Bad Sister (1931). When she arrived in Hollywood, the studio representative who went to meet her train left without her because he could find no one who looked like a movie star. An official at Universal complained she had "as much sex appeal as Slim Summerville" and her performance in "Bad Sister" didn't impress.
In 1932, she signed a seven-year deal with Warner Brothers Pictures. Her first film with them was The Man Who Played God (1932). She became a star after this appearance, known as the actress that could play a variety of very strong and complex roles. More fairly successful movies followed, but it was the role of Mildred Rogers in RKO's Of Human Bondage (1934) that would give Bette major acclaim from the film critics. She had a significant number of write-in votes for the Best Actress Oscar, but didn't win. Warner Bros. felt their seven-year deal with Bette was more than justified. They had a genuine star on their hands. With this success under her belt, she began pushing for stronger and more meaningful roles. In 1935, she received her first Oscar for her role in Dangerous (1935) as Joyce Heath.
In 1936, she was suspended without pay for turning down a role that she deemed unworthy of her talent. She went to England, where she had planned to make movies, but was stopped by Warner Bros. because she was still under contract to them. They did not want her to work anywhere. Although she sued to get out of her contract, she lost. Still, they began to take her more seriously after that.
Returning after losing her lawsuit, her roles improved dramatically. In 1938, Bette received a second Academy Award win for her work in Jezebel (1938) opposite the soon-to-be-legendary Henry Fonda. The only role she didn't get that she wanted was Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind (1939). Warners wouldn't loan her to David O. Selznick unless he hired Errol Flynn to play Rhett Butler, which both Selznick and Davis thought was a terrible choice. It was rumored she had numerous affairs, among them George Brent and William Wyler, and she was married four times, three of which ended in divorce. She admitted her career always came first.
She made many successful films in the 1940s, but each picture was weaker than the last and by the time her Warner Brothers contract had ended in 1949, she had been reduced to appearing in such films as the unintentionally hilarious Beyond the Forest (1949). She made a huge comeback in 1950 when she replaced an ill Claudette Colbert in, and received an Oscar nomination for, All About Eve (1950). She worked in films through the 1950s, but her career eventually came to a standstill, and in 1961 she placed a now famous Job Wanted ad in the trade papers.
She received an Oscar nomination for her role as a demented former child star in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962). This brought about a new round of super-stardom for generations of fans who were not familiar with her work. Two years later, she starred in Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964). Bette was married four times.
In 1977 she received the AFI's Lifetime Achievement Award and in 1979 she won a Best Actress Emmy for Strangers: The Story of a Mother and Daughter (1979). In 1977-78 she moved from Connecticut to Los Angeles and filmed a pilot for the series Hotel (1983), which she called Brothel. She refused to do the TV series and suffered a stroke during this time.
Her last marriage, to actor Gary Merrill, lasted ten years, longer than any of the previous three. In 1985, her daughter Barbara Davis ("B.D.") Hyman published a scandalous book about Bette called "My Mother's Keeper." Bette worked in the later 1980s in films and TV, even though a stroke had impaired her appearance and mobility. She wrote a book, "This 'N That", during her recovery from the stroke. Her last book was "Bette Davis, The Lonely Life", issued in paperback in 1990. It included an update from 1962 to 1989. She wrote the last chapter in San Sebastian, Spain.
Sadly, Bette Davis died on October 6, 1989, of metastasized breast cancer, in Neuilly-sur-Seine, Hauts-de-Seine, France. Many of her fans refused to believe she was gone.My favorite actress, unless it's a tie with Louise Rainer.
Favorite Role(s): All About Eve (1950) (absolutely one of my all-time favorites); Now, Voyager (1942); Whatever Happened to Baby Jane (1962).
Also saw her in: The Star (1952), A Double Life- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor was considered one of the last, if not the last, major star to have come out of the old Hollywood studio system. She was known internationally for her beauty, especially for her violet eyes, with which she captured audiences early in her youth and kept the world hooked with ever after.
Taylor was born on February 27, 1932 in London, England. Although she was born an English subject, her parents, Sara Taylor (née Sara Viola Warmbrodt) and Francis Taylor, were Americans, art dealers from St. Louis, Missouri. Her father had moved to London to set up a gallery prior to Elizabeth's birth. Her mother had been an actress on the stage, but gave up that vocation when she married. Elizabeth lived in London until the age of seven, when the family left for the US when the clouds of war began brewing in Europe in 1939. They sailed without her father, who stayed behind to wrap up the loose ends of the art business.
The family relocated to Los Angeles, where Mrs. Taylor's own family had moved. Mr. Taylor followed not long afterward. A family friend noticed the strikingly beautiful little Elizabeth and suggested that she be taken for a screen test. Her test impressed executives at Universal Pictures enough to sign her to a contract. Her first foray onto the screen was in There's One Born Every Minute (1942), released when she was ten. Universal dropped her contract after that one film, but Elizabeth was soon picked up by MGM.
The first production she made with that studio was Lassie Come Home (1943), and on the strength of that one film, MGM signed her for a full year. She had minuscule parts in her next two films, The White Cliffs of Dover (1944) and Jane Eyre (1943) (the former made while she was on loan to 20th Century-Fox). Then came the picture that made Elizabeth a star: MGM's National Velvet (1944). She played Velvet Brown opposite Mickey Rooney. The film was a smash hit, grossing over $4 million. Elizabeth now had a long-term contract with MGM and was its top child star. She made no films in 1945, but returned in 1946 in Courage of Lassie (1946), another success. In 1947, when she was 15, she starred in Life with Father (1947) with such heavyweights as William Powell, Irene Dunne and Zasu Pitts, which was one of the biggest box office hits of the year. She also co-starred in the ensemble film Little Women (1949), which was also a box office huge success.
Throughout the 1950s, Elizabeth appeared in film after film with mostly good results, starting with her role in the George Stevens film A Place in the Sun (1951), co-starring her good friend Montgomery Clift. The following year, she co-starred in Ivanhoe (1952), one of the biggest box office hits of the year. Her busiest year was 1954. She had a supporting role in the box office flop Beau Brummell (1954), but later that year starred in the hits The Last Time I Saw Paris (1954) and Elephant Walk (1954). She was 22 now, and even at that young age was considered one of the world's great beauties. In 1955 she appeared in the hit Giant (1956) with James Dean.
Sadly, Dean never saw the release of the film, as he died in a car accident in 1955. The next year saw Elizabeth co-star with Montgomery Clift in Raintree County (1957), an overblown epic made, partially, in Kentucky. Critics called it dry as dust. In addition, Clift was seriously injured during the film, with Taylor helping save his life. Despite the film's shortcomings and off-camera tragedy, Elizabeth was nominated for an Academy Award for her portrayal of Southern belle Susanna Drake. However, on Oscar night the honor went to Joanne Woodward for The Three Faces of Eve (1957).
In 1958 Elizabeth starred as Maggie Pollitt in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958). The film received rave reviews from the critics and Elizabeth was nominated again for an Academy Award for best actress, but this time she lost to Susan Hayward in I Want to Live! (1958). She was still a hot commodity in the film world, though. In 1959 she appeared in another mega-hit and received yet another Oscar nomination for Suddenly, Last Summer (1959). Once again, however, she lost out, this time to Simone Signoret for Room at the Top (1958). Her Oscar drought ended in 1960 when she brought home the coveted statue for her performance in BUtterfield 8 (1960) as Gloria Wandrous, a call girl who is involved with a married man. Some critics blasted the movie but they couldn't ignore her performance. There were no more films for Elizabeth for three years. She left MGM after her contract ran out, but would do projects for the studio later down the road. In 1963 she starred in Cleopatra (1963), which was one of the most expensive productions up to that time--as was her salary, a whopping $1,000,000. The film took years to complete, due in part to a serious illness during which she nearly died.
This was the film where she met her future and fifth husband, Richard Burton (the previous four were Conrad Hilton, Michael Wilding, Mike Todd--who died in a plane crash--and Eddie Fisher). Her next films, The V.I.P.s (1963) and The Sandpiper (1965), were lackluster at best. Elizabeth was to return to fine form, however, with the role of Martha in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966). Her performance as the loudmouthed, shrewish, unkempt, yet still alluring Martha was easily her finest to date. For this she would win her second Oscar and one that was more than well-deserved. The following year, she and Burton co-starred in The Taming of The Shrew (1967), again giving winning performances. However, her films afterward were box office failures, including Reflections in a Golden Eye (1967), The Comedians (1967), Boom! (1968) (again co-starring with Burton), Secret Ceremony (1968), The Only Game in Town (1970), X, Y & Zee (1972), Hammersmith Is Out (1972) (with Burton again), Ash Wednesday (1973), Night Watch (1973), The Driver's Seat (1974), The Blue Bird (1976) (considered by many to be her worst), A Little Night Music (1977), and Winter Kills (1979) (a controversial film which was never given a full release and in which she only had a small role). She later appeared in some movies, both theatrical and made-for-television, and a number of television programs. In February 1997, Elizabeth entered the hospital for the removal of a brain tumor. The operation was successful. As for her private life, she divorced Burton in 1974, only to remarry him in 1975 and divorce him, permanently, in 1976. She had two more husbands, U.S. Senator John Warner and construction worker Larry Fortensky, whom she met in rehab.
In 1959, Taylor converted to Judaism, and continued to identify herself as Jewish throughout her life, being active in Jewish causes. Upon the death of her friend, actor Rock Hudson, in 1985, she began her crusade on behalf of AIDS sufferers. In the 1990s, she also developed a successful series of scents. In her later years, her acting career was relegated to the occasional TV-movie or TV guest appearance.
Elizabeth Taylor died on March 23, 2011 in Los Angeles, from congestive heart failure. Her final resting place is Forest Lawn Memorial Park, in Glendale, California.Favorite Role(s): "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" (an astonishing performance); "Under Milk Wood".
Also seen her in: "Cleopatra".- Actress
- Art Department
- Director
As a kid, Sissy Spacek climbed trees, rode horses, swam, and played in the woods. She was born Mary Elizabeth Spacek on December 25, 1949, in Quitman, Texas, to Virginia Frances (Spilman) and Edwin Arnold Spacek, Sr., a county agricultural agent. Her father's family was of Czech and German origin.
Sissy attended Quitman High School and was homecoming queen. After graduating, she embarked on an acting career, gaining interest in the profession through her cousin, actor Rip Torn. Sissy relocated to New York, and through him, enrolled in the New York branch of the Actors Studio. She studied acting at the Lee Strasberg Institute while also pursuing work as a model and singer, appearing in West Village showcases such as the Bitter End for $10 a night. Sissy eventually broke into film and one of her first roles was as Holly in the classic Badlands (1973). The art director on that film was Jack Fisk, with whom she would marry in 1974 and ultimately collaborate on eight films. Sissy followed this landmark film with a star-making and Oscar nominated performance in Carrie (1976), in which she played a humiliated prom queen who goes postal with her telekinesis. Sissy has had an enduring and award winning career in movies and television, which includes an Oscar as Best Actress for Coal Miner's Daughter (1980). The parents of two grown daughters, Sissy and Jack live on a large horse ranch in the foothills of Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains. Even though she continued to appear in film and television during the late 1980s and 1990s, Sissy devoted most of those years to her family. Then, in 2001, Sissy returned to the big screen in a major way with a powerful performance in In the Bedroom (2001), which not only earned her a sixth Best Actress Oscar nomination, but a win for Best Actress at the Golden Globes, Independent Spirit Awards, and numerous critics association awards. Sissy continues to work steadily as an actress, but in 2012, her credits expanded even further to include a memoir, My Extraordinary Ordinary Life.Favorite Role(s): Carrie (1976), Coal Miner's Daughter (1980), In the Bedroom (2001).- Actress
- Producer
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Dominique Swain was raised in Malibu, California, USA. The second of three daughters of mother Cindy and father David an electrical engineer, her sisters makeup artist Alexis and actress Chelse. She debuted her film career in the controversial remake of Vladimir Nabokov's novel and Stanley Kubrick's film Lolita by director Adrian Lyne. It was a powerful first performance by the young actress, Lyne had seen her performance on a videotape audition she put together with a friend while she was between agents, selecting her from a pool of more than 2500 actresses vying for the role. Lyne was charmed by her and her reading directly from the novel as opposed to the script. . Despite a phenomenal performance opposite Jeremy Irons as Humbert and Melanie Griffith as Lolita's mother, the film faced a great deal of controversy due to its subject matter as networks pulled away from backing wide theatrical release. After some delays, it was eventually premiered to US audiences on the Showtime network followed by a limited theatrical release.
Since then she has gone on to act and star in close to 100 other films, including Face/Off, Girl and Alpha Dog. Recently she has joined Cameo where her fans can directly reach out to her for personal videos or direct message chats.Favorite Role(s): Lolita (1997). She was perfect for the role - reading all the bad reviews of that version of the film never ceases to amaze me.
Because of the reveal of the production code, the 1997 version was able to go places that the novel went, and Kubrick's version couldn't - although it wasn't without its definite flaws, this version was so much more alive, modern, and sexual to me than the earlier version - and Swain was a perfectly gorgeous, messy, alluring fallen angel of a centerpiece.- Nancy Anne Allen was born and raised in the Bronx borough of New York City, the youngest of three children. Her father, Eugene Allen, was a New York police lieutenant. At a young age, she trained for a dancing career at the High School of Performing Arts, and then attended Jose Quintano's School for Young Professionals. In dozens of television commercials from the age of 15, Nancy made her first film appearance in The Last Detail (1973) with Jack Nicholson. Three years later, she furnished the standard for all future bitch-goddess teenagers as Chris Hargensen in Stephen King's Carrie (1976), taken to the big screen by director Brian De Palma. Nancy then married De Palma in 1979. She next appeared in Steven Spielberg's I Wanna Hold Your Hand (1978); for the next few years, she appeared only in De Palma's films: Home Movies (1979), Dressed to Kill (1980), and she starred with John Travolta in Blow Out (1981).
After her divorce from De Palma in 1984, Nancy's film opportunities were supposedly narrowed, but then she surprised the whole world when she performed as Officer Anne Lewis in the sci-fi cult film RoboCop (1987), along with Peter Weller. Here, she furnished another standard as a tough but at the same time feminine policewoman, whose sex would not interfere with her actions. After the success of Robocop (1987), she performed as Patricia Gardner in the second sequel Poltergeist III (1988). She came back in RoboCop 2 (1990) and in order to get more involved with her character, Nancy learned martial arts and police training for real. She returned again in RoboCop 3 (1993), though her co-star Peter Weller did not this time. In 1993, Nancy joined several other veteran stars in Acting on Impulse (1993), and married co-star Craig Shoemaker, in the same year. A few years later, she divorced Craig and some time after she married again.
She later appeared in some diverse films: Dusting Cliff 7 (1997), Secret of the Andes (1998), Circuit (2001), and she had a guest appearance in Steven Soderbergh's Out of Sight (1998). Her last performance was for the television series Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999), in the episode "Escape" aired on December 2, 2003. Allen has appeared in a number of documentaries about her most famous films, including Dressed to Kill (1980), Carrie (1976), Blow Out (1981), Poltergeist III (1988), and the RoboCop trilogy. She also hosted Andrew J. Kuehn's horror film documentary Terror in the Aisles (1984), along with Donald Pleasence.
Interested in projecting the image of a strong but at the same time feminine woman, she managed to get away from the victim roles she was always offered, she also was able to get away from the stereotype of the beautiful but dumb woman in most action films. She is an environmentalist that traded her Volvo car for an Hybrid car in order to furnish the example. She is also an activist against breast cancer along with her friend actress Wendie Jo Sperber, who created the foundation WeSpark. Her last appearance on television was on the Inside E! story of her co-star John Travolta and the A&E Biography of Travolta - both appearances in 2004. Nowadays, Allen lives a quiet life along with her family and friends somewhere in the United States.Favorite Role(s): Carrie (1976).
Also: RoboCop (1987), Poltergeist III (1988). - Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Alicia Silverstone was born on October 4, 1976 in San Francisco, California, the youngest of three children. She is the daughter of Didi (Radford), a former flight attendant, and Monty Silverstone, a real estate investor. Her English-born father is from a Jewish family, while her Scottish-born mother converted to Judaism. Alicia's career began at the tender age of six, when her father took some photos of his young daughter, which eventually led to her getting several television commercials. After a guest spot on The Wonder Years (1988) as a literal "dream girl", she moved on to movies. She landed a role in The Crush (1993), a sort of Fatal Attraction (1987) for teenagers in which she portrayed a disturbed young girl obsessed with an older man. The nasty little role did not impress the critical establishment but it wowed its target audience: teenagers. In fact, the role won her the 1994 MTV Movie Award for "Best Villain" and "Breakthrough Performance". It is interesting to note that during the filming of the movie, Alicia became an emancipated minor in order to get around child labor laws which would have interfered with her working hours. She was a dedicated actress from early on.
The film also caught the attention of Aerosmith, who hired her to appear in a string of their music videos. The first of them, "Cryin'", was voted the #1 video of all time on MTV. Silverstone was definitely a hit with the MTV crowd, but larger commercial success still eluded her. That all changed when she landed the role of Cher in Amy Heckerling's Clueless (1995). Cher was the antithesis of Alicia's role in The Crush; this time around, she was a rich, naive yet endearing girl from Beverly Hills in search of love in the 1990s. The film was a huge box-office hit and wowed both audiences and critics alike and demonstrated Alicia's strength and bankability. She was hailed as the woman of the hour, and branded the spokeswoman for an emerging young generation. She signed a deal with Columbia TriStar worth $10 million and got the coveted role of Batgirl in the Batman franchise. Also, as part of the package, she received a three-year first-look deal for her own production company, First Kiss Productions. The first film released by First Kiss was Excess Baggage (1997).Favorite Role(s): "Clueless", (1995), and the videos for Aerosmith's "Cryin" and "Crazy".- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Rose Byrne was born in Balmain, Sydney, Australia. She is the daughter of Jane, a primary school administrator, and Robin Byrne, a semi-retired statistician and market researcher.
She landed her first role in a movie, Dallas Doll (1994), when she was 15 years old.
Since then, Rose has appeared in a variety of Australian televisions shows including Heartbreak High (1994), Echo Point (1995), and the film Two Hands (1999) alongside Heath Ledger. After this, she appeared in various movies like The Date (1999), My Mother Frank (2000), and Clara Law's The Goddess of 1967 (2000) for which she obtained the Female Volpi Cup at the Venice Festival in 2000.
Her first experience on a big-budget movie came when she played handmaiden, Dormé, to Natalie Portman, Padmé Amidala, in Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002). In 2003, she starred, coincidentally, as Rose Mortmain in the adaptation of Dodie Smith's I Capture the Castle (2003). In 2004, she acted in Wicker Park (2004) with Diane Kruger and Josh Hartnett. Here, she heard Wolfgang Petersen was looking for an actress for Briseis in his next movie Troy (2004) with Brad Pitt, she got the part and was recognised as one of the most promising actresses in Hollywood.
After Troy (2004), she played Edith in a TV adaptation of Casanova (2005). In September 2005, she started to act in Sunshine (2007), a Danny Boyle movie, where she plays the pilot in a space mission.Favorite Role(s): Get Him to the Greek (2010), Spy (2015), Bridesmaids (2011).
Also: Marie Antoinette (2006).- Actress
- Soundtrack
Greta Garbo was born Greta Lovisa Gustafsson on September 18, 1905, in Stockholm, Sweden, to Anna Lovisa (Johansdotter), who worked at a jam factory, and Karl Alfred Gustafsson, a laborer. She was fourteen when her father died, which left the family destitute. Greta was forced to leave school and go to work in a department store. The store used her as a model in its newspaper ads. She had no film aspirations until she appeared in short advertising film at that same department store while she was still a teenager. Erik A. Petschler, a comedy director, saw the film and gave her a small part in his Luffar-Petter (1922). Encouraged by her own performance, she applied for and won a scholarship to a Swedish drama school. While there she appeared in at least one film, En lyckoriddare (1921). Both were small parts, but it was a start. Finally famed Swedish director Mauritz Stiller pulled her from the drama school for the lead role in The Saga of Gösta Berling (1924). At 18 Greta was on a roll.
Following The Joyless Street (1925) both Greta and Stiller were offered contracts with MGM, and her first film for the studio was the American-made Torrent (1926), a silent film in which she didn't have to speak a word of English. After a few more films, including The Temptress (1926), Love (1927) and A Woman of Affairs (1928), Greta starred in Anna Christie (1930) (her first "talkie"), which not only gave her a powerful screen presence but also garnered her an Academy Award nomination as Best Actress (she didn't win). Later that year she filmed Romance (1930), which was somewhat of a letdown, but she bounced back in 1931, landing another lead role in Mata Hari (1931), which turned out to be a major hit.
Greta continued to give intense performances in whatever was handed her. The next year she was cast in what turned out to be yet another hit, Grand Hotel (1932). However, it was in MGM's Anna Karenina (1935) that she gave what some consider the performance of her life. She was absolutely breathtaking in the role as a woman torn between two lovers and her son. Shortly afterwards, she starred in the historical drama Queen Christina (1933) playing the title character to great acclaim. She earned an Oscar nomination for her role in the romantic drama Camille (1936), again playing the title character. Her career suffered a setback the following year in Conquest (1937), which was a box office disaster. She later made a comeback when she starred in Ninotchka (1939), which showcased her comedic side. It wasn't until two years later she made what was to be her last film, Two-Faced Woman (1941), another comedy. But the film drew controversy and was condemned by the Catholic Church and other groups and was a box office failure, which left Garbo shaken.
After World War II Greta, by her own admission, felt that the world had changed perhaps forever and she retired, never again to face the camera. She would work for the rest of her life to perpetuate the Garbo mystique. Her films, she felt, had their proper place in history and would gain in value. She abandoned Hollywood and moved to New York City. She would jet-set with some of the world's best-known personalities such as Aristotle Onassis and others. She spent time gardening and raising flowers and vegetables. In 1954 Greta was given a special Oscar for past unforgettable performances. She even penned her biography in 1990.
On April 15, 1990, Greta died of natural causes in New York and with her went the "Garbo Mystique". She was 84.I adored her in: "Camille", (1936).
Also seen her in: Grand Hotel (1932).- Actress
- Writer
- Soundtrack
Born Rose Louise Hovick in Seattle, Washington, in 1911, but called Louise from early childhood, Gypsy Rose Lee was the daughter of a mild-mannered businessman and a restless, fiery young woman named Rose, who was determined to get out of Seattle and make a life for herself and her daughter in show business. In 1912, Rose had another child, June. Rose thought June was much more beautiful, photogenic and talented than Louise apparently could ever hope to be, which soon caused her to pack up her two children and search for a career in vaudeville (she divorced her husband when he objected to a career in show business). By the time Louise was seven and June five, they had put together a very successful act, Baby June and Her Farmboys. June was, of course, the star, and Louise was put in the chorus, though she did get an occasional moment in the spotlight. The act was making $1500 a week, but the family was not exactly living in high style, having to scrimp and save much of the time in order to buy food, and often in debt. There are many who believe that Rose was squandering the money.
There were also rumors about Rose during this time, about how she had to dodge the police, who enforced strict child labor laws, and even about how she may have murdered a man she thought was pestering her children. Despite these rumors, June and Louise's act continued to be successful throughout the 1920s. At the end of the decade June was 13 and had been re-christened Dainty June. By this time it was clear that vaudeville was a dying art form. Rose, however, still chased after her dream, and still made June up to be a cute baby. June resented it, and finally she married one of the chorus boys in the act (she was still only 13) and ran away with him. Not even this could stop Rose, however. This time she formed a new act, centering it around Louise. Called Rose Louise and Her Hollywood Blondes, she and her chorus girls performed slightly risqué musical numbers, and were moderately successful. Still, vaudeville continued to die out, which hurt the act. However, there was one form of vaudeville that still drew crowds: burlesque. Eventually, Rose, Louise and company had to take a job in a burlesque house. Sometime during their stay there the star stripper was not able to go on for a performance. Rose, never one to pass up an opportunity, volunteered Louise for the job. So Louise, just 15 at the time, stepped on stage, wearing not much more than a grass skirt, and slowly and teasingly . . . didn't take much off. Audiences responded favorably to this new kind of striptease act, which was more "tease" than "strip," more tantalizing than tawdry. Louise had finally found her calling.
For her stage name she took Gypsy, a nickname she derived from her hobby of reading tea leaves, and combined it with her real first name, Rose, and Lee, which she added on a whim. As Gypsy Rose Lee she launched a hugely successful career in burlesque, incorporating humor and intelligence, as well as the requisite removal of various articles of clothing, into her act. She became extremely popular, even appearing at the last place anyone would expect, high society balls. Once she had conquered the stages of burlesque, she decided to try her hand at movies. Billed under her real name, Louise Hovick--because the studio heads were afraid her stage name would scare people away--she made her film debut in Ali Baba Goes to Town (1937). It was a forgettable film, and her performance wasn't much more memorable. She appeared in three more films in the 1930s, and two more in the 1940s, but her film career was pretty much a bust. She tried her hand at writing with the "burlesque mystery" novel "The G-String Murders" (1941), which was made into the film Lady of Burlesque (1943), starring Barbara Stanwyck. By the 1950s, however, she was comfortable just being a sort of queen mother of burlesque. She had gone through three unhappy marriages, as well as affairs with showman Mike Todd and director Otto Preminger; the latter was the father of her only child, Erik Lee Preminger. She was not close to her sister June, who by this time had changed her name and was known as actress/dancer June Havoc. She also still had to contend with Mama Rose, who constantly tried to extort money from her with vicious threats. It wasn't until Rose died from terminal cancer in 1954 that Gypsy truly felt safe to write her memoirs, without having to worry anymore about her mother's repercussions. Her autobiography, "Gypsy", was published in 1957. Detailing her childhood in vaudeville and her relationship with her mother. It was an immediate bestseller. Broadway producers also noticed it and decided it would make a great musical, and so was born what many consider the best Broadway musical of all time: "Gypsy". With book by Arthur Laurents, music by Jule Styne and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, it premiered in 1959 and was an immediate smash. However, though Gypsy was an important character, of course, it did not focus on her alone, but rather on the hard-boiled, driven, single-minded, even monstrous stage mother that was Mama Rose.
This time it was Rose who was the star, which, as the musical implies, was perhaps what she always wanted. The musical has been frequently revived and been made into two films. The role of Mama Rose has been played by, among others, Ethel Merman, Angela Lansbury, Tyne Daly, Bette Midler and Betty Buckley. Gypsy Rose Lee was able to enjoy the musical's success in her last years. She had appeared in three films in the 1950s, and made three more in the 1960s, including a cameo in, of all films, the family comedy The Trouble with Angels (1966), opposite Hayley Mills and Rosalind Russell, who played Mama Rose in the first screen version of the play, Gypsy (1962). The real Gypsy even hosted two incarnations of her own talk show. She died of cancer in 1970. Even if her film career wasn't spectacular, she was immortalized on the stage of both burlesque and Broadway.- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Born Joan de Beauvoir de Havilland on October 22, 1917, in Tokyo, Japan, in what was known as the International Settlement, to British parents, Lilian Augusta (Ruse), a former actress, and Walter Augustus de Havilland, an English professor and patent attorney. Her paternal grandfather's family was from Guernsey in the Channel Islands. Her father had a lucrative practice in Japan, but due to Joan and older sister Olivia de Havilland's recurring ailments the family moved to California in the hopes of improving their health. Mrs. de Havilland and the two girls settled in Saratoga while their father went back to his practice in Japan. Joan's parents did not get along well and divorced soon afterward. Mrs. de Havilland had a desire to be an actress but her dreams were curtailed when she married, but now she hoped to pass on her dream to Olivia and Joan. While Olivia pursued a stage career, Joan went back to Tokyo, where she attended the American School. In 1934 she came back to California, where her sister was already making a name for herself on the stage. Joan likewise joined a theater group in San Jose and then Los Angeles to try her luck there. After moving to L.A., Joan adopted the name of Joan Burfield because she didn't want to infringe upon Olivia, who was using the family surname.
She tested at MGM and gained a small role in No More Ladies (1935), but she was scarcely noticed and Joan was idle for a year and a half. During this time she roomed with Olivia, who was having much more success in films. In 1937, this time calling herself Joan Fontaine, she landed a better role as Trudy Olson in You Can't Beat Love (1937) and then an uncredited part in Quality Street (1937). Although the next two years saw her in better roles, she still yearned for something better. In 1940 she garnered her first Academy Award nomination for Rebecca (1940). Although she thought she should have won, (she lost out to Ginger Rogers in Kitty Foyle (1940)), she was now an established member of the Hollywood set. She would again be Oscar-nominated for her role as Lina McLaidlaw Aysgarth in Suspicion (1941), and this time she won. Joan was making one film a year but choosing her roles well. In 1942 she starred in the well-received This Above All (1942).
The following year she appeared in The Constant Nymph (1943). Once again she was nominated for the Oscar, she lost out to Jennifer Jones in The Song of Bernadette (1943). By now it was safe to say she was more famous than her older sister and more fine films followed. In 1948, she accepted second billing to Bing Crosby in The Emperor Waltz (1948). Joan took the year of 1949 off before coming back in 1950 with September Affair (1950) and Born to Be Bad (1950). In 1951 she starred in Paramount's Darling, How Could You! (1951), which turned out badly for both her and the studio and more weak productions followed.
Absent from the big screen for a while, she took parts in television and dinner theaters. She also starred in many well-produced Broadway plays such as Forty Carats and The Lion in Winter. Her last appearance on the big screen was The Witches (1966) and her final appearance before the cameras was Good King Wenceslas (1994). She is, without a doubt, a lasting movie icon.Favorite Role(s): Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948).
Sister (estranged) of Olivia de Havilland. I like her better than Olivia so far.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Today Barbara Stanwyck is remembered primarily as the matriarch of the family known as the Barkleys on the TV western The Big Valley (1965), wherein she played Victoria, and from the hit drama The Colbys (1985). But she was known to millions of other fans for her movie career, which spanned the period from 1927 until 1964, after which she appeared on television until 1986. It was a career that lasted for 59 years.
Barbara Stanwyck was born Ruby Catherine Stevens on July 16, 1907, in Brooklyn, New York, to working class parents Catherine Ann (McPhee) and Byron E. Stevens. Her father, from Massachusetts, had English ancestry, and her Canadian mother, from Nova Scotia, was of Scottish and Irish descent. Stanwyck went to work at the local telephone company for fourteen dollars a week, but she had the urge (a dream--that was all it was) somehow to enter show business. When not working, she pounded the pavement in search of dancing jobs. The persistence paid off. Barbara was hired as a chorus girl for the princely sum of $40 a week, much better than the wages she was getting from the phone company. She was seventeen, and was going to make the most of the opportunity that had been given her.
In 1928 Barbara moved to Hollywood, where she was to start one of the most lucrative careers filmdom had ever seen. She was an extremely versatile actress who could adapt to any role. Barbara was equally at home in all genres, from melodramas, such as Forbidden (1932) and Stella Dallas (1937), to thrillers, such as Double Indemnity (1944), one of her best films, also starring Fred MacMurray (as you have never seen him before). She also excelled in comedies such as Remember the Night (1939) and The Lady Eve (1941). Another genre she excelled in was westerns, Union Pacific (1939) being one of her first and TV's The Big Valley (1965) (her most memorable role) being her last. In 1983, she played in the ABC hit mini-series The Thorn Birds (1983), which did much to keep her in the eye of the public. She turned in an outstanding performance as Mary Carson.
Barbara was considered a gem to work with for her serious but easygoing attitude on the set. She worked hard at being an actress, and she never allowed her star quality to go to her head. She was nominated for four Academy Awards, though she never won. She turned in magnificent performances for all the roles she was nominated for, but the "powers that be" always awarded the Oscar to someone else. However, in 1982 she was awarded an honorary Academy Award for "superlative creativity and unique contribution to the art of screen acting." Sadly, Barbara died on January 20, 1990, leaving 93 movies and a host of TV appearances as her legacy to us.Favorite Role(s): Double Indemnity (1944), The Lady Eve (1941), "Ball Of Fire".
She was an incredibly versatile actress doing all kinds of movies, and she made 80 films for the big screen during her career. Some great articles about her in the New Yorker:
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/04/30/lady-be-good
http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/barbara-stanwycks-best
I'm excited to see the infamous "Baby Face" (1933), which has been said to be the reason the Hays Code was finally enforced in 1934. After the movie was banned in several states and countries, a second ending was filmed in which Barbara's character is "punished" at the end and loses everything. Ain't that just how they do us women dirty.- Actress
- Producer
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Intriguing, inspiring, and never less than interesting -- key adjectives in describing the career of Beverly D'Angelo, which has well passed the four-decade mark. Perhaps deserving better movies than she generally found herself in, she nevertheless was always an object of fascination and the one to watch...whatever the role. Hardly the shrinking violet type, Hollywood counted on her for her colorful personality, down-to-earth demeanor and scene-stealing capabilities.
Beverly Heather D'Angelo was born on November 15, 1951 in Columbus, Ohio, the daughter of musicians Priscilla Ruth (Smith), a violinist, and Eugene Constantino "Gene" D'Angelo, a bass player who also managed a TV station. Her maternal grandfather, Howard Dwight Smith, was the architect who designed the Ohio ("Horseshoe") Stadium at Ohio State University. Her mother had English, Irish, Scottish, and German ancestry, and her father was of Italian descent. Beverly once attended an American school in Florence, Italy.
Initially drawn to art, Beverly worked as a animator/cartoonist at Hanna-Barbera Productions before moving to Canada to pursue a rock singing career, To make ends meet she worked as a session vocalist and sang anyplace she could -- from coffeehouses to topless bars. At one point the teenager was invited to join up with rockabilly legend Ronnie Hawkins. Beverly's acting career started up when she left the Hawkins band and joined the Charlottetown Festival repertory company. She was touring Canada as Ophelia in "Kronborg: 1582", a rock musical version of Shakespeare's "Hamlet" when the renowned Colleen Dewhurst caught a performance and saw promise in both Beverly and the show. Eventually musical director Gower Champion got into the mix and the show was completely revamped, becoming the rock musical "Rockabye Hamlet", which made its way to Broadway in 1976. While the show itself was short-lived, Beverly's Ophelia attracted fine notices and she soon found herself on the West coast with film and TV opportunities. After this point, she seldom returned to the stage but did star alongside Ed Harris in the 1995 off-Broadway production of Sam Shepard's "Simpatico", which earned her a Theatre World Award.
A role in the TV miniseries Captains and the Kings (1976) led to bit parts in The Sentinel (1977) and in the Woody Allen classic Annie Hall (1977). A string of co-starring roles followed with First Love (1977), the Clint Eastwood starrer Every Which Way But Loose (1978) and the film adaptation of the hit counterculture musical Hair (1979). Best of all for Beverly was her powerhouse featured performance as the one-and-only Patsy Cline in the acclaimed biopic Coal Miner's Daughter (1980). Both she and Oscar winner Sissy Spacek (as fellow country singer Loretta Lynn) expertly supplied their own vocals.
Playing everything from tough-as-nails prostitutes, party girls and barflies to rich, prim widows and depressed, alcoholic moms, most of Beverly's output was solid during this time. Playing happening kind of gals, she customarily rose above much of the standard comedic or dramatic material given. An interesting gallery of offbeat characters came her way in a number of hit-or-miss features: Paternity (1981), Finders Keepers (1984), Big Trouble (1986), Maid to Order (1987), High Spirits (1988), Cold Front (1989), Daddy's Dyin'... Who's Got the Will? (1990), The Pope Must Diet (1991), Man Trouble (1992), Lightning Jack (1994), The Crazysitter (1994), Merchants of Venus (1998) and Sugar Town (1999). She also sang in a few of these films.
Beverly attracted mainstream notice as Chevy Chase's beleaguered wife in the comedy spoof Vacation (1983) and its three sequels. Stronger roles came with such films as the English/Irish production The Miracle (1991) and the Neo-Nazi film American History X (1998). She was also a favorite of director John Schlesinger who used her in Honky Tonk Freeway (1981) and Eye for an Eye (1996), among others. In the spoof Pterodactyl Woman from Beverly Hills (1996), in which she served as associate producer, Beverly gamely starred as a chic Beverly Hills housewife who turns into a flying prehistoric reptile by night. Other offbeat independent filming includes Illuminata (1998), Merchants of Venus (1998), Weaver of Claybank (1915), Black Water Transit (2009), The House Bunny (2008), Episode #7.33 (2007), Bounty Killer (2013), Frat Pack (2018) and Dreamland (2016).
On TV, Beverly scored well as matricide victim Kitty Menendez in Menendez: A Killing in Beverly Hills (1994) and earned an Emmy-nomination (and arguably gave the best performance) as Stella Kowalski opposite "Hair" co-star Treat Williams in the TV remake of A Streetcar Named Desire (1984). Other topnotch TV mini-movies included Sweet Temptation (1996) and Judgment Day: The John List Story (1993), in which she played Robert Blake's devout wife. On primetime she has been cast quite assertively in recurring parts -- she has been spotted on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999) as a defense attorney; Entourage (2004) as a talent agent; Shooter (2016) as a national security advisor; and Insatiable (2018) as a scheming beauty contestant coach.
Beverly's off-camera romantic life has been just as interesting. Following her relationship with "Hair" director Milos Forman, she married Lorenzo Salviati, an economics student who also was an Italian duke. She left Hollywood and lived with him in Europe, but separated after two years and returned. A six-year relationship with Irish director Neil Jordan was followed by one with Oscar-winning production designer Anton Furst; this ended tragically when, just weeks after their breakup, he committed suicide. A former union with the volatile Al Pacino produced twins Olivia and Anton, who were born in 2001.
These days, Beverly's career on camera has remained secondary to the raising of her children. Occasionally she has made use of her vocal talents performing at L.A. nightclubs and with a jazz band that included brother Jeff. From time to time she still lights up the screen as a brash professional or somebody's colorful mom; whatever time she has on screen, whether major or minor, it is always welcomed and never, ever less than...interesting.Favorite Role(s): "Coal Miner's Daughter" (1980), "National Lampoon's Vacation" (1983), "The Sentinel" (1977), "American History X" (1998).
Her singing in Coal Miner's Daughter (as Patsy Cline) is beautiful and extraordinary, and I won't ruin it for you, but her small role in The Sentinel was unique - another reason on a long list of reasons why I love classic horror.
Also: American History X (1998).- The original ash-blonde "iceberg maiden", Madeleine Carroll was a knowing beauty with a confident air, the epitome of poise and "breeding". Not only did she have looks and allure in abundance, but she had intellectual heft to go with them, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts from Birmingham University at the age of 20. The daughter of a French mother and an Irish father, she briefly held a position teaching French at a girls seminary near Brighton, but was by this time thoroughly determined to seek her career in the theatre--much to her dad's chagrin. Madeleine's chance arrived, after several failed auditions (and in between modeling hats), in the shape of a small part as a French maid in a 1927 West End production of "The Lash". Her film debut followed within a year and stardom was almost instantaneous. By the time she appeared in The W Plan (1930), Madeleine had become Britain's top female screen star. That is not to say, however, that she was a gifted actress from the outset. In fact, she learned her trade on the job, finding help along the way from established thespians such as Seymour Hicks and Miles Mander. Most of her early films tended to focus on that exquisite face, and bringing out her regal, well-bred--if rather icy--personality. Her beautiful speaking voice enabled her to make the transition to sound pictures effortlessly.
Following a year-long absence from acting (and marriage to Capt. Philip Astley of the King's Guards) she returned to the screen, having been tempted with a lucrative contract by Gaumont-British. The resulting films, Sleeping Car (1933) and I Was a Spy (1933), were both popular and critical successes and prompted renewed offers from Hollywood. However, on loan to Fox, the tedious melodrama The World Moves On (1934) did absolutely nothing for her career and she quickly returned to Britain--a fortuitous move, as it turned out. Alfred Hitchcock had been on the lookout for one of the unattainable, aloof blondes he was so partial to, whose smoldering sexuality lay hidden beneath a layer of ladylike demeanor (other Hitch favorites of that type included Grace Kelly and Kim Novak). Madeleine fitted the bill perfectly. The 39 Steps (1935), based on a novel by John Buchan, made her an international star. The process was not entirely painless, however, as Hitchcock "introduced" Madeleine to co-star Robert Donat by handcuffing them together (accounts vary as to how long, exactly, but it was likely for several hours) for "added realism". In due course the enforced companionship got the stars nicely acquainted and helped make their humorous banter in the film all the more convincing.
Hitchcock liked Madeleine and attempted to repeat the success of "The 39 Steps" with Secret Agent (1936), but with somewhat diminished results (primarily because Donat had to pull out of the project due to illness and Madeleine's chemistry with John Gielgud was not on the same level as it was with Donat). Nonetheless, her reputation was made. After Alexander Korda sold her contract, she ended up back in Hollywood with Paramount. Initially she was signed for one year (1935-36), but this was extended in 1938 with a stipulation that she make two pictures per year until the end of 1941. The studio publicity machine touted Madeleine as "the most beautiful woman in the world". This was commensurate with her being given A-grade material, beginning with The General Died at Dawn (1936), opposite Gary Cooper. For once, Madeleine portrayed something other than a regal or "squeaky clean" character, and she did so with more warmth and élan than she had displayed in her previous films. She then showed a humorous side in Irving Berlin's On the Avenue (1937); had Tyrone Power and George Sanders fight it out for her affections in Lloyd's of London (1936) (on loan to Fox); and turned up as a particularly decorative--though in regard to acting, underemployed--princess, in The Prisoner of Zenda (1937). Thereafter she had hit the peak of her profession in terms of salary, reportedly making $250,000 in 1938 alone. For the remainder of her Hollywood tenure, Madeleine co-starred three times with Fred MacMurray (the most enjoyable encounter was Honeymoon in Bali (1939)), and opposite Bob Hope in one of his most fondly remembered comedies, My Favorite Blonde (1942). Then it all started to come to an end.
Having lost her sister Guigette during a German air attack on London in October 1940, Madeleine devoted more and more of her time to the war effort, becoming entertainment director for the United Seamens Service and joining the Red Cross as a nurse under the name Madeleine Hamilton. She was unable to rekindle her popularity after the war, her last film of note being The Fan (1949), a dramatization of Oscar Wilde's play. She made a solitary, albeit very successful, attempt at Broadway, with a starring role in the comedy "Goodbye, My Fancy" (1948), directed by and co-starring a young Sam Wanamaker. There were a few more TV and radio appearances but, for all intents and purposes, her career had run its course. Britain's most glamorous export to Hollywood became increasingly self-deprecating, rejecting further overtures from producers. Instead, she became more committed to charitable works on behalf of children, orphaned or injured as the result of the Second World War.
Madeleine spent the last 21 years of her life in retirement, first in Paris, then in the south of Spain. Two of her four ex-husbands included the actor Sterling Hayden and the French director/producer Henri Lavorel. Last of the quartet was Andrew Heiskell, publisher of 'Life' magazine. She died in Marbella in October 1987. In her private life, the trimmings of stardom seemed to have mattered little to Madeleine. As to her status as a sex symbol, she was once said to have quipped to a group of collegians who had voted her the girl they'd most like to be marooned with on a desert island, that she would not object, provided at least one of them was a good obstetrician!Favorite Role(s): Hitchcock's "The 39 Steps". - Actress
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Alicia Vikander is a Swedish actress, dancer and producer. She was born and raised in Gothenburg, Västra Götalands län, Sweden, to Maria Fahl, an actress of stage and screen, and Svante Vikander, a psychiatrist. Through her mother, she is one quarter Finnish, and had a maternal great aunt who moved from Finland to Sweden to escape World War 2. Alicia began acting as a child in minor stage productions at The Göteborg Opera, and trained as a ballet dancer at the Royal Swedish Ballet School in Stockholm, and the School of American Ballet in New York. She began her professional acting career by appearing in Swedish short films and television series, and first gained recognition in Northern Europe for her role as Josefin Björn-Tegebrandt in the TV drama Second Avenue (2007). Vikander made her feature film debut in Pure (2009), for which she won the Guldbagge Award for Best Actress. She attracted widespread recognition in 2012 for portraying Princess Ekaterina "Kitty" Alexandrovna Shcherbatskaya in Joe Wright's film adaptation of Anna Karenina (2012), and Queen Caroline Mathilde in the acclaimed Danish film A Royal Affair (2012), receiving a BAFTA Rising Star Award nomination for her breakthrough. She went on to star in the 2013 Swedish drama film Hotel (2013)and appeared in the Julian Assange biopic The Fifth Estate (2013) that same year. In 2014 and 2015, Vikander achieved global recognition and acclaim for her roles as activist Vera Brittain in Testament of Youth (2014), an AI in Ex Machina (2014), for which she was nominated for the Golden Globe and BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actress, and painter Gerda Wegener in The Danish Girl (2015), for which she received the Academy Award and the Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Supporting Actress.Favorite Role(s): "Ex Machina".- Actress
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Lovely, auburn-haired Martha Vickers (nee Martha MacVicar) was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on May 28, 1925, the daughter of James S. and Frances MacVicar. After attending schools in various states - Florida, Texas and California - she and her family settled on the West Coast. A raving beauty, she broke into the entertainment field as a model for still photographer William Mortenson. This attracted the interest of David O. Selznick and she signed a starlet contract with him, but nothing came of it. Universal took over her contract where she was groomed in inauspicious bit parts such as her corpse/victim in Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man (1943), and in such low-level entries as Captive Wild Woman (1943) and The Mummy's Ghost (1944). In between assignments, Martha earned WWII pin-up exposure in such magazines as "Yank: The Army Weekly."
RKO gave her some higher-level billing chances with Marine Raiders (1944) and The Falcon in Mexico (1944), but it was Warner Bros. that put her officially on the map. The enticing Martha earned celebrity status and a new stage moniker when she generated some real heat as Lauren Bacall's wild, thumb-sucking sister Carmen in the film noir classic The Big Sleep (1946), which also starred Humphrey Bogart, playing the teenage nymphet "bad girl" for all it was worth. This major success quickly led to other "B" roles and not necessarily all "bad girl" parts. Highly appealing as the second femme lead in the pleasant musical The Time, the Place and the Girl (1946), Martha looked radiant but was overlooked for bigger things. She continued on and disrupted the proceedings again in the atmospheric film noir The Man I Love (1946) with Ida Lupino and finally earned leading lady status in That Way with Women (1947) opposite Dane Clark.
Very much a part of the Hollywood dating scene, which included actor James Stewart and director Frederick De Cordova, Martha finally married producer A.C. Lyles in March of 1948, but the marriage was over within a couple of months. Post-war films included Love and Learn (1947), another film noir piece Ruthless (1948), and the melodrama Bad Boy (1949), which was Audie Murphy's first starring role. She ended the decade top-lining the "Poverty-Row" drama Alimony (1949). Surprisingly, Martha's high-profiled second marriage in 1949 to film star Mickey Rooney (she was his third wife) did not advance her career. In fact, Martha was not seen in films at all during this period. Despite the couple having a son, Teddy Rooney, the next year (1950), Rooney had already hit the nadir of his career and had turned excessively to the bottle. Her marriage to Rooney would be short-lived as well.
Martha married a third time in 1954 to Chilean polo player-turned-actor Manuel Rojas, best known for his co-starring role in The Magnificent Matador (1955), and she finally returned to the screen in The Big Bluff (1955) co-starring with John Bromfield. The momentum, however, was gone and the movie did nothing to generate new interest. She did move, however, into TV and performed effectively in a number of dramatic showcases. She and Rojas had two children, Tina and Tessa. In 1960, Martha did her last filming with the western Four Fast Guns (1960) and after guesting on a couple of episodes of the TV series "The Rebel," ended her career. Not much was heard from this sultry beauty until her death from cancer in 1971 at age 46 in Hollywood, California.Favorite Role(s): "The Big Sleep" (1946). She played the Lolita-like, spoiled, sexpot little sister (of an exceptional Lauren Bacall) and was a stand-out in a world swimming with sexy, yet demure brunettes.
"She tried to sit in my lap while I was standing up!!"- Humphrey Bogart
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Katharine Houghton Hepburn was born on May 12, 1907 in Hartford, Connecticut to a suffragist, Katharine Martha (Houghton), and a doctor, Thomas Norval Hepburn, who both always encouraged her to speak her mind, develop it fully, and exercise her body to its full potential. An athletic tomboy as a child, she was very close to her brother Tom; at 14 she was devastated to find him dead, the apparent result of accidentally hanging himself while practicing a hanging trick their father had taught them. For many years afterward, she used his November 8 birth date as her own. She became shy around girls her age and was largely schooled at home. She did attend Bryn Mawr College, where she decided to become an actress, appearing in many of their productions.
After graduating, she began getting small roles in plays on Broadway and elsewhere. She always attracted attention, especially for her role in "Art and Mrs. Bottle" (1931). She finally broke into stardom when she took the starring role of the Amazon princess Antiope in "A Warrior's Husband" (1932). The inevitable film offers followed; after making a few screen tests, she was cast in A Bill of Divorcement (1932), opposite John Barrymore. The film was a hit, and after agreeing to her salary demands, RKO signed her to a contract. She made five films between 1932 and 1934. For her third, Morning Glory (1933), she won her first Academy Award. Her fourth, Little Women (1933), was the most successful picture of its day.
But stories were beginning to leak out, of her haughty behavior off- screen and her refusal to play the Hollywood Game, always wearing slacks and no makeup, never posing for pictures or giving interviews. Audiences were shocked at her unconventional behavior instead of applauding it, and so when she returned to Broadway in 1934 to star in "The Lake", the critics panned her, and the audiences, who at first bought up tickets, soon deserted her. When she returned to Hollywood, things didn't get much better. From 1935-1938, she had only two hits: Alice Adams (1935), which brought her her second Oscar nomination, and Stage Door (1937); the many flops included Break of Hearts (1935), Sylvia Scarlett (1935), Mary of Scotland (1936), Quality Street (1937), and the now-classic Bringing Up Baby (1938).
With so many flops, she came to be labeled "box-office poison". She decided to go back to Broadway to star in "The Philadelphia Story" (1938) and was rewarded with a smash. She quickly bought the film rights and so was able to negotiate her way back to Hollywood on her own terms, including her choice of director and co-stars. The Philadelphia Story (1940) was a box-office hit, and Hepburn, who won her third Oscar nomination for the film, was bankable again. For her next film, Woman of the Year (1942), she was paired with Spencer Tracy, and the chemistry between them lasted for eight more films, spanning the course of 25 years, and a romance that lasted that long off-screen. (She received her fourth Oscar nomination for the film.) Their films included the very successful Adam's Rib (1949), Pat and Mike (1952), and Desk Set (1957).
With The African Queen (1951), Hepburn moved into middle-aged spinster roles, receiving her fifth Oscar nomination for the film. She played more of these types of roles throughout the 1950s, and won more Oscar nominations for many of them, including her roles in Summertime (1955), The Rainmaker (1956), and Suddenly, Last Summer (1959). Her film roles became fewer and farther between in the 1960s, as she devoted her time to the ailing Tracy. For one of her film appearances in this decade, in Long Day's Journey Into Night (1962), she received her ninth Oscar nomination. After a five-year absence from films, she then made Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967), her last film with Tracy and the last film Tracy ever made; he died just weeks after finishing it. It garnered Hepburn her tenth Oscar nomination and her second win. The next year, she did The Lion in Winter (1968), which brought her her eleventh Oscar nomination and third win.
In the 1970s, she turned to making made-for-TV films, with The Glass Menagerie (1973), Love Among the Ruins (1975), and The Corn Is Green (1979). She still continued to make an occasional appearance in feature films, such as Rooster Cogburn (1975) with John Wayne and On Golden Pond (1981) with Henry Fonda. This last brought her her twelfth Oscar nomination and fourth win - the latter still the record.
She made more TV-films in the 1980s and wrote her autobiography, 'Me', in 1991. Her last feature film was Love Affair (1994), with Warren Beatty and Annette Bening, and her last TV- film was One Christmas (1994). With her health declining, she retired from public life in the mid-1990s. She died at 96 at her home in Old Saybrook, Connecticut.Favorite Role(s): "The Philadelphia Story", and probably about a thousand other films I haven't seen yet.- Producer
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The woman who will always be remembered as the crazy, accident-prone, lovable Lucy Ricardo was born Lucille Desiree Ball on August 6, 1911 in Jamestown, New York, the daughter of Desiree Evelyn "DeDe" (Hunt) and Henry Durrell "Had" Ball. Her father died before she was four, and her mother worked several jobs, so she and her younger brother were raised by their grandparents. Always willing to take responsibility for her brother and young cousins, she was a restless teenager who yearned to "make some noise". She entered a dramatic school in New York City, but while her classmate Bette Davis received all the raves, she was sent home; "too shy". She found some work modeling for Hattie Carnegie's and, in 1933, she was chosen to be a "Goldwyn Girl" and appear in the film Roman Scandals (1933).
She was put under contract to RKO Radio Pictures and several small roles, including one in Top Hat (1935), followed. Eventually, she received starring roles in B-pictures and, occasionally, a good role in an A-picture, like in Stage Door (1937) or The Big Street (1942). While filming Too Many Girls (1940), she met and fell madly in love with a young Cuban actor-musician named Desi Arnaz. Despite different personalities, lifestyles, religions and ages (he was six years younger), he fell hard, too, and after a passionate romance, they eloped and were married in November 1940. Lucy soon switched to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, where she got better roles in films such as Du Barry Was a Lady (1943); Best Foot Forward (1943) and the Katharine Hepburn-Spencer Tracy vehicle Without Love (1945). In 1948, she took a starring role in the radio comedy "My Favorite Husband", in which she played the scatterbrained wife of a Midwestern banker. In 1950, CBS came knocking with the offer of turning it into a television series. After convincing the network brass to let Desi play her husband and to sign over the rights to and creative control over the series to them, work began on the most popular and universally beloved sitcom of all time.
With I Love Lucy (1951), she and Desi promoted the 3-camera technique now the standard in filming sitcoms using 35mm film (the earliest known example of the 3-camera technique is the first Russian feature film, "Defence of Sevastopol" in 1911). Desi syndicated I Love Lucy. Lucille Ball was the first woman to own her own studio as the head of Desilu Productions.
Lucille Ball died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, age 77, of an acute aortic aneurysm on April 26, 1989 in Los Angeles, CA.A comic legend.
Favorite Role(s): "I Love Lucy". I grew up watching Nick at Nite.- Rose Leslie is a Scottish actress. Her leading on screen debut was at age 21 in the television film New Town (2009). She is famous for playing Ygritte in the HBO fantasy series Game of Thrones (2011). Leslie also appeared in the films Now Is Good (2012) and The Last Witch Hunter (2015).
Leslie was born Rose Eleanor Arbuthnot-Leslie in Aberdeen, Scotland, near Lickleyhead Castle, where her family has lived for more than 500 years. Rose is the daughter of Candida Mary Sibyl (Weld) and Sebastian Arbuthnot-Leslie, who is the Aberdeenshire Chieftain of Clan Leslie. She is the middle of five children, and went to the local primary school in Rayne, before going to Millfield, a co-ed public school in England. It was at Millfield that Rose really cultivated her love for acting, as the school had an excellent drama department. After five years at Millfield, Rose went on to the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA) to earn a bachelor's degree with honors in 2008.
Rose's first acting job was in a television documentary series, called Locked Up Abroad (2007), in 2008. In 2009, she appeared in the made-for-TV film, Purves + Pekkala (2009), in which she received a Scottish BAFTA Award for Best Acting Performance - New Talent Award. In 2010, Rose appeared in the British TV Series, Downton Abbey (2010), as "Gwen Dawson", for 7 episodes. Later that year, she appeared in the play, "Bedlam", at the Globe Theatre in London. In 2011, Rose appeared in the British drama television series, Case Histories (2011), as "Laura Wyre", for 2 episodes. In 2012, Rose played "Lena Holgate" in the episode, The Ghost Position (2012), in the British detective television series, Vera (2011). Later that same year, Rose would make her iconic appearance in the 2nd season of the HBO epic fantasy series, Game of Thrones (2011), opposite Kit Harington as the wildling "Ygritte".Favorite Role(s): Game of Thrones, Downton Abbey - but she was also at her best in Utopia, and I was surprised to see her pop up on it (she doesn't appear until the second season) to make one of my favorite shows even greater.
She's really something to watch... an up-and coming star - at least, with her talents, we should all hope so. - Actress
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Ruth Wilson, born on 13 January 1982, is an English actress. She is known for her performances in Suburban Shootout (2006), Jane Eyre (2006), and as "Alice Morgan" in the BBC-TV psychological crime drama, Luther (2010), since 2010. She has also appeared in Anna Karenina (2012), The Lone Ranger (2013), and Saving Mr. Banks (2013). In 2014, she had a voice role in the film, Locke (2013), and began a starring role in the Showtime series, The Affair (2014).Favorite Role(s): as Jane Eyre in the mini-series (which I haven't finished yet), and she's quite intriguing as the highly gifted, murderer-prodigy 'Alice' in "Luther".- Actress
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Sweet, sweeter, sweetest. No combination of terms better describes the screen persona of lovely Loretta Young. A&E's Biography (1987) has stated that Young "remains a symbol of beauty, serenity, and grace. But behind the glamour and stardom is a woman of substance whose true beauty lies in her dedication to her family, her faith, and her quest to live life with a purpose."
Loretta Young was born Gretchen Young in Salt Lake City, Utah on January 6, 1913, to Gladys (Royal) and John Earle Young. Her parents separated when Loretta was three years old. Her mother moved Loretta and her two older sisters to Southern California, where Mrs. Young ran a boarding house. When Loretta was 10, her mother married one of her boarders, George Belzer. They had a daughter, Georgianna, two years later.
Loretta was appearing on screen as a child extra by the time she was four, joining her elder sisters, Polly Ann Young and Elizabeth Jane Young (later better known as Sally Blane), as child players. Mrs. Young's brother-in-law was an assistant director and got young Loretta a small role in the film The Only Way (1914). The role consisted of nothing more than a small, weeping child lying on an operating table. Later that year, she appeared in another small role, in The Primrose Ring (1917). The film starred Mae Murray, who was so taken with little Loretta that she offered to adopt her. Loretta lived with the Murrays for about a year and a half. In 1921, she had a brief scene in The Sheik (1921).
Loretta and her sisters attended parochial schools, after which they helped their mother run the boarding house. In 1927, Loretta returned to films in a small part in Naughty But Nice (1927). Even at the age of fourteen, she was an ambitious actress. Changing her name to Loretta Young, letting her blond hair revert to its natural brown and with her green eyes, satin complexion and exquisite face, she quickly graduated from ingenue to leading lady. Beginning with her role as Denise Laverne in The Magnificent Flirt (1928), she shaped any character she took on with total dedication. In 1928, she received second billing in The Head Man (1928) and continued to toil in many roles throughout the '20s and '30s, making anywhere from six to nine films a year. Her two sisters were also actresses but were not as successful as Loretta, whose natural beauty was her distinct advantage.
The 17-year-old Young made headlines in 1930 when she and Grant Withers, who was previously married and nine years her senior, eloped to Yuma, Arizona. They had both appeared in Warner Bros.' The Second Floor Mystery (1930). The marriage was annulled in 1931, the same year in which the pair would again co-star on screen in a film ironically titled Too Young to Marry (1931). By the mid-'30s, Loretta left First National Studios for rival Fox, where she had previously worked on a loan-out basis, and became one of the premier leading ladies of Hollywood.
In 1935, she made Call of the Wild (1935) with Clark Gable and it was thought they had an affair where Loretta got pregnant thereafter. Because of the strict morality clauses in their contracts - and the fact that Clark Gable was married - they could not tell anybody except Loretta's mother. Loretta and her mother left for Europe after filming on The Crusades finished. They returned in August 1935 to the United States, at which time Gladys Belzer announced Loretta's 'illness' to the press. Filming on Loretta's next film, Ramona, was also cancelled. During this time, Loretta was living in a small house in Venice, California, her mother rented. On November 6, 1935, Loretta delivered a healthy baby girl whom she named Judith. It wasn't until the 1990s when she was watching Larry King Live where she first heard the word 'date rape' and upon finding out exactly what it was, professed to her friend and biographer Edward Funk and her daughter-in-law Linda Lewis, that she had gone through the same with Clark Gable. "That's what happened between me and Clark."
In 1938, Loretta starred as Sally Goodwin in Kentucky (1938), an outstanding success. Her co-star Walter Brennan won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role as Peter Goodwin.
In 1940, Loretta married businessman Tom Lewis, and from then on her child was called Judy Lewis, although Tom Lewis never adopted her. Judy was brought up thinking that both parents had adopted her and did not know, until years later, that she was actually the biological daughter of Loretta and Clark Gable. Four years after her marriage to Tom Lewis, Loretta had a son, Christopher Lewis, and later another son, Peter Charles.
In the 1940s, Loretta was still one of the most beautiful ladies in Hollywood. She reached the pinnacle of her career when she won the Academy Award for Best Actress in The Farmer's Daughter (1947), the tale of a farm girl who rises through the ranks and becomes a congresswoman. It was a smash and today is her best remembered film. The same year, she starred in the delightful fantasy The Bishop's Wife (1947) with David Niven and Cary Grant. It was another box office success and continues to be a TV staple during the holiday season. In 1949, Loretta starred in the well-received film, Mother Is a Freshman (1949) with Van Johnson and Rudy Vallee and Come to the Stable (1949). The latter garnered Loretta her second Oscar nomination, but she lost to Olivia de Havilland in The Heiress (1949). In 1953, Loretta made It Happens Every Thursday (1953), which was to be her final big screen role.
She retired from films in 1953 and began a second, equally successful career as hostess of The Loretta Young Show (1953), a half-hour television drama anthology series which ran on NBC from September 1953 to September 1961. In addition to hosting the series, she frequently starred in episodes. Although she is most remembered for her stunning gowns and swirling entrances, over the broadcast's eight-year run she also showed again that she could act. She won Emmy awards for best actress in a dramatic series in 1954, 1956 and 1958.
After the show ended, she took some time off before returning in 1962 with The New Loretta Young Show (1962), which was not so successful, lasting only one season. For the next 24 years, Loretta did not appear in any entertainment medium. Her final performance was in a made for TV film Lady in the Corner (1989).
By 1960, Loretta was a grandmother. Her daughter Judy Lewis had married about three years before and had a daughter in 1959, whom they named Maria. Loretta and Tom Lewis divorced in the early 1960s. Loretta enjoyed retirement, sleeping late, visiting her son Chris and daughter-in-law Linda, and traveling. She and her friend Josephine Alicia Saenz, ex-wife of John Wayne, traveled to India and saw the Taj Mahal. In 1990, she became a great-grandmother when granddaughter Maria, daughter of Judy Lewis, gave birth to a boy.
Loretta lived a quiet retirement in Palm Springs, California until her death on August 12, 2000 from ovarian cancer at the home of her sister Georgiana and Georgiana's husband, Ricardo Montalban.Favorite Role(s): She was demure and stunning in "Midnight Mary" (1933), a fun pre-code.
She was also a wonderfully shrieky damsel-in-distress, proto-Shelley-Duvall-in-The Shining opposite Orson Welles in the (sometimes very silly) "is this dude a Nazi" movie, "The Stranger" (1946), which probably could have been retitled "Orson Welles looks ridiculous running around on top of a giant clock". Lol... unintentional comedy, thy name is Orson.- Actress
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Isa Miranda was one of the most significant actresses in Europe from the 1930s-'50s. Her remarkable talent expressed itself both in cinema and theater. She reached international popularity in the 1930s, especially in France, Germany and Austria, and became the only international movie star produced by the fascist cinema. In the 1950s, when her film career began declining, she played on stage in Italy, the US ("Mike McCauley", 1951), France ("Le serpent à sonettes", 1953) and England ("Orpheus Descending" by Tennessee Williams, 1959), receiving positive reviews everywhere. In the 1960s she started a TV career in England, appearing in many made-for-TV movies. She was a versatile actress, exceedingly sensible, a charming woman, and unjustly forgotten at the end of her life even by those who should have remembered her.- British actress Naomie Harris was born in London, England, the only child of television scriptwriter Lisselle Kayla. Her father is from Trinidad and her mother is from Jamaica. They separated before she was born, and Harris was raised by her mother and has no relationship with her father. She showed an interest in acting from an early age and attended the prestigious Anna Scher Theatre School. From here, Harris won roles in various projects, such as Simon and the Witch (1987) and The Tomorrow People (1992). She went on to study social and political sciences at Pembroke College, Cambridge University, an experience Harris did not enjoy.
After graduating from the University, Harris trained at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. Acting success soon followed and her breakthrough film role came in Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later (2002). Other notable projects include Miami Vice (2006) and Small Island (2009) (for which she was named best female actor by the Royal Television Society). Harris also won fans for her role as voodoo witch Tia Dalma in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006) and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (2007), and further international attention came her way when she played field agent Eve Moneypenny in the James Bond film Skyfall (2012).
Naomie was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in the drama Moonlight (2016), which won the Best Picture Oscar that year.
Naomie Harris was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) by Queen Elizabeth II in the 2017 New Years Honours for her services to drama. - Actress
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Vera-Ellen began dancing at the age of 10, and a few years later became one of the youngest Rockettes. She appeared in several Broadway musicals until she was spotted by film producer Samuel Goldwyn in 1945. She was only 24 years old when Goldwyn cast her opposite Danny Kaye in Wonder Man (1945). She danced with Fred Astaire in Three Little Words (1950) and with Gene Kelly in On the Town (1949). Blonde, slim of build, and a dancing sensation, she appeared in a string of light-hearted but successful films. Vera-Ellen retired from acting in the late 1950s.Favorite Role(s): White Christmas. Her tiny waist is probably physically impossible, and her legs are like toothpicks, but she can dance somehow, and wonderfully well.- Actress
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Myrna Williams, later to become Myrna Loy, was born on August 2, 1905 in Helena, Montana. Her father was the youngest person ever elected to the Montana State legislature. Later on her family moved to Radersburg where she spent her youth on a cattle ranch. At the age of 13, Myrna's father died of influenza and the rest of the family moved to Los Angeles. She was educated in L.A. at the Westlake School for Girls where she caught the acting bug. She started at the age of 15 when she appeared in local stage productions in order to help support her family. Some of the stage plays were held in the now famous Grauman's Theater in Hollywood. Mrs. Rudolph Valentino happened to be in the audience one night who managed to pull some strings to get Myrna some parts in the motion picture industry. Her first film was a small part in the production of What Price Beauty? (1925). Later she appeared the same year in Pretty Ladies (1925) along with Joan Crawford. She was one of the few stars that would start in silent movies and make a successful transition into the sound era. In the silent films, Myrna would appear as an exotic femme fatale. Later in the sound era, she would become a refined, wholesome character. Unable to land a contract with MGM, she continued to appear in small, bit roles, nothing that one could really call acting. In 1926, Myrna appeared in the Warner Brothers film called Satan in Sables (1925) which, at long last, landed her a contract. Her first appearance as a contract player was The Caveman (1926) where she played a maid. Although she was typecast over and over again as a vamp, Myrna continued to stay busy with small parts. Finally, in 1927, she received star billing in Bitter Apples (1927). The excitement was short lived as she returned to the usual smaller roles afterward. Myrna would take any role that would give her exposure and showcase the talent she felt was being wasted. It seemed that she would play one vamp after another. She wanted something better. Finally her contract ran out with WB and she signed with MGM where she got two meaty roles. One was in the The Prizefighter and the Lady (1933), and the other as Nora Charles in The Thin Man (1934) with William Powell. Most agreed that the Thin Man series would never have been successful without Myrna. Her witty perception of situations gave her the image that one could not pull a fast one over on the no-nonsense Mrs. Charles. After The Thin Man, Myrna would appear in five more in the series. Myrna was a big box-office draw. She was popular enough that, in 1936, she was named Queen of the Movies and Clark Gable the king in a nationwide poll of movie goers. Her popularity was at its zenith. With the outbreak of World War II, Myrna all but abandoned her acting career to focus on the war effort. After making THE SHADOW OF THE THIN MAN in November of 1941, Myrna more or less stayed away from Hollywood for five years. She broke this hiatus to appear in one Thin Man sequel while devoting most of her time working with the Red Cross. When she did return her star quality had not diminished a bit, as evidenced by her headlining The Best Years of Our Lives (1946). The film did superbly at the box-office, winning the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1947. With her career in high gear again, Myrna played opposite Cary Grant in back-to-back hits The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer (1947) and Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House (1948). She continued to make films through the '50s but the roles started getting fewer, her biggest success coming at the start of that decade with Cheaper by the Dozen (1950). By the 1960s the parts had all but dried up as producers and directors looked elsewhere for talent. In 1960 she appeared in Midnight Lace (1960) and was not in another film until 1969 in The April Fools (1969). The 1970s found her mainly in TV movies, not theatrical productions, except for small roles in Airport 1975 (1974) and The End (1978). Her last film was in 1981 called Summer Solstice (1981), and her final acting credit was a guest spot on the sitcom Love, Sidney (1981) in 1982. By the time Myrna passed away, on December 14, 1993, at the age of 88, she had appeared in a phenomenal 129 motion pictures. She was buried in Helena, Montana.Favorite Role(s): The scene-stealing supporting actress in "Love Me Tonight". In what other romance film is the comic relief more beautiful, more fashionable, and just overall sexier than than the female lead? : )- Actress
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Béatrice Romand was born on 16 April 1952 in Birkadem, Alger, Algeria. She is an actress and director, known for Claire's Knee (1970), A Good Marriage (1982) and Graf Yoster gibt sich die Ehre (1967).Favorite Role(s): Laura in "Le Genou de Claire" (1970). Honorable mention goes to Laurence de Monaghan as Claire.- Actress
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Haydée Politoff was born on 25 May 1946 in Paris, France. She is an actress and writer, known for The Collector (1967), Bora Bora (1968) and Le mutant (1978).Favorite Role(s): In Rohmer's "La Collectioneuse" (1967).- Actress
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Though most famous for her role as Isabella "Bella" Swan in The Twilight (2008) Saga, Kristen Stewart has been a working actor since her early years in Los Angeles, California. Her parents, John Stewart and Jules Stewart, both work in film and television. The family includes three boys, Kristen's older brother Cameron Stewart and two adopted brothers Dana and Taylor. Kristen is of English, Scottish, and Ashkenazi Jewish descent.
After a talent scout caught her grade school performance in a play at the age of eight, she appeared on television in a few small roles. Her first significant role came when she was cast as Sam Jennings in The Safety of Objects (2001). Soon after that, she starred alongside Jodie Foster in the hit drama, Panic Room (2002) and was nominated for a Young Artist Award.
Praised for her Panic Room performance, she went on to join the cast of Cold Creek Manor (2003) as the daughter of Dennis Quaid and Sharon Stone. Though the film did not do well at the box office, she received another nomination for a Young Artist Award. After appearing in a handful of movies and a Showtime movie called Speak (2004), Stewart was cast in the role of a teenage singer living in a commune in Sean Penn's Into the Wild (2007), a critically acclaimed biopic. A third Young Artist Award nomination resulted in a win for this role. She also appeared in Mary Stuart Masterson's The Cake Eaters (2007) that same year.
Just 17, Stewart took on the starring role in Twilight (2008) which was based on a series of the same name written by Stephenie Meyer, the novel already had a huge following and the film opened to fans anxious to see the vampire romance brought to life. Awarded the MTV Movie Award for Best Female Performance, Stewart's turn as Bella continued in the sequels The Twilight Saga: New Moon (2009) and The Twilight Saga: Eclipse (2010). The final installments of the series started filming in late 2010, and were released the following years, as The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1 (2011) and The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2 (2012).
Despite her stratospheric launch into stardom with the Twilight films, she stayed true to her roots by working on a number of indie projects, including Adventureland (2009) (filmed prior to the Twilight series) and Welcome to the Rileys (2010). And she took on the daunting task of playing hard rocker Joan Jett in Floria Sigismondi's The Runaways (2010) alongside Dakota Fanning. Stewart received praise for her acting and musical performances and later won the 2010 BAFTA Rising Star Award and best actress at the Milan International Film Festival for Welcome to the Rileys (2010).
Stewart worked on several other leading roles between the Twilight Saga installments including the #1 summer box office hit, Snow White and the Huntsman (2012), and the Cannes selection On the Road (2012). She also performed in the Sundance drama Camp X-Ray (2014), Cannes selection Clouds of Sils Maria (2014), for which she won a César Award, and the Lionsgate action comedy, American Ultra (2015), also starring Jesse Eisenberg, the Adventureland duo. She also delivered an acclaimed turn opposite Academy Award-winner Julianne Moore in Still Alice (2014). For the remainder of the decade, Kristen alternated choice supporting roles, such as Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk (2016) and Café Society (2016), with starring roles in films about historical figures, including Lizzie (2018) and Seberg (2019), and special effects/action thrillers Charlie's Angels (2019) and Underwater (2020).
Kristen had a change-of-pace role in the romantic comedy Happiest Season (2020), about an LGBT+ couple, and received universal acclaim, and her first Oscar nomination, for Best Actress, for her performance as Princess Diana in Pablo Larraín's Spencer (2021). Moving deeper into the 2020s, she is working on David Cronenberg's thriller Crimes of the Future (2022).
Stewart lives in Los Angeles, California.Favorite Role(s): Not a fan of Twilight... but she actually seems mad chill, and she's cute and outspoken... and gay, so there could be a chance there, haha.- Actress
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With blonde hair, big blue eyes and a big smile, Joan Blondell was usually cast as the wisecracking working girl who was the lead's best friend.
Joan was born Rose Blondell in Manhattan, New York, the daughter of Katie and Eddie Blondell, who were vaudeville performers. Her father was a Polish Jewish immigrant, and her mother was of Irish heritage. Joan was on the stage when she was three years old. For years, she toured the circuit with her parents and joined a stock company when she was 17. She made her New York debut with the Ziegfeld Follies and appeared in several Broadway productions.
She was starring with James Cagney on Broadway in "Penny Arcade" (1929) when Warner Brothers decided to film the play as Sinners' Holiday (1930). Both Cagney and Joan were given the leads, and the film was a success. She would be teamed with Cagney again in The Public Enemy (1931) and Blonde Crazy (1931) among others. In The Office Wife (1930), she stole the scene when she was dressing for work. While Warner Brothers made Cagney a star, Joan never rose to that level. In gangster movies or musicals, her performances were good enough for second leads, but not first lead. In the 1930s, she made a career playing gold-diggers and happy-go-lucky girlfriends. She would be paired with Dick Powell in ten musicals during these years, and they were married for ten years. By 1939, Joan had left Warner Brothers to become an independent actress, but by then, the blonde role was being defined by actresses like Veronica Lake. Her work slowed greatly as she went into straight comedy or dramatic roles. Three of her better roles were in Topper Returns (1941), Cry 'Havoc' (1943), and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945). By the 50s, Joan would garner an Academy Award nomination for The Blue Veil (1951), but her biggest career successes would be on the stage, including a musical version of "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn."
In 1957, Joan would again appear on the screen as a drunk in Lizzie (1957) and as mature companion to Jayne Mansfield in Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (1957). While she would appear in a number of television shows during the 50s and 60s, she had the regular role of Winifred on The Real McCoys (1957) during the 1963 season. Her role in the drama The Cincinnati Kid (1965) was well received, but most of her remaining films would be comedies such as Waterhole #3 (1967) and Support Your Local Gunfighter (1971). Still in demand for TV, she was cast as Lottie on Here Come the Brides (1968) and as Peggy on Banyon (1971).Favorite Role(s): She just has so much personality! Blondell injects every movie I've seen her in with a lighthearted & sexy, bubbly, bleached blonde buoyancy that is every bit her own - and probably a big influence on another actress who would become famous a few decades later - Marilyn Monroe. <3- Actress
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Acclaimed actress Jessica Walter was born on January 31, 1941 in Brooklyn, New York, the daughter of Esther (Groisser), a teacher, and David Walter (his original surname was Warshawsky), a musician who was a member of the NBC Symphony Orchestra and the NYC Ballet Orchestra. She was of Russian Jewish descent, the sister of screenwriter and Chairman of the UCLA Screenwriting program Richard Walter. Their uncle was stage and screen actor Jerry Jarrett. Raised in Queens, Walter was a graduate of New York's High School of the Performing Arts and the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre. She first acted in summer stock and her extensive subsequent career on the stage included productions both on- and off-Broadway.
On Broadway, Walter appeared in Peter Ustinov's "Photo Finish" (which earned her the Clarence Derwent Award as Most Promising Newcomer), "A Severed Head", "Advise and Consent", "Night Life" and Neil Simon's "Rumors". Off-Broadway, she acted in a 1986 Los Angeles Theater Center production of "Tartuffe" opposite Ron Leibman (to whom she was married from 1983 until his death in 2019).
After guesting on several TV series in the early and mid-1960s, Walter made her move to feature films where she attracted attention for her role as the brash Libby in Sidney Lumet's The Group (1966). This seemed to set the tone for her next screen personae as bitchy, difficult or dangerously vindictive women, the most memorable of which was Evelyn in Clint Eastwood's directorial debut film, Play Misty for Me (1971). This earned Walter a richly deserved Golden Globe nomination. Another stand-out role was Pat, the bored ex-glamour model wife of one racing driver (Brian Bedford) and troublesome girlfriend of another (James Garner) in Grand Prix (1966). Walter's numerous TV roles included the enchantress Morgan LeFay in the rarely seen telemovie Dr. Strange (1978). Of her many screen villainesses she later said: "those are the fun roles. They're juicy, much better than playing the vanilla ingénues".
By the 1980s, Walter had turned increasingly towards comedy, both on the big screen (The Flamingo Kid (1984)) and the small (Three's a Crowd (1984)). However, she never shied away from other genres, whether playing an EarthGov senator on the cult sci-fi series Babylon 5 (1993) or providing the voice for the leading female character in the animated sitcom Dinosaurs (1991). Walter received an Emmy Award for Best Dramatic Actress in the Ironside (1967) spin-off Amy Prentiss (1974) and was nominated for guest-starring roles in episodes of Trapper John, M.D. (1979) and The Streets of San Francisco (1972). She found a new audience among younger viewers as the devious matriarch Lucille Bluth in Arrested Development (2003).
Jessica Walter died in her sleep on March 24, 2021 from undisclosed causes at the age of 80. Riverside Memorial Chapel and Funeral Home in New York City completed her final arrangements. She was cremated and her ashes are with her daughter.Favorite Role(s): "Arrested Development".- Actress
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Catherine Keener is an American actress, Oscar-nominated for her roles in the independent films Being John Malkovich (1999) and Capote (2005). Acclaimed in her community for her quirky roles in independent film and mainstream such as The 40-Year-Old Virgin (2005), Keener got her start as a casting director in New York City.
Catherine Ann Keener was born in Miami, Florida, and was raised in Hialeah, FL. She is the daughter of Evelyn (Jamiel) and James Keener, who owned an auto shop. She is of Lebanese (mother) and English, Scottish, and German (father) descent. Keener attended Wheaton College in Massachusetts. She began taking acting classes when she was unable to sign up for a photography class. After graduating, Keener managed a McDonalds in New York City before becoming an assistant casting director and soon relocating to Los Angeles.
Not long after, Keener told her superior of her aspirations for acting and she landed a one-worded role as a waitress in About Last Night (1986). Two years later, she landed a role in a film called Survival Quest (1988), where she met her future husband, Dermot Mulroney. After struggling for years in the industry, Keener landed a role in an independent film, opposite the unknown Brad Pitt, in Johnny Suede (1991). Her ascent in independent film began as she starred in Living in Oblivion (1995) and Walking and Talking (1996) before her mainstream break with Being John Malkovich (1999) in 1999, which earned Keener her first Oscar nomination. Since then, Catherine Keener has starred in several critically acclaimed films.- Actress
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After working as early as the 1910s as a band vocalist, Hattie McDaniel debuted as a maid in The Golden West (1932). Her maid-mammy characters became steadily more assertive, showing up first in Judge Priest (1934) and becoming pronounced in Alice Adams (1935). In this one, directed by George Stevens and aided and abetted by star Katharine Hepburn, she makes it clear she has little use for her employers' pretentious status seeking. By The Mad Miss Manton (1938) she actually tells off her socialite employer Barbara Stanwyck and her snooty friends. This path extends into the greatest role of her career, Mammy in Gone with the Wind (1939). Here she is, in a number of ways, superior to most of the white folk surrounding her. From that point her roles unfortunately descended, with her characters becoming more and more menial. She played on the "Amos and Andy" and Eddie Cantor radio shows in the 1930s and 1940s; the title in her own radio show "Beulah" (1947-51), and the same part on TV (Beulah (1950)). Her part in Gone with the Wind (1939) won her the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress, the first African American actress to win an Academy Award, it was presented to her by Fay Bainter at a segregated ceremony, she had to sit at the back away from the rest of the cast.Favorite Role(s): "Gone With the Wind"! They could have made the movie from Mammy's perspective and it would have been just as good, if not better. I also recently noticed her in a tiny part in... hmm. Can't remember.- Actress
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Marilyn Monroe was an American actress, comedienne, singer, and model. Monroe is of English, Irish, Scottish and Welsh descent. She became one of the world's most enduring iconic figures and is remembered both for her winsome embodiment of the Hollywood sex symbol and her tragic personal and professional struggles within the film industry. Her life and death are still the subjects of much controversy and speculation.
She was born Norma Jeane Mortenson at the Los Angeles County Hospital on June 1, 1926. Her mother, Gladys Pearl (Monroe), was born in Piedras Negras, Coahuila, Mexico, to American parents from Indiana and Missouri, and was a film-cutter at Consolidated Film Industries. Marilyn's biological father has been established through DNA testing as Charles Stanley Gifford, who had been born in Newport, Rhode Island, to a family with deep roots in the state. Because Gladys was mentally and financially unable to care for young Marilyn, Gladys placed her in the care of a foster family, The Bolenders. Although the Bolender family wanted to adopt Marilyn, Gladys was eventually able to stabilize her lifestyle and took Marilyn back in her care when Marilyn was 7 years old. However, shortly after regaining custody of Marilyn, Gladys had a complete mental breakdown and was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic and was committed to a state mental hospital. Gladys spent the rest of her life going in and out of hospitals and rarely had contact with young Marilyn. Once Marilyn became an adult and celebrated as a film star, she paid a woman by the name of Inez Melson to look in on the institutionalized Gladys and give detailed reports of her progress. Gladys outlived her daughter, dying in 1984.
Marilyn was then taken in by Gladys' best friend Grace Goddard, who, after a series of foster homes, placed Marilyn into the Los Angeles Orphan's Home in 1935. Marilyn was traumatized by her experience there despite the Orphan's Home being an adequate living facility. Grace Goddard eventually took Marilyn back to live with her in 1937 although this stay did not last long as Grace's husband began molesting Marilyn. Marilyn went to live with Grace's Aunt Ana after this incident, although due to Aunt Ana's advanced age she could not care properly for Marilyn. Marilyn once again for the third time had to return to live with the Goddards. The Goddards planned to relocated and according to law, could not take Marilyn with them. She only had two choices: return to the orphanage or get married. Marilyn was only 16 years old.
She decided to marry a neighborhood friend named James Dougherty; he went into the military, she modeled, they divorced in 1946. She owned 400 books (including Tolstoy, Whitman, Milton), listened to Beethoven records, studied acting at the Actors' lab in Hollywood, and took literature courses at UCLA downtown. 20th Century Fox gave her a contract but let it lapse a year later. In 1948, Columbia gave her a six-month contract, turned her over to coach Natasha Lytess and featured her in the B movie Ladies of the Chorus (1948) in which she sang three numbers : "Every Baby Needs a Da Da Daddy", "Anyone Can Tell I Love You" and "The Ladies of the Chorus" with Adele Jergens (dubbed by Virginia Rees) and others. Joseph L. Mankiewicz saw her in a small part in The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and put her in All About Eve (1950) , resulting in 20th Century re-signing her to a seven-year contract. Niagara (1953) and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) launched her as a sex symbol superstar.
When she went to a supper honoring her in the The Seven Year Itch (1955) , she arrived in a red chiffon gown borrowed from the studio (she had never owned a gown). That same year, she married and divorced baseball great Joe DiMaggio (their wedding night was spent in Paso Robles, California). After The Seven Year Itch (1955) , she wanted serious acting to replace the sexpot image and went to New York's Actors Studio. She worked with director Lee Strasberg and also underwent psychoanalysis to learn more about herself. Critics praised her transformation in Bus Stop (1956) and the press was stunned by her marriage to playwright Arthur Miller . True to form, she had no veil to match her beige wedding dress so she dyed one in coffee; he wore one of the two suits he owned. They went to England that fall where she made The Prince and the Showgirl (1957) with Laurence Olivier , fighting with him and falling further prey to alcohol and pills. Two miscarriages and gynecological surgery followed. So had an affair with Yves Montand . Work on her last picture The Misfits (1961) , written for her by departing husband Miller, was interrupted by exhaustion. She was dropped from the unfinished Something's Got to Give (1962) due to chronic lateness and drug dependency.
On August 4, 1962, Marilyn Monroe's day began with threatening phone calls. Dr. Ralph Greenson, Marilyn's physician, came over the following day and quoted later in a document "Felt it was possible that Marilyn had felt rejected by some of the people she had been close to." Apart from being upset that her publicist slept too long, she seemed fine. Pat Newcombe, who had stayed the previous night at Marilyn's house, left in the early evening as did Greenson who had a dinner date. Marilyn was upset he couldn't stay, and around 7:30pm she telephoned him to say that her second husband's son had called her. Peter Lawford also called Marilyn, inviting her to dinner, but she declined. Lawford later said her speech was slurred. As the evening went on there were other phone calls, including one from Jose Belanos, who said he thought she sounded fine. According to the funeral directors, Marilyn died sometime between 9:30pm and 11:30pm. Her maid unable to raise her but seeing a light under her locked door, called the police shortly after midnight. She also phoned Ralph Greenson who, on arrival, could not break down the bedroom door. He eventually broke in through French windows and found Marilyn dead in bed. The coroner stated she had died from acute barbiturate poisoning, and it was a 'probable suicide' though many conspiracies would follow in the years after her death.The poster woman for beauty, charisma, and sex appeal - with a heavy side of mental illness and trauma history. I feel for her so much. <3- Actress
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Natalie Portman is the first person born in the 1980s to have won the Academy Award for Best Actress (for Black Swan (2010)).
Natalie was born Natalie Hershlag on June 9, 1981, in Jerusalem, Israel. She is the only child of Avner Hershlag, an Israeli-born doctor, and Shelley Stevens, an American-born artist (from Cincinnati, Ohio), who also acts as Natalie's agent. Her parents are both of Ashkenazi Jewish descent. Natalie's family left Israel for Washington, D.C., when she was still very young. After a few more moves, her family finally settled in New York, where she still lives to this day. She graduated with honors, and her academic achievements allowed her to attend Harvard University. She was discovered by an agent in a pizza parlor at the age of 11. She was pushed towards a career in modeling but she decided that she would rather pursue a career in acting. She was featured in many live performances, but she made her powerful film debut in the movie Léon: The Professional (1994) (aka "Léon"). Following this role Natalie won roles in such films as Heat (1995), Beautiful Girls (1996), and Mars Attacks! (1996).
It was not until 1999 that Natalie received worldwide fame as Queen Amidala in the highly anticipated US$431 million-grossing prequel Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999). She then she starred in two critically acclaimed comedy dramas, Anywhere But Here (1999) and Where the Heart Is (2000), followed by Closer (2004), for which she received an Oscar nomination. She reprised her role as Padme Amidala in the last two episodes of the Star Wars prequel trilogy: Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002) and Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (2005). She received an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in Black Swan (2010).
She received a second nomination for Best Actress, for playing Jacqueline Kennedy in Jackie (2016).Favorite Role(s): "Leon: The Professional" was one of my favorite movies when I was a kid. Her more recent stuff is often good, too ("Black Swan" comes to mind), but I'd love to see her in something that showcases the clearly brimming potential she showed as a child actress.- A resolute, blue-eyed brunette with attractive, slightly pinched features, Geraldine Brooks was born to a Dutch couple on October 29, 1925, in New York City. Her parents had a theater-based background -- father, James Stroock, owned a top costume company and mother, Bianca, was a costume designer and stylist. In dance shoes from age 2, her closer relatives were also extensively involved in theater -- one aunt being a former Ziegfeld Follies girl and another a contralto with the Metropolitan Opera. Growing up surrounding by these theatrical types, it was only natural that it rubbed off on her. She attended the Hunter Modeling School as a young teen and graduated from Julia Richman High School in 1942 as president of her drama club. Older sister, Gloria Stroock, also became an actress, primarily on TV.
In New York, Geraldine studied at the American Academy of Dramatic Art and the Neighborhood Playhouse before apprenticing in summer stock productions. In a pre-Broadway tryout of "Follow the Girls" in 1944, Geraldine subsequently went with the show to Broadway in May of that same year and enjoyed a nine-month run. Following her role as "Perdita" in "A Winter's Tale" at the Theatre Guild, she was signed by Warner Bros. and made her film debut promisingly as a second femme lead in the mystery thriller Cry Wolf (1947) starring Barbara Stanwyck and Errol Flynn. At this time, she shunned her odd-sounding last name of "Stroock" in favor of the more euphonious marquee name of "Brooks", which was the name of her father's costume company. Playing Flynn's cool, conniving niece who gives trouble to Stanwyck, she gave added suspense to the film. In her second movie, Possessed (1947), she is again at odds with another powerhouse star, this time Joan Crawford, but shows more sensitivity against the manic Crawford character in this film-noir chiller.
Geraldine moved to dramatic lead status with Embraceable You (1948) opposite Dane Clark, and played daughter to real wife-and-husband team Fredric March and Florence Eldridge in An Act of Murder (1948), a drama that dealt with the topic of euthanasia. Less impressive was the standard Warner Bros. "B" western The Younger Brothers (1949) and her MGM loanout appearance in Challenge to Lassie (1949). Floundering a bit at this time and failing to strike a star-making chord with audiences, she attempted a few continental film assignments, one in which she played Anna Magnani's younger sister, but grew quickly disillusioned there as well and returned to America.
Focusing instead on stage and TV, including a Broadway stint in "Time of the Cuckoo" starring Tony-winning Shirley Booth, Geraldine eventually went back to studying acting again. In 1956, she became a member of the Actor's Studio and became a strong exponent of its method style. Despite this renewed, enlightening acting technique, her film career found no momentum at all. In fact, she appeared in only two films in the oncoming years as brittle, harder-core ladies in Street of Sinners (1957) and Johnny Tiger (1966). Her greater notices were to be found guesting on various popular TV series. Particularly noteworthy were her roles on Perry Mason (1957), The Defenders (1961), Bus Stop (1961) (for which she earned an Emmy nomination), the pilot of Ironside (1967) and the last final climactic episode of The Fugitive (1963). A regular as Dan Dailey's secretary on the mildly received Faraday and Company (1973), she also appeared in the 70s episodes of Kung Fu (1972), Cannon (1971), Barnaby Jones (1973) and McMillan & Wife (1971), the last in which sister, Gloria Stroock, had a recurring role as Rock Hudson's secretary.
Geraldine's later theater included her Tony-nominated role in "Brightower" (1970) (despite it closing after only one performance) on Broadway and as wife "Golde" in the musical "Fiddler on the Roof". Her final movie part came in the rather ho-hum crime movie Mr. Ricco (1975) alongside Dean Martin. A short-lived series regular as the matriarch of The Dumplings (1976), a rare comedic venture for her, and a stage production of Jules Feiffer's "Hold Me!" in 1977 capped her capable but somewhat unsatisfying career. She deserved much better attention than she got, especially in films. Divorced from TV writer Herbert Sargent after only three years (1958-1961), she married author Budd Schulberg (best known for his screenplay of On the Waterfront (1954)), in 1964. The couple moved to Los Angeles and opened a writers' workshop together for the underprivileged. She also collaborated with Schulberg on the book Swan Watch (1975), a study on the elegant birds in which she also took photographs. In addition, she wrote poetry for children although she herself never had any. Sadly, Geraldine died in 1977 at age 51 of a heart attack while battling cancer, thus depriving the entertainment industry of a valuable talent. She was survived by her husband, mother and sister.Favorite Role(s): So lovely and charming in Possessed (1947). She's got some junk in the trunk too. - Baybi Day studied Performance Art and contemporary ballet at the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore Maryland. Upon moving to NYC in 1973 at the age of 16 she continued in her study of ballet and modern dance at the Alvin Ailey dance school primarily under Master Robert Christopher, of the Stuttgart Ballet Co. She later studied Jazz dance under Phil Black and also studied intermittently at the Joffrey Ballet school while participating in acting classes at HB Studios.
Abel Ferrara cast Baybi Day for the female lead role of Driller Killer along with her rival Carolyn Mars.
Baybi Day has also fashion modeled and performed on off Broadway venues in New York City including assistant with the Great Scott its Magic Review in live performance in the greater New York area.
Baybi Day has parented two boys. Her first sons father Tommy Santora ( the Attacker) in Driller Killer.
Baybi Day is writing a book and partial biography from her New York loft residence under her surname B.D. Bergman. (2013)Favorite Role(s): As a punk rock... well, Barbie, in "The Driller Killer" (1979). - Actress
- Soundtrack
The personification of class and cultivation on the movie screen, comely actress Kay Johnson forsook a prominent stage and film career in order to play wife to actor John Cromwell and mother to their two children. Still and all, the elegant actress, reminiscent in looks and style to that of Irene Dunne and Judith Anderson, contributed to a number of important '30s and early '40s films and is deserving of a richer place in Hollywood history than has been acknowledged thus far.
Born Catherine Townsend Johnson, the daughter of a Michigan architect (Thomas R. Johnson--who worked in the firm of Cass Gilbert the architect of the impressive Woolworth Building in NYC), Kay received her early education at the Drew Seminary for Young Women and later, intent on becoming an actress, studied at Sargent's Dramatic School of the American Academy of Dramatic Art (AADA). Her first professional role came with the Theatre Guild's Chicago production of "R.U.R." in the role of Helena, a robot. From there she appeared on Broadway in "Go West, Young Man" and continued on with stage roles in "The Morning After," "One of the Family," "No Trespassing" and "Crime".
Kay met actor/producer/director Cromwell while she was appearing in the play "A Free Soul" in 1928 and he was involved in another play. They married later that year (October) and moved to California, where he directed her in a stage production of "The Silver Cord". Her showy role as Christine earned the attention of none other than Cecil B. DeMille, who cast her in his film Dynamite (1929) opposite Charles Bickford and Conrad Nagel. While the movie received lukewarm reviews, Kay, who suffered from appendicitis and had surgery during filming, was instantly noticed. She continued on with The Ship from Shanghai (1930), This Mad World (1930) (directed by William C. de Mille, the brother of C.B.), The Spoilers (1930) (opposite Gary Cooper), the title role as Madam Satan (1930) (again for C.B. DeMille), and Billy the Kid (1930) starring Johnny Mack Brown as the legendary gunslinger.
Kay alternated between stage and film parts in the following years. She toured with another production of "The Silver Cord" and appeared as Roxanne opposite Richard Bennett's lead in "Cyrano de Bergerac". Later she was on stage in "When Ladies Meet" and "Living Dangerously". On screen Kay appeared in the mediocre films The Single Sin (1931) and The Spy (1931) before glowing onscreen in such fare as American Madness (1932) and This Man Is Mine (1934), the latter directed by husband Cromwell.
Kay's most noteworthy career assignment came with the screen role of Nora in W. Somerset Maugham's classic Of Human Bondage (1934)--again, directed by her husband Cromwell--with Leslie Howard and Bette Davis completing the romantic triangle. Cromwell went on to direct Kay on screen again in Village Tale (1935), Jalna (1935) and Son of Fury: The Story of Benjamin Blake (1942). Other notable Kay Johnson films included White Banners (1938), Mr. Lucky (1943) and her last, The Adventures of Mark Twain (1944). Her final acting appearance was in a prime role opposite Ralph Bellamy in a stage production of "State of the Union" in 1945.
Kay never aggressively pursued her career, instead focusing on her marriage to Cromwell and the raising of their two children. The couple's first child was adopted in 1938; their second son, born in January of 1940, became the noted character actor James Cromwell. Following her divorce from Cromwell in the late '40s, Kay decided to remain out of the limelight. She died just short of her 71st birthday at her Waterford, CT., home on November 17, 1975, long forgotten.Favorite Role(s): Madam Satan! which I really need to see soon... and Norah in "Of Human Bondage" (1934), an early Bette Davis classic.- Actress
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- Additional Crew
Monica Vitti was born on 3 November 1931 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. She was an actress and writer, known for L'Avventura (1960), Red Desert (1964) and L'Eclisse (1962). She was married to Roberto Russo. She died on 2 February 2022 in Rome, Lazio, Italy.Favorite Role(s): I've only just dipped into Italian cinema, and I'm currently about 4/5s of the way through "L'Eclisse" (1962), in which she is equally beautiful stone-faced as she is while smiling in delight at her dapper, money-obsessed, aggressively boring suitor.
Aside from the racism and loneliness/relationship blues, the movie is exquisitely beautiful - a study in contrasts and the way things move toward and away from each other in perpetuity; the way people things only exist at all in relation to one another, and how the other (or lack of) can define us.- Actress
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The daughter of a stage entertainer, New York-born actress Genevieve Tobin started treading the boards as a child and appeared in the role of Little Eva in the silent short Uncle Tom's Cabin (1910). Her older brother George Tobin and younger sister Vivian Tobin also became stage and film actors. By her teens Genevieve was appearing as a sparkling blonde ingénue on 20s Broadway, steadily gaining notice with her chic looks and vivacious personality. Considered a medium-weight talent, she nevertheless tackled such roles as Cordelia in "King Lear" (1923) in addition to her usual frothy comedies and musicals such as "Polly Preferred" (1923). Following her New York performance in Cole Porter's musical "Fifty Million Frenchmen" in 1929 in which she introduced the song "You Do Something to Me," Genevieve started focusing squarely on films, particularly screwball farce, starting with a couple of glamorous leading lady roles in the early talkies A Lady Surrenders (1930) and Free Love (1930), one a heavy drama and the other a lighter comedy both co-starring Conrad Nagel. Genevieve moved into second leads as the 1930s flew by, however, often playing the arch or self-involved 'other woman' role. She appeared in fine form as the problematic third wheel in One Hour with You (1932) with Maurice Chevalier and Jeanette MacDonald; Goodbye Again (1933) co-starring Warren William and Joan Blondell; Kiss and Make-Up (1934) with Cary Grant and Helen Mack; The Goose and the Gander (1935) with Kay Francis and George Brent; and, her last, No Time for Comedy (1940) which paired up James Stewart with Rosalind Russell, and was also directed by her husband (and former stage actor) William Keighley. Genevieve abandoned her career for high society after marrying Keighley and never looked back -- her marriage lasting 46 years until his death in 1984 at age 90+. Genevieve herself would live to become a nonagenarian, dying of natural causes in 1995 in Pasadena, California.- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Mary Elizabeth Winstead is an actress known for her versatile work in a variety of film and television projects. Possibly most known for her role as Ramona Flowers in Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010), she has also starred in critically acclaimed independent films such as Smashed (2012), for which she received an Independent Spirit Award nomination, as well as genre fare like Final Destination 3 (2006) and Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof (2007).
Winstead was born in Rocky Mount, North Carolina but largely raised in Sandy, Utah, which is where she discovered a love for the performing arts. She grew up training to be a ballerina and attended the Joffrey Ballet School training program at the age of 12. It was also around this time that she began to pursue a career in acting and soon started working steadily in television and film.
Winstead is also a recording artist and performs under the name "Got a Girl" alongside producer Dan the Automotor.Death Proof, 10 Cloverfield Lane, Fargo S3.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Helen Chandler was born in Charleston, South Carolina on February 1, 1906. By the late 1920s she had become a hugely popular actress on the New York stage. That Hollywood should beckon was inevitable, but unfortunately whatever quality made Chandler a success on the stage did not survive the transition to film. Chandler is probably best remembered by movie fans as the fragile Mina, pursued and nearly victimized by Bela Lugosi in the original Dracula (1931). In 1937 Chandler left Hollywood to return to the stage, but a dependency on alcohol and sleeping pills haunted her subsequent career, and in 1940 she was committed to a sanitarium. Ten years later she was disfigured in a fire, apparently caused by smoking in bed. Helen Chandler died (following surgery for a bleeding ulcer) on April 30, 1965. Her body was cremated, however, as no relative ever came forward to claim the remains, her ashes reposed in the vault (off limits to visitors) of the Chapel of the Pines Crematory in Los Angeles. After an online fundraising effort led by Hollywood Graveyard YouTube channel creator Arthur Dark, Chandler's ashes were reinurned in the Cathedral Mausoleum of Hollywood Forever Cemetery on July 13, 2023.As Mina in "Dracula" (1931).- Actress
- Soundtrack
The sultry, versatile, petite (5' 4") beauty Sherilyn Fenn was born Sheryl Ann Fenn in Detroit, Michigan, into a family of musicians. The youngest of three children, her mother, Arlene Quatro, played keyboard in rock bands, her aunt is rock-star Suzi Quatro, and her grandfather, Art Quatro, was a jazz musician. Her father, Leo Fenn, was the manager of such bands as The Pleasure Seekers (the all-girl band formed by the Quatro sisters), Alice Cooper, and The Billion Dollar Babies. Sherilyn's ancestry includes Irish, Italian, Hungarian, German, and Bohemian Czech.
Sherilyn traveled a lot with her divorced mother and two older brothers before the family settled in Los Angeles when she was seventeen. Fenn, who says herself she's demure didn't want to start with a new school again and soon enrolled at the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute.
Fenn began her career with a number of B-movies including The Wild Life (1984) (alongside Chris Penn), skater film Thrashin' (1986) (opposite Josh Brolin) and teen-fantasy movie The Wraith (1986) (opposite Charlie Sheen). She had a memorable part in the cult teen-comedy Just One of the Guys (1985) in which she tries to seduce a teenage girl disguised as a boy, played by Joyce Hyser. Fenn landed her first starring role, as an engaged heiress to an old Southern family experiencing her sexual awakening in Zalman King's erotic drama film Two Moon Junction (1988), after which she said she wanted to hide for a year. Fenn won her most outstanding role and made an indelible impression on the public when she was cast by David Lynch and Mark Frost as the tantalizing Audrey Horne, the high-school femme fatale from the critically acclaimed TV series Twin Peaks (1990). The series ran from 1990 to 1991, and the character of Audrey was one of the most popular with fans, in particular for her unrequited love for FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper (played by Kyle MacLachlan) and her style from the '50s (with her saddle shoes, plaid skirts and tight sweaters). Sherilyn made a memorable impression as the cherry stem-twisting siren. This was her breakout role; even now she says of her Twin Peaks (1990) experience: "It still makes me feel kind of proud and special to be part of something like that". In the show's second season, when the idea of pairing Audrey and Cooper was abandoned, Audrey was paired with other characters like Bobby Briggs (Dana Ashbrook) and John Justice Wheeler (Billy Zane). Sherilyn hit cult status when Lynch filmed her dancing on Angelo Badalamenti's music and with another memorable scene in which her character knotted a cherry stem with her tongue.
Shortly after shooting Twin Peaks' pilot episode, David Lynch gave her a small but impressive part in Wild at Heart (1990), as a girl injured in a car wreck, obsessed by the contents of her purse, opposite Nicolas Cage and Laura Dern. According to Fenn, the turning point in her career was when she met veteran acting coach Roy London in 1990. She credits him with instilling confidence and newfound enthusiasm.
After two nominations (Emmy and Golden Globe) and covers for Rolling Stone and Playboy magazines, Fenn was propelled to stardom and became a major sex symbol. She was chosen as one of People magazine's "50 Most Beautiful People in the World", was named one of the "10 Most Beautiful Women in the World" by Us magazine, and one of the "100 Sexiest Women in the World" by FHM magazine. Fenn's classic looks - with her lily-white skin, vertiginous boomerang eyebrows, beauty mark next to her left eye and topaz eyes - were highlighted by renowned photographers like George Hurrell Sr., Steven Meisel, and Bettina Rheims, and led her to be compared to the ones like Marilyn Monroe and Ava Gardner. Fenn has had an eclectic career with a significant body of work following Twin Peaks (1990). She chose to focus on widening her range of roles and was determined to avoid typecasting. She turned down the Audrey Horne spin-off series that was offered to her, and unlike most of the cast, chose not to return for the 1992 prequel movie Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992), as she was then shooting Of Mice and Men (1992). She proved her mettle as an actress with varied roles in neo-noir black comedy Desire and Hell at Sunset Motel (1991) (as a sultry femme fatale, opposite Whip Hubley and David Hewlett), huis-clos Diary of a Hitman (1991) (the directorial debut of her acting coach Roy London, in which she plays a fragile mother who confronts hitman Forest Whitaker), John Mackenzie's fictionalized biopic Ruby (1992), (as stripper Sheryl Ann DuJean, a Marilyn Monroe look-alike fictional character, who is a composite of several real-life women from Jack Ruby and president John Kennedy's entourage; opposite 'Danny Aiello' and Arliss Howard), romantic comedy Three of Hearts (1993) (as Kelly Lynch and William Baldwin's love interest), Carl Reiner's 1940s detective parody Fatal Instinct (1993) (as Armand Assante's lovesick secretary and Sean Young and Kate Nelligan's rival) and Showtime's biblical Slave of Dreams (1995), directed by Robert M. Young (as Potiphar's seductive wife Zulaikha, opposite Adrian Pasdar and Edward James Olmos, and produced by Dino De Laurentiis).
A highlight of Fenn's film career is Gary Sinise's film adaptation of Of Mice and Men (1992), in which she brought nuance to the role of a seductive and lonely country wife, desperately in need to talk to somebody, opposite Sinise and John Malkovich. In 1993, Fenn teamed up with David Lynch's daughter Jennifer Lynch and starred in her directorial debut Boxing Helena (1993) as a haughty seductress forced to live in a box after her limbs were amputated by love-obsessed surgeon Julian Sands in an effort to possess her (a role Kim Basinger backed out of). Both Lynch and Fenn were proud of their work in it but the film - which was overshadowed by the lawsuits against Kim Basinger after she dropped out - ultimately was a critical and commercial failure. Another outstanding performance was in NBC's miniseries Liz: The Elizabeth Taylor Story (1995). During the shooting, Fenn fought to keep integrity in the script. Her priority was to respectfully and accurately portray Taylor, and she supported the original screenwriter's effort to concentrate on Taylor the person, not the legend. The same year she starred in an episode of Tales from the Crypt (1989) directed by Robert Zemeckis, alongside Isabella Rossellini and John Lithgow, as the lover of Humphrey Bogart, who appeared in the episode via CGI special effects. She went on to star in independent films that have been well received on the festival circuit like Jon Harmon Feldman's Lovelife (1997) (as a low self-esteemed waitress, along with Bruce Davison, Jon Tenney, Carla Gugino and Saffron Burrows), romantic comedy Just Write (1997) (as the dream actress of Hollywood tour bus driver Jeremy Piven, who mistakes him for a famous screenwriter) and Adrian Pasdar's neo-noir directorial debut Cement (2000), a contemporary re-telling of "Othello", in which she played a tempting but imprudent femme fatale, alongside Chris Penn, Jeffrey Wright and Henry Czerny.
Tired of Hollywood, Fenn contemplated starting a European career when she starred opposite Ray Winstone in the British psychological drama and huis-clos Darkness Falls (1999) (as a wealthy, neglected wife, sequestered with her husband by a man determined to understand the events that led to his wife ending up in a coma). She eventually decided to return to the United-States and gained newfound enthusiasm with the lead role in Showtime's dark comedy Rude Awakening (1998) as Billie Frank, an alcoholic ex-soap actress who struggles with her self-destructive habits. Based upon creator/executive producer Claudia Lonow's experience, the series ran from 1998 to 2001 and co-starred Lynn Redgrave, Jonathan Penner and Mario Van Peebles. Following Rude Awakening (1998), Fenn's film and television credits have included Showtime's family comedy Off Season (2001), directed by Bruce Davison (along with Hume Cronyn, Rory Culkin, Adam Arkin and Davison; as a singer who takes care of her orphaned nephew), Matthew Ryan Hoge's The United States of Leland (2003) (as a woman who represents happiness and joie de vivre to Ryan Gosling), Showtime's Cavedweller (2004) (2004, along with Kyra Sedgwick and directed by Lisa Cholodenko), Geretta Geretta's Whitepaddy (2006) (opposite Lisa Bonet and Hill Harper, as a woman who struggles with her dysfunctional family after she reluctantly returned home and tries to fit in with her new neighborhood that has become predominantly black), Emily Skopov's Novel Romance (2006) (as a pregnancy shop owner, opposite Traci Lords and Paul Johansson), psychological thriller Presumed Dead (2006) (as a female detective working on a missing person case, who has to outwit crime novelist Duncan Regehr in order to get to the truth), and The Dukes of Hazzard: The Beginning (2007) (as a flirtatious version of Lulu Hogg).
Fenn has appeared along with Rob Estes and Milo Ventimiglia in a 2003 episode of Amy Sherman-Palladino's Gilmore Girls (2000), which was the pilot for a California-set spin-off, eventually dropped by the network. Sherman-Palladino brought her back in the series with a different part as Scott Patterson's ex-girlfriend and protective mother to his daughter (2006-2007). Fenn had previously had recurring parts on Dawson's Creek (1998), (2002, as Joshua Jackson's seductive boss) and Boston Public (2000) (2003-2004, as a porn star turned tutor). Other notable guest appearances have included 21 Jump Street (1987) (opposite her then-fiancé Johnny Depp), Friends (1994) (1997, as Matthew Perry's wooden-legged girlfriend), The Outer Limits (1995) (2001, as a duplicated scientist), Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999) (2002, as a manipulative actress), and The 4400 (2004) (2005, as Jean DeLynn Baker, a 4400 who has the ability to grow deadly toxin-emitting spores on her hands).
Fenn's interest in directing and children led her to step behind the camera to direct in 2006 a documentary film about the child enrichment program CosmiKids and Judy Julin, the program's founder. She subsequently joined its executive team as executive director of the film and television division.
On set, Sherilyn is noted for having a quirky sense of humor and a joie de vivre. Off-screen, Sherilyn is proud of the friendship she has maintained with her ex-hubby Toulouse Holliday, a musician and film technician. Sherilyn lives with her son, Myles, and two cats: Ophelia and Redmond. Sherilyn practices meditative kundalini yoga, and every room in her house has feng shui elements-- crystals in one corner, water in another. Sherilyn enjoys biking, swimming and cooking, and of course being a mom: "After I had my son, I found life much funnier and brighter".Audrey, Twin Peaks- Actress
- Additional Crew
- Casting Department
"Dead, wrapped in plastic" is how Sheryl Lee entered onto the scene as Laura Palmer, the doomed homecoming queen on the cult TV series Twin Peaks (1990).
Lee was born April 27, 1967 in Germany. She grew up in Boulder, Colorado, spending much of her youth studying dance before knee injuries ended her hope of becoming a dancer. She began acting in school plays, graduated from Fairview High School, and attended the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in Pasadena, California. Lee also spent time at the North Carolina School of Arts, the National Conservatory Theater in Denver, and Colorado University before pursuing stage work in Seattle, Washington.
Here Lee landed the role of Laura Palmer, and she later appeared on Twin Peaks (1990) as Laura's cousin, Madeleine Ferguson. Madeleine was a brunette and wore glasses, but of course bore a striking resemblance to her late relative. Lee worked with Twin Peaks (1990) mastermind David Lynch again on the film, Wild at Heart (1990), and resurrected Laura Palmer one last time for Lynch's Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992).
Lee has gone on to have a long and adventurous career since then. Appearances have included the Stuart Sutcliffe biopic Backbeat (1994), the John Carpenter film Vampires (1998), and the TV series L.A. Doctors (1998).Who Killed Laura Palmer?- Actress
- Director
- Producer
Born and raised in Sparks, Nevada, Mädchen Amick was encouraged by her parents to follow her own creative instincts where she learned the skill of playing the piano, bass, violin and guitar as well as being able to do tap, ballet, jazz and modern dancing. In 1987 at the age of 16, she traveled to Los Angeles to pursue a career in acting.Shelly, Twin Peaks- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Naomi Ellen Watts was born on September 28, 1968 in Shoreham, England to Myfanwy Edwards "Miv" (Roberts), an antiques dealer and costume/set designer, and Peter Watts (Peter Anthony Watts), Pink Floyd's road manager. Her maternal grandfather was Welsh. Her father died when she was seven and she followed her mother and brother around England until she was 14 and they finally settled in Australia, homeland of her maternal grandmother. When they arrived, she coaxed her mother to let her take acting classes. After bit parts in commercials, she landed her first role in For Love Alone (1986). Naomi met her best friend Nicole Kidman when they both auditioned for a bikini commercial and shared a taxi ride home. In 1991, Naomi starred with Kidman in the sleeper hit Flirting (1991), directed by John Duigan. Naomi continued her career by starring in the Australian Brides of Christ (1991) co-starring Oscar-winners Russell Crowe and Brenda Fricker.
In 1993, she worked with John Duigan again in Wide Sargasso Sea (1993) and director George Miller in Gross Misconduct (1993). Tank Girl (1995), in 1995, an adaptation of the comic book was a cult hit, starred Naomi as "Jet Girl", but it didn't do at the box-office or do much for her career. Watts continued to take insignificant parts in movies including the much forgotten film Children of the Corn: The Gathering (1996). It wasn't until David Lynch cast her in the critically acclaimed film Mulholland Drive (2001) that she began to become noticed. Her part as an aspiring actress showed her strong acting ability and wide range and earned her much respect, as much as to say by some that she was overlooked for a Oscar nomination that year. Stardom finally came to Naomi in the surprise hit The Ring (2002), which grossed over $100,000,000 at the box-office and starred Watts as an investigative reporter hunting down the truth behind several mysterious deaths seemingly caused by a video tape. While the movie did not fare well with the critics, it launched her into the spotlight. In 2003, she starred in Alejandro González Iñárritu's 21 Grams (2003) which earned her - what some say is a much overdue Oscar nomination and brought others to call her one of the best in her generation of actors. The same year, she was nominated for 21 Grams (2003), Naomi was chosen to play "Ann Darrow" in director Peter Jackson's King Kong (2005) which took her to New Zealand for a five month shoot. Watts completed her first comedy in I Heart Huckabees (2004) for director David O. Russell, playing a superficial spokes model - a break from her usual intense and dramatic roles she is known for.
In 2005, she reprized her role as the protective-mother-reporter "Rachel Keller" in The Ring Two (2005). The movie, released in March, opened to $35,000,000 at the box office in the first weekend and established her as a box-office draw. Also in 2005, it was decided that her independent movie Ellie Parker (2001) would be re-released in late 2005 after its success at resurfacing at the Sundance Film Festival. The movie, which Naomi also produced, features her in the title role and is a bit biographical, but yet exaggerated take of the life of a struggling actress as she comes to Hollywood and encounters nightmares of the profession (it also features Watts' own beat-up Honda which she travels around in). In 2006, she starred with Edward Norton in The Painted Veil (2006). In July of 2007, Naomi gave birth to a boy, Alexander Pete (Sasha Schreiber) in Los Angeles with Liev Schreiber. Since then her career choices have gathered even more critical acclaim with starring roles roles in German director Michael Haneke's American remake of his thriller Funny Games (2007), David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises (2007), and the action-thriller, The International (2009), released in February 2009. In mid-2008, Watts announced she was expecting her second child with Schreiber and gave birth to second son Samuel Kai Schreiber, in New York on December 13.Janey-E, Twin Peaks- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
"Amazing Grace" Zabriskie was born in New Orleans, Louisiana. She wrote her own original poetry, then performed at coffee shops and various artist hangouts in Atlanta. She was also a wonderful silk-screen printmaker. She moved to Hollywood and made her acting debut in Norma Rae (1979). She went on to appear in over 80 movies. She gave an acclaimed performance as Mrs. Ames in East of Eden (1981), the adaptation of John Steinbeck's novel. Grace appeared in the highly acclaimed and Oscar-nominated An Officer and a Gentleman (1982) and The Big Easy (1986), set in her beloved New Orleans. She worked with producer and director David Lynch, and was a series regular in the cult favorite Twin Peaks (1990) as Sarah Palmer, the part with which she is most often identified. She also appeared in Lynch's Wild at Heart (1990) the same year. She has played a wide variety of roles, and gave a terrific performance in the Oscar-nominated Fried Green Tomatoes (1991) and showed great character depth as the lonely and despondent widow in The Passion of Darkly Noon (1995).
Grace's more recent roles were in the zany Sparkler (1997) and in the big-name feature No Good Deed (2002), based on a short story by Dashiell Hammett. A woman of many talents, she is currently creating her own original paintings, unique sculptures and woodwork art that can be viewed in Los Angeles galleries.
Her visual arts, which include creating lamps or "sculptures with light" as she calls them, are available from the L.A.-based ArtHaus.Sarah Palmer, Twin Peaks- Actress
- Writer
Kimmy Robertson began her career as a ballet dancer but her distinctive sense of humor and quirky style brought her to the attention of an agent who happened to worked in the same office as her ballet company. After at first being unsure about becoming an actor, Kimmy was then hired for the first role she auditioned for in the teen comedy The Last American Virgin (1982). She then returned to ballet but appeared in the occasional film such as Honey, I Shrunk the Kids (1989) and My Mom's a Werewolf (1989) before being cast as the Sheriff's ditsy secretary, Lucy, in the groundbreaking TV series Twin Peaks (1990). Creators Mark Frost and David Lynch recognized Kimmy's comedic talent and exploited it by encouraging her to ad-lib her lines, some of which turned into the funniest moments of the series. Since then, she has appeared in such films as Disney's Beauty and the Beast (1991), Speed 2: Cruise Control (1997) and Stuart Little (1999).Lucy, Twin Peaks- Music Artist
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An out-of-wedlock child, Eartha Kitt was born in the cotton fields of South Carolina. Kitt's mother was a sharecropper of African-American and Cherokee Native American descent. Her father's identity is unknown. Given away by her mother, she arrived in Harlem at age nine. At 15, she quit high school to work in a Brooklyn factory. As a teenager, Kitt lived in friends' homes and in the subways. However, by the 1950s, she had sung and danced her way out of poverty and into the spotlight: performing with the Katherine Dunham Dance Troupe on a European tour, soloing at a Paris nightclub and becoming the toast of the Continent. Orson Welles called her "the most exciting girl in the world". She also spoke out on hard issues. She took over the role of Catwoman for the third and final season of the television series Batman (1966), replacing Julie Newmar. Eartha Kitt died of colon cancer in her home in Weston, Connecticut, on Christmas Day 2008.Meow... purrrrrr ; )- Actress
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The daughter of a noted surgeon, Dana Wynter was born Dagmar Winter in Berlin, Germany, and grew up in England. When she was 16 her father went to Morocco, reportedly to operate on a woman who wouldn't allow anyone else to attend her; he visited friends in Southern Rhodesia, fell in love with it and brought his daughter and her stepmother to live with him there. Wynter later enrolled as a pre-med student at Rhodes University (the only girl in a class of 150 boys) and also dabbled in theatrics, playing the blind girl in a school production of "Through a Glass Darkly", in which she says she was "terrible."
After a year-plus of studies, she returned to England and shifted gears, dropping her medical studies and turning to an acting career. She was appearing in a play in Hammersmith when an American agent told her he wanted to represent her. She left for New York on November 5, 1953, "Guy Fawkes Day," a holiday commemorating a 1605 attempt to blow up the Parliament building. "There were all sorts of fireworks going off," she later told an interviewer, "and I couldn't help thinking it was a fitting send-off for my departure to the New World."
Wynter had more success in New York than in London, acting on TV (Robert Montgomery Presents (1950), Suspense (1949), Studio One (1948), among others) and the stage before "going Hollywood" a short time later. The willowy, dark-eyed actress appeared in over a dozen films, worked in "Golden Age" television (such as Playhouse 90 (1956)) and even co-starred in her own short-lived TV series, the globe-trotting The Man Who Never Was (1966). Married and divorced from well-known Hollywood lawyer Greg Bautzer, Wynter, once called Hollywood's "oasis of elegance", divided her time between homes in California and County Wicklow, Ireland until her death.Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). She's all charm school grace, beautiful frame and tanned skin - like a brunette version of Grace Kelly in To Catch a Thief, who was, imo, one of the most beautiful women ever to be captured on film.- Actress
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Karen Jane Allen was born in Carrollton, rural southern Illinois, to Patricia (Howell), a teacher, and Carroll Thompson Allen, an FBI agent. She spent her first 10 years traveling around the country with her parents and two sisters. She was always "the new girl in school." Acting did not really cross Allen's mind until she was in her early 20s, when she saw a Jerzy Grotowski theater production that impressed her so much, she instantly decided to give it a shot. She trained as a classical actress and enrolled at the Actors Studio and with Lee Strasberg in New York City. During this period, she made several student films and directed and acted in several plays. In 1976, she made her first film appearance in the award-winning small film The Whidjitmaker (1976).
Her first major film role came as Katy in 1978's National Lampoon's National Lampoon's Animal House (1978), which became one of the biggest hits of the year, obtained "classic" status, and launched a whole host of young "hot" stars. However, shortly after National Lampoon's Animal House (1978) opened, Allen was struck by a rare and dangerous eyesight condition called keratoconjunctivitis. Luckily, the condition subsided and Allen could continue her dramatic rise to the top. Lead roles in cult favorites like The Wanderers (1979) and the controversial thriller Cruising (1980) followed, as did smaller parts as in Woody Allen's Manhattan (1979). However, it was her performance in Rob Cohen's A Small Circle of Friends (1980), as well as her previously mentioned turn in National Lampoon's Animal House (1978), that caught the eye of a certain Steven Spielberg. He then cast her as the feisty heroine and co-star of Harrison Ford in his big-budget blockbuster Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), which became a huge hit in 1981-82 and is regarded by many film buffs as the greatest action-adventure film ever made.
Following the huge success of Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Allen chose to spend more than two years out of the limelight, concentrating on smaller, more personal projects. She won a major award for her performances on Broadway, won critical acclaim for her portrayal of Abra in the hugely successful ABC production of East of Eden (1981), and had parts in two smaller films: Alan Parker's Shoot the Moon (1982) and Split Image (1982), co-starring James Woods and Peter Fonda. She returned to the mainstream in 1984 with Until September (1984) and Starman (1984), co-starring Jeff Bridges and directed by John Carpenter (of Halloween (1978) fame), but once again decided to leave the limelight for a couple of years to do more stage work and some troubled indie films. While Allen has worked almost constantly since then, giving notable performances in Paul Newman's screen adaptation of The Glass Menagerie (1987), the Christmas hit Scrooged (1988), and Steven Soderbergh's underrated King of the Hill (1993), she has not been able to scale the same dizzy heights as the early 1980s hits. Most of her lead roles in feature films since Starman (1984) have not been that well-received (Animal Behavior (1989), Ghost in the Machine (1993), and The Turning (1992) among them). However, she has been seen to good effect on TV in such films as Challenger (1990), in which she portrayed tragic schoolteacher Christa McAuliffe, and All the Winters That Have Been (1997), co-starring Richard Chamberlain.
She has also made special guest star appearances on such shows as Law & Order (1990), Knots Landing (1979), and Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1985), and in several TV movies, including Hostile Advances: The Kerry Ellison Story (1996) and Secret Weapon (1990). She also played the lead in the CBS series The Road Home (1994). Karen Allen was married to soap star Kale Browne (with whom she co-starred in 'Til There Was You (1997)) in 1988 and they have a son, Nicholas. Apart from acting, Allen is also an accomplished singer, songwriter, and musician. She played in a band with Kathleen Turner, and recorded a duet with Jeff Bridges for the Starman (1984) soundtrack album.
She also writes plays, screenplays, and poetry; owns her own Ashtanga yoga enterprise; and spends time at her Berkshire Mountains farm or Upper West Side Manhattan townhouse. The classically trained actress also has a screenplay called "The Second Coming," which is about to be made into a movie. Most recently she has starred opposite Peter Coyote in The Basket (1999), and appeared in the blockbuster The Perfect Storm (2000), in which she co-starred with George Clooney, Mark Wahlberg, and Diane Lane. In addition to these, she is working on Shaka Zulu: The Citadel (2001) and recently made an independent film, In the Bedroom (2001). Karen Allen is undoubtedly one of the most talented, ambitious, and versatile actresses of the last 20 years. In many ways, her own choices to "go back to theater and smaller projects" are the only things that have really stopped her being a major, major star. Allen was voted one of the most beautiful women in the world in 1983, and is a naturally attractive lady - who often plays characters significantly younger than herself. She also often plays unglamorous types - and there is no one better at portraying real, human, and wholly believable people.- Producer
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Jo-Issa Rae Diop credited professionally as Issa Rae, is an American actress, writer, producer, and comedian. Rae first garnered attention for her work on the YouTube web series Awkward Black Girl. Since 2011, Rae has continued to develop her YouTube channel, which features various short films, web series, and other content created by black people.- Actress
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Shelley Alexis Duvall was born in Fort Worth, Texas, the first child to Bobbie Ruth (Massengale, 1929-2020), a real estate broker, and Robert Richardson Duvall (1919-1994), a lawyer. At the time of her birth, her mother was visiting her grandmother in Fort Worth, though Duvall was raised in Houston. During her childhood, Shelley's mother humorously gave Shelley the nickname "Manic Mouse", because she would often run around her house and tip over furniture. Shelley however was more than a mouse, but rather quite the little artist. Her favorite thing to do when she was very young was draw. She also has three brothers: Scott, Shane, and Stewart.
Shelley graduated from Waltrip High School in Texas and at first became a cosmetics salesperson. It was in 1970 when Shelley was discovered by talent scouts at a local party. Director Robert Altman wanted to cast Shelley in a film that he was making during the time. Shelley had experience in acting in high school plays at the time and took Altman's offer and she appeared in her first film Brewster McCloud. Altman was so fascinated by her performance that she appeared in his next films including: McCabe and Mrs. Miller in 1971, Thieves Like Us in 1974, and Nashville in 1975. Aside from these three successful films, Duvall's acting blossomed in her leading role as Mille Lammoroux in 3 Women in 1977. Duvall's acting was so superb that she won Best Actress at the 1977 Cannes Film Festival. Shelley also starred as Bernice in Joan Micklin Silver's Bernice Bobs Her Hair in 1976, and had a cameo in Woody Allen's Annie Hall in 1977. In the same year, Shelley also hosted an episode of Saturday Night Live.
When the 1980s hit, Duvall's career was just beginning. She is famously known for playing the role of "Wendy Torrance" in Stanley Kubrick's The Shining with Jack Nicholson. During the making of this film, Kubrick psychologically tormented Duvall, causing her immense stress and affecting her mental state. He would often ignore her entirely during filming or would put in her situations which caused her immense fear and distress. The most obvious example is when Kubrick shot the famous "baseball bat scene" with Duvall and Nicholson 127 times, which is the world record for most number of takes in any film set.
In January of 1979, Robert Altman would offer Duvall yet another role in one of his films. Only the role was a certain role that Altman believed she was born to play. That certain role was "Olive Oyl" in the real life version of Popeye. Shelley was skeptical at first on accepting the role, due to bad memories as a child of negatively being called "Olive Oyl" in grade school. She fortunately decided to take the role and performed admirably. Shelley also sings several songs in this film. The most famous ones would be "He's Large" and "He Needs Me" which also appeared in the film Punch Drunk Love.
As the 1980s rolled on, Shelley's career never slowed down. She appeared as a supporting actress in Terry Gilliam's Time Bandits in 1981; she played "Susan Frankenstein" in Tim Burton's Frankenweenie (1984) , and co-starred in the hit comedy film Roxanne in 1987 starring Steve Martin. From 1982 to 1986, Shelley continued her filming career but from a different aspect. Since Shelley was 17, she had a collection of a variety of illustrated classic fairy tale books. During the making of Popeye, she showed her collection to Robin Williams. One particular fairy tale she showed Robin was "The Frog Prince". Picturing Robin as the real life Frog Prince, Shelley created Platypus Productions, her own production company. Shelley went to Showtime with the idea for airing a television program that was based on fairy tales. She produced Fairy Tale Theater which Showtime aired that was a hit television series that was based on several classic fairy tales. Fairy Tale Theatre was on television from 1982-1987. Each episode was a one-hour series and there were a total of twenty six episodes, all hosted by Shelley Duvall. Shelley also starred in four out of the twenty six episodes. In 1985, Ms. Duvall created Tall Tales and Legends that was aired for three years until it ended in 1988. Similar to Fairy Tale Theatre, Tall Tales and Legends was also a one-hour series hosted, produced, and guest starred by Duvall. Although it only consisted of nine episodes, Shelley was nominated for an Emmy from the series. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Shelley discovered Think Entertainment; another production company which helped Shelley create more programs and movies that were made for television that aired on common cable channels. Shelley produced three more programs from these production companies that aired on Showtime: Nightmare Classics, Shelley Duvall's Bedtime Stories, and Mrs. Piggle Wiggle. Her Bedtime Stories program earned her a 2nd Emmy Nomination. Shelley sold Think Entertainment in 1993 and retired as a producer.
In 1989, Shelley met Dan Gilroy while filming the Disney Channel movie Mother Goose Rock 'n' Rhyme (1990), the two fell in love and they have been together ever since.
Shelley Duvall's later career found her a number of different roles. She appeared in the family comedy Home Fries in 1998 playing "Mrs. Jackson", Drew Barrymore's character's mother. Other comedic films Shelley appeared in were Suburban Commando in 1991, and Changing Habits in 1997. She also had cameos in several TV series' such as: Frasier, L.A. Law, The Ray Bradbury Theater, Wishbone, and several others. Shelley returned to the horror genre when she played "Martha Stewart" in The 4th Floor in 1999 and played the role of "Mrs. Stein" in Big Monster On Campus in 2000; which consisted of both the comedy and horror genre.
Since 2002, Shelley Duvall has not acted in any films, but lives a quiet and peaceful life in Blanco, Texas. She has lived in Blanco since 1994, after her home in Los Angeles got damaged by an earthquake. For the last couple years, there have been several rumors about Duvall being a "recluse" and not being in touch with reality. However, a recent interview in 2010 was conducted by MondoFilm VideoGuide that had heavy proof that Shelley is as normal and aware of reality as ever. She has also noted in this interview that she takes care of several animals at her home in Texas and writes a lot of poetry, and that returning to acting is always a possibility.- Actress
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Kirsten Caroline Dunst is an American actress, who also holds German citizenship. She was born on April 30, 1982 in Point Pleasant, New Jersey, to parents Inez (née Rupprecht), who owned an art gallery, and Klaus Dunst, a medical services executive. She has a younger brother named Christian Dunst, born in 1987. Her father is German, from Hamburg, and her mother, who is American, is of German and Swedish descent.
Her career began at the age of 3 when she started modeling and appearing in commercials. She made her feature film debut with an uncredited role at age 6 in the 'Oedipus Wrecks' segment of Woody Allen's 1989 film New York Stories (1989). She received her first film credit in The Bonfire of the Vanities (1990). Her family moved to Los Angeles in 1993, where her film career took off.
In 1994, she made her breakthrough performance in Interview with the Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles (1994), alongside such stars as Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise. Her performance earned her a Golden Globe nomination, the MTV Award for Best Breakthrough Performance and the Saturn Award for Best Young Actress. In 1995, she was named one of People Magazine's 50 Most Beautiful People. Over the next few years, she made a string of hit movies including Little Women (1994), Jumanji (1995) and Small Soldiers (1998).
In 2000, she received rave reviews for her role as "Lux Lisbon" in Sofia Coppola's independent film, The Virgin Suicides (1999) and proved her status as a leading actress in the comedy hit, Bring It On (2000). She also graduated from Notre Dame High School in Los Angeles in June of that year.
In 2002, she landed one of her best known roles as Peter Parker's love interest, Mary Jane Watson, in Spider-Man (2002). She continued her role in Spider-Man 2 (2004) and Spider-Man 3 (2007).
She went on to land roles in such films as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), the romantic comedy Wimbledon (2004), and in Cameron Crowe's Elizabethtown (2005). She also played the title character in Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette (2006).
Dunst won the Best Actress Award at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival for her performance as Justine in Lars von Trier's Melancholia (2011). In 2012, she appeared in Walter Salles' film adaptation of On the Road (2012) and the independent comedy Bachelorette (2012). She also has several films in production, including The Two Faces of January (2014).
Her charity work includes designing a necklace to raise funds for the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation as well as supporting various cancer charities.- Actress
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Born in Seattle, Frances Farmer studied drama at the University of Washington, Seattle. In 1935, she went to Hollywood where she secured a seven-year contract with Paramount. In 1943, she was wrongfully declared mentally incompetent and committed by her parents to a series of asylums and public mental hospitals, leading to a false rumor that she received a lobotomy. After seven years she was released, and spent some of the remaining years of her life tending the parents who had committed her and taking odd jobs. She appeared on This Is Your Life (1950), and then her own TV show, Frances Farmer Presents (1958) for six years. She died of cancer in 1970.- Actress
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Juliette Lewis has been recognized as one of Hollywood's most talented and versatile actors of her generation since she first stunned audiences and critics alike with her Oscar-nominated performance as "Danielle Bowden" in Cape Fear (1991). To date, she has worked with some of the most revered directors in the industry, including Martin Scorsese, Woody Allen, Lasse Hallström, Oliver Stone, and Garry Marshall. Whether lending dramatic authenticity or a natural comedic flair to her roles, Lewis graces the screen with remarkable range and an original and captivating style.
Lewis was born in Los Angeles, Californa, to Glenis (Duggan) Batley, a graphic designer, and Geoffrey Lewis, an actor. By the age of six, she knew she wanted to be a performer. At twelve, Lewis landed her first leading role in the Showtime miniseries Home Fires (1987). After appearing in several TV sitcoms including The Wonder Years (1988), she made her move to film, starring with Chevy Chase in National Lampoon's National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989) and with Jennifer Jason Leigh in the drama Crooked Hearts (1991). At 16, Lewis starred opposite Brad Pitt in the critically acclaimed television movie Too Young to Die? (1990), catching the attention of Martin Scorsese, who cast her in his thriller Cape Fear (1991). Her powerful scenes with Robert De Niro captured the quiet complexities of adolescence and earned her an Oscar nomination and Golden Globe nomination for "Best Supporting Actress". Her auditorium scene with De Niro went down in movie history as one of cinema's classic scenes.
Lewis next worked with Woody Allen in Husbands and Wives (1992), playing a self-assured college coed with a penchant for older men and, particularly, her married professor. She quickly followed suit with a succession of starring roles in a variety of blockbusters and critically acclaimed projects including Kalifornia (1993), Romeo Is Bleeding (1993), What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993), and Natural Born Killers (1994), Oliver Stone's controversial media satire about two mass murderers who become legendary folk heroes. Lewis's other credits include the Nora Ephron comedy Mixed Nuts (1994), with Steve Martin and Adam Sandler; the sci-fi action film Strange Days (1995) with Ralph Fiennes and Angela Bassett; Quentin Tarantino's vampire tale From Dusk Till Dawn (1996) with George Clooney; The Evening Star (1996) with Shirley MacLaine; the Garry Marshall-directed The Other Sister (1999), and Todd Phillips' Old School (2003), co-starring opposite Luke Wilson, Vince Vaughn, and Will Ferrell as well as Starsky & Hutch (2004). In addition to her film career, Lewis has continued to add roles to her growing list of television credits with a performance in Showtime's My Louisiana Sky (2001), for which she secured an EMMY nomination, and a starring role in the Mira Nair-directed HBO's film Hysterical Blindness (2002), alongside Uma Thurman and Gena Rowlands.
After a six-year hiatus from film to pursue her burgeoning music career exclusively, Lewis announced her return to acting with a handful of upcoming movies. Juliette starred alongside Elliot Page, Marcia Gay Harden, Kristen Wiig and Jimmy Fallon in the comedy Whip It (2009). The film was released by Fox Searchlight on October 2nd, 2009. Directed by Drew Barrymore, the film tells the story of an ex-beauty pageant contestant that leaves her crowns behind after joining a roller derby team. Lewis plays "Iron Maven", the star of a top derby team. Next, she joined the cast of the acclaimed European animated thriller Metropia (2009), as the voice of "Nina". She also appeared in the romantic comedy The Switch (2010), opposite Jennifer Aniston, Jason Bateman, and Patrick Wilson. The film tells the story of a single mother (Aniston) who decides to have a child using a sperm donor. Juliette plays "Debbie Epstein", the best friend of Aniston's character. Lewis also appears in Sympathy for Delicious (2010), Mark Ruffalo's directorial debut. The film follows a paralyzed DJ, struggling to survive on the streets of LA who turns to faith healing and mysteriously develops the ability to cure the sick. Juliette plays "Ariel", costarring alongside Orlando Bloom, Mark Ruffalo, and Laura Linney. The film took home the US Dramatic Special Jury Prize at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival. Most recently, Juliette Lewis appears in the indie-drama Conviction (2010), which stars Hilary Swank, Melissa Leo, Minnie Driver, and Sam Rockwell. She plays "Roseanna Perry" in the true story of an unemployed single mother (Swank) who saw her brother begin serving a life sentence in 1983 for murder and robbery. The role has won Lewis praise from audiences and critics, alike, for her performance, with USA Today saying, "Juliette Lewis has an indelible role" and the San Francisco Chronicle saying "Her character work should be studied in schools. Just remarkable". In addition to Conviction (2010), Lewis also makes a cameo in Todd Phillips's comedy, Due Date (2010), starring Robert Downey Jr., Michelle Monaghan, and Zach Galifianakis.
Beginning in 2004, Juliette took a hiatus from acting to embark on a musical journey. After six years, two full length albums and countless high profile tours and festival gigs with her band, 'Juliette & the Licks', Juliette set out on a solo career. Releasing "Terra Incognita" last fall, the album has taken her all across the world from Europe to Japan to Turkey, Australia, North America and Canada. For more information on Juliette Lewis' music, please visit her MySpace page. Juliette Lewis resides in Los Angeles.- Actress
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Spencer is a native of Montgomery, Alabama, which she claims is the proverbial buckle of the Bible belt. She's the sixth of seven siblings and holds a BS in Liberal Arts from Auburn University. A "closet" lover of acting, this practical Alabamian knew that she'd someday work in the film industry, but never dreamed it would be in front of the camera. In 1995, acclaimed director Joel Schumacher changed all that by giving her a small part opposite Sandra Bullock in the hit film A Time to Kill, and Spencer was on her way. In 1996, she teamed up with Bullock again in Bullock's directorial debut of Making Sandwiches, a short film that premiered at the 1997 Sundance Film Festival.
Spencer made her stage debut in Los Angeles and originated the role of "LaSonia" (pronounced lasagna) in famed writer/director Del Shore's, The Trials and Tribulations of a Trailer Trash Housewife, starring opposite veteran actors Beth Grant, Dale Dickey and David Steen (2003). The play garnered Spencer and her fellow cast mates critical acclaim and a bevy of awards. Since then, Spencer has continued to see success as an actor in both film and television, working alongside Hollywood's elite. In February 2009, she was lauded by Los Angeles Times publication: The Envelope, for her brief but memorable performance in the Will Smith drama Seven Pounds.- Actress
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Jessica Michelle Chastain was born in Sacramento, California, and was raised in a middle-class household in a Northern California suburb. Her mother, Jerri Chastain, is a vegan chef whose family is originally from Kansas, and her stepfather is a fireman. She discovered dance at the age of nine and was in a dance troupe by age thirteen. She began performing in Shakespearean productions all over the Bay area.
An actor in a production of "Romeo & Juliet" encouraged her to audition for Juilliard as a drama major. She became a member of "Crew 32" with the help of a scholarship from one of the school's famous alumni, Robin Williams.
In her last year at Juilliard, she was offered a holding deal with TV writer/producer John Wells and she eventually worked in three of his TV shows. Jessica continues to do theatre, having played in "The Cherry Orchard", "Rodney's Wife", "Salome" and "Othello". She spends her time between New York and Los Angeles, working in theater, film and TV.
In 2011, she had a prolific year in film. She was nominated for and won a number of awards, including a 2012 Oscar nomination for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role for The Help (2011).- Actress
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Born in San Giorgio di Piano, Giulietta Masina spent part of her teenage years living with a widowed aunt in Rome, where she cultivated a passion for the theater and studied for a degree in Philosophy. She began her career on the radio with the program "Terzoglio" (1942), about the adventures of newlyweds Cico and Pallina from scripts written by Federico Fellini. The series brought her great success. The following year she married Fellini and became the inspirational muse for many of his films.
She made her cinema debut in Without Pity (1948), directed by Alberto Lattuada, but really established her reputation with her next few films: Behind Closed Shutters (1951), directed by Luigi Comencini, Variety Lights (1950), which also marked Fellini's debut as director (the film credits both Fellini and Lattuada); and Europe '51 (1952), directed by Roberto Rossellini. Her artistic partnership with her husband really took off with the Oscar-winning The Road (1954), followed by The Swindle (1955) and the widely acclaimed Nights of Cabiria (1957), which again won an Oscar and brought her the award for Best Female Performance at the Cannes Film Festival. Over the following years she played many memorable roles in such films as Fortunella (1958), directed by Eduardo De Filippo; ...and the Wild Wild Women (1959), directed by Renato Castellani; and later in Juliet of the Spirits (1965) and Ginger & Fred (1986), both directed by Fellini.
From 1966 to 1969 she hosted the immensely popular radio show "Lettere aperte a Giulietta Masina" and starred in the television series Eleonora (1973), by Tullio Pinelli, directed by Silverio Blasi, and Camilla (1976), directed by Sandro Bolchi, based on the novel by Fausta Cialente, "Un inverno freddissimo" (1966).
She died in Rome in 1994, just a few months after the death of her husband.- Actress
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Genevieve Bujold spent her first twelve school years in Montreal's oppressive Hochelaga Convent, where opportunities for self-expression were limited to making welcoming speeches for visiting clerics. As a child she felt "as if I were in a long dark tunnel trying to convince myself that if I could ever get out there was light ahead." Caught reading a forbidden novel, she was handed her ticket out of the convent and she then enrolled in Montreal's free Conservatoire d'Art Dramatique. There she was trained in classical French drama and shortly before graduation was offered a part in a professional production of Beaumarchais' "The Barber of Seville." In 1965 while on a theatrical tour of Paris with another Montreal company, Rideau Vert, Bujold was recommended to director Alain Resnais (by his mother) who cast her opposite Yves Montand in The War Is Over (1966). She then made two other French films in quick succession, the Philippe de Broca cult classic King of Hearts (1966) and Louis Malle's The Thief of Paris (1967). She was also very active during this time in Canadian television where she met and married director Paul Almond in 1967. They had one child and divorced in 1974. Two remarkable appearances - first as the titular Saint Joan (1967) on television, then as Anne Boleyn in her Hollywood debut Anne of the Thousand Days (1969), co-starring Richard Burton - introduced Bujold to American audiences and yielded Emmy and Oscar nominations respectively. Immediately after "Anne," while under contract with Universal, she opted out of a planned Mary, Queen of Scots (1971) ("it would be the same producer, the same director, the same costumes, the same me") prompting the studio to sue her for $750,000. Rather than pay, she went to Greece to film The Trojan Women (1971) with Katharine Hepburn. Her virtuoso performance as the mad seer Cassandra led critic Pauline Kael to prophesy "prodigies ahead" but to assuage Universal, Bujold eventually returned to Hollywood to make Earthquake (1974), co-starring Charlton Heston, which was a box office hit. A host of other films of varying quality followed, most notably Obsession (1976), Coma (1978), The Last Flight of Noah's Ark (1980), and Tightrope (1984), but she managed nevertheless to transcend the material and deliver performances with her trademark combination of ferocious intensity and childlike vulnerability. In the 1980s she found her way to director Alan Rudolph's nether world and joined his film family for three movies including the memorable Choose Me (1984). Highlights of recent work are her brave performance in the David Cronenberg film Dead Ringers (1988) and a lovely turn in the autumnal romance Les noces de papier (1990).- Actress
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Karachi-born Margaret Lockwood, daughter of a British colonial railway clerk, was educated in London and studied to be an actress at the Italia Conti Drama School. Her first moment on stage came at the age of 12, when she played a fairy in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" in 1928. She had a bit part in the Drury Lane production of "Cavalcade" in 1932, before completing her training at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.
Her film career began in 1934 with Lorna Doone (1934) and she was already a seasoned performer when Alfred Hitchcock cast her in his thriller, The Lady Vanishes (1938), opposite relative newcomer Michael Redgrave. The film was shot at Islington studios and was "in the can" after just five weeks in 1937 and released the following year. This was her first opportunity to shine, and she gave an intelligent, convincing performance as the inquisitive girl who suspects a conspiracy when an elderly lady (May Whitty) seemingly disappears into thin air during a train journey. Due to the success of the film, Margaret spent some time in Hollywood but was given poor material and soon returned home. Back at Gainsborough, producer Edward Black had planned to pair Lockwood and Redgrave much the same way William Powell and Myrna Loy had been teamed up in the "Thin Man" films in America, but the war intervened and the two were only to appear together in the Carol Reed-directed The Stars Look Down (1940). This was the first of her "bad girl" roles that would effectively redefine her career in the 1940s. In between playing femmes fatales, she had a popular hit in the 1944 melodrama A Lady Surrenders (1944) as a brilliant but fatally ill pianist and was sympathetic enough as a young girl who is possessed by a ghost in A Place of One's Own (1945). However, her best-remembered performances came in two classic Gainsborough period dramas. The first of these, The Man in Grey (1943), co-starring James Mason, was torrid escapist melodrama with Lockwood portraying a treacherous, opportunistic vixen, all the while exuding more sexual allure than was common for films of this period. The enormous popular success of this picture led to her second key role in 1945 (again with Mason) as the cunning and cruel title character of The Wicked Lady (1945), a female Dick Turpin. This was even more daring in its depiction of immorality, and the controversy surrounding the film did no harm at the box office. Some of Lockwood's scenes had to be re-shot for American audiences not accustomed to seeing décolletages. Margaret scored another hit with Bedelia (1946), as a demented serial poisoner, and then played a Gypsy girl accused of murder in the Technicolor romp Jassy (1947).
As her popularity waned in the 1950s she returned to occasional performances on the West End stage and appeared on television, making her greatest impact as a dedicated barrister in the ITV series Justice (1971), which ran from 1971 to 1974.- Actress
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Heather Joan Graham was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to Joan (Bransfield), a schoolteacher and children's book author, and James Graham, an FBI agent. She and her sister, actress Aimee Graham, were raised by their strictly Catholic parents. They relocated often, as a result of their father's occupation, and Heather became increasingly shy. Surprisingly, she had a passion for acting from an early age and despite being labeled a 'theater geek' by her peers, she was voted Most Talented by her high school senior class. Unfortunately, her love of acting created a tension between Heather and her family although her mother obligingly drove her to auditions in Hollywood throughout her adolescence.
After high school Heather moved to Los Angeles and received small roles in a variety of films including Drugstore Cowboy (1989). When her career did not take off as quickly as was hoped, Heather enrolled in the University of California at Los Angeles to get her degree in drama. It was at UCLA that she was noticed by actor James Woods and received a subsequent part in a film Woods starred in, Diggstown (1992). Heather dropped out of UCLA after two years to pursue her acting career on a full time basis. Aside from gaining a modeling contract with Emanuel Ungaro Liberte, Heather has risen to star in such films as Swingers (1996), a role she received after being taken out swing dancing by Jon Favreau, to blockbusters like Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999), and Boogie Nights (1997).- Actress
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Kevin Smith called her an American Pop Icon and John Waters called her the ultimate bad girl. While her early notoriety brought her international fame, her determination, grit, and talent have garnered her respect in many areas of the entertainment industry. She has appeared in dozens of films and television shows such as Roger Corman's cult classic Not of This Earth, John Water's Crybaby, Marvel's Blade, Kevin Smith's Zack and Miri Make a Porno, to the award-winning Excision; from Melrose Place, Roseanne, Will & Grace to series regular roles on NBC's Profiler and Syfy's First Wave. Her memoir Traci Lords Underneath It All (HarperCollins) was a NY Times Bestseller, and her pioneering techno album 1000 Fires topped the Billboard Dance Chart and was featured on both the Mortal Combat and Virtuosity soundtracks earning double platinum status. Lords is an award-winning voice over artist and has a vintage inspired line of clothing. In 2020, she made her stage debut as Gloria in the revival of Tom Eyen's cult classic Women Behind Bar which is now streaming on Broadway World.
Lords is an Ohio native born to Patricia and Louis Kuzma. Young Nora Louise Kuzma spent her early days in rural Steubenville, Ohio shuttled between her divorced parent's houses. It was then that her mother began a relationship with a man named Roger Hayes and relocated to Southern California. Teenage Nora missed her father terribly and began to treat Roger as a father figure. Her mother eventually realized that Roger was not the man she had thought he was and ended the relationship but left Nora in Roger's care, claiming she was overwhelmed and couldn't provide for the teenager. In Traci's memoir Underneath It All, she states that Roger groomed her for nude modeling and sex trafficked her at that time. Porn agent Jim South has confirmed in various interviews that it was Roger Hayes who brought the 15-year-old to his office in Van Nuys, California in 1984. Armed with a fake ID, no one questioned the stunning woman-child who signed on as a figure model which eventually led to adult films. With her rebellious attitude and stunning looks, she shot to stardom quickly in the X-rated world.
In May 1986, the Traci Lords story broke. The media had a field day with the tale of the troubled bad girl who tricked the porn world. The FBI questioned Lords and announced that because she was a minor, she was not responsible and that all films that featured her must be destroyed. Lords was never arrested or charged with any crimes but was punished in other ways. She was forced to pay estimated taxes on her purported income. And has faced years of criticism and ridicule because of her history in adult movies but eventually carved an impressive body of work in mainstream Hollywood where she continues to thrive today. Lords' lives in Southern California with her husband and their son.- Actress
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From 1979 to 1984 Johanna ter Steege studied at the academy of dramatic art in Kampen to become a drama teacher. Her initial desire to develop theatre for and with children prompted her to seek a career as an actress and a teacher. From 1984 to 1988 she attended the school of acting at Arnhem to become a stage actress. Considering acting "the language of the heart", one of the most important things she learned was that the personnel and creative development of an actor are closely knit. Her acting experience ranges from Shakespeare, Sophocles, Strindberg and Chekhov to improvisory clown acts.
At the academy, collaboration with fellow students resulted in the very successful theatre group "De Trust", directed by Boermans. In 1987 Johanna was asked for a role in the film The Vanishing (1988) (A.K.A. "The Vanishing"), directed by George Sluizer. This role met international acclaim, winning her the "Felix Award" (Best Supporting Actress) in Berlin.
Inevitably, her career shifted from the theatre to the cinema. For the past twelve years she has traveled all over the world, acting in different languages and working with renowned directors, such as Robert Altman (Vincent & Theo (1990)), István Szabó (Dear Emma, Sweet Böbe (1992), A.K.A. "Sweet Emma, Dear Bobe"), Heddy Honigmann (Goodbye (1995) A.K.A. "Goodbye", for which she won Best Actress at the Locarno International Film Festival) and Bruce Beresford (Paradise Road (1997)).
Johanna has also worked with actors such as Gary Oldman, Glenn Close, Frances McDormand, Isabella Rossellini, Tim Roth and Klaus Maria Brandauer. In January 2001 ter Steege played Countess Geschwitz, in the play "Lulu", directed by Jonathan Kent, both in the Almeida theatre in London and in Washington.- Actress
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Moira was born the daughter of Harold Charles King, a civil engineer, in Dunfermline, Scotland. She was educated at Dunfermline High School, Ndola in Zambia (formerly Northern Rhodesia) and Bearsden Academy, Scotland. She received her professional training at the Mayfair School and The Nicholas Legat Studio. She made her debut in the International Ballet with 1941 and then danced at Sadler's Wells in 1942. From 1942 to 1952 she danced all the major classic roles and a full repertoire of revivals and new ballets. Her first role as prima ballerina was "Sleeping Beauty" at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden in 1946 which was followed by 'Coppelia' and. 'Swan Lake'. She toured the United States with the Sadler's Wells Ballet in 1949 and in 1950/51. She toured as Sally Bowles in "I am a Camera" in 1955 and appeared at the Bristol Old Vic as "Major Barbara" in 1956. Although these performances were the start of her secondary career as an actress, she continued her primary career as a ballerina. She has appeared on TV as a ballerina and as an actress- Actress
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Mary Louise Brooks, also known by her childhood name of Brooksie, was born in the Midwestern town of Cherryvale, Kansas, on November 14, 1906. She began dancing at an early age with the Denishawn Dancers (which was how she left Kansas and went to New York) and then with George White's Scandals before joining the Ziegfeld Follies, but became one of the most fascinating and alluring personalities ever to grace the silver screen. She was always compared to her Lulu role in Pandora's Box (1929), which was filmed in 1928. Her performances in A Girl in Every Port (1928) and Beggars of Life (1928), both filmed in 1928, proved to all concerned that Louise had real talent. She became known, mostly, for her bobbed hair style. Thousands of women were attracted to that style and adopted it as their own. As you will note by her photographs, she was no doubt the trend setter of the 1920s with her Buster Brown-Page Boy type hair cut, much like today's women imitate stars. Because of her dark haired look and being the beautiful woman that she was, plus being a modern female, she was not especially popular among Hollywood's clientele. She just did not go along with the norms of the film society. Louise really came into her own when she left Hollywood for Europe. There she appeared in a few German productions which were very well made and continued to prove she was an actress with an enduring talent. Until she ended her career in film in 1938, she had made only 25 movies. After that, she spent most of her time reading and painting. She also became an accomplished writer, authoring a number of books, including her autobiography. On August 8, 1985, Louise died of a heart attack in Rochester, New York. She was 78 years old.- Actress
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Heather Matarazzo was born November 10, 1982, in Oyster Bay, New York. She was adopted by Camille and Ray Matarazzo, an Italian-American couple although she is of Irish descent biologically. Heather attended both Oyster Bay High School and Long Island High School for the Arts. In 1997, she made her film debut in Welcome to the Dollhouse (1995), she played the lead role of Dawn Wiener a shy, unattractive, unpopular 7th grader who falls for a charismatic and handsome aspiring rock musician, and decides to pursue him romantically. She won an Independent Spirit Award for her performance in the film.- Actress
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Mieko Harada was born on 26 December 1958 in Tokyo, Japan. She is an actress and writer, known for Ran (1985), Dreams (1990) and Begging for Love (1998). She is married to Ryo Ishibashi. They have two children.- Actress
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Edith Falco, called Edie, was born on July 5, 1963 in Brooklyn, New York, to Judith Anderson, an actress, and Frank Falco, a jazz drummer. She is of Italian (father) and Swedish, English, and Cornish (mother) descent. Edie grew up on Long Island and attended SUNY Purchase, where she was trained in acting at the prestigious Conservatory of Theatre Arts and Film. She moved to Manhattan after graduation, auditioning for roles and supporting herself as best she could; for example, working parties for an entertainment company where she would wear a Cookie Monster costume and urge people to get on the dance floor. Falco began getting film roles, mostly smaller supporting parts, starting in the late 1980s. Her first notable role was a supporting part in Bullets Over Broadway (1994).
Ironically, it was in television where the conservatory-trained Falco's career first flowered. She obtained her first recurring roles in 1993, on the acclaimed police dramas Homicide: Life on the Street (1993), as the wife of a blinded police officer, and Law & Order (1990) as a Legal Aid attorney. Next came a recurring role on the prison drama Oz (1997), as a sympathetic corrections officer. All the while she continued to work in film, still in small supporting roles.
Supporting herself in acting continued to be a challenge until at last Falco found success in 1999, when she was cast in the HBO series The Sopranos (1999), as Carmela, the wife of New Jersey Mafia street boss Tony Soprano. "The Sopranos" gained her a great deal of visibility and praise for her exceptionally strong dramatic skills. In 2000 Falco became one of the few actresses in history to sweep all of the major television awards (the Emmy, the Golden Globe and the SAG Award) in one year for a dramatic role. She is also the first female actor ever to receive the Television Critics Association Award for Individual Achievement in Drama.
Interestingly, her roles have frequently put her on one side of the law or the other--a defense attorney, a corrections officer, a cop's wife, a mobster's wife, a police officer (in a pilot for a television adaptation of the movie Fargo (1996)). She has also worked frequently on the stage, such as her award-winning work in the play "Sideman," in "The Vagina Monologues," and in revivals of "Frankie and Johnny in the Claire de Lune" (which was hugely successful) and "'night Mother."
Unlike her brashly assertive alter-ego Carmela Soprano, Falco is self-described as shy, but is clearly a witty and down-to-earth person. She sometimes travels with her beloved dog Marley, driving so that the dog does not have to travel in the baggage compartment. At one point Falco had a relationship with her "Frankie and Johnny" co-star Stanley Tucci. She was treated for breast cancer in 2004 and her prognosis is very good. In December 2004, Falco adopted a baby boy, whom she named Anderson, after her mother's surname. Another adoption, of a baby girl named Macy, followed in 2008.- Actress
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Debbie Reynolds was born Mary Frances Reynolds in El Paso, Texas, the second child of Maxine N. (Harmon) and Raymond Francis Reynolds, a carpenter for the Southern Pacific Railroad. Her film career began at MGM after she won a beauty contest at age 16 impersonating Betty Hutton. Reynolds wasn't a dancer until she was selected to be Gene Kelly's partner in Singin' in the Rain (1952). Not yet twenty, she was a quick study. Twelve years later, it seemed like she had been around forever. Most of her early film work was in MGM musicals, as perky, wholesome young women. She continued to use her dancing skills with stage work.
She was 31 when she gave an Academy Award-nominated performance in The Unsinkable Molly Brown (1964). She survived losing first husband Eddie Fisher to Elizabeth Taylor following the tragic death of Mike Todd. Her second husband, shoe magnate Harry Karl, gambled away his fortune as well as hers. With her children as well as Karl's, she had to keep working and turned to the stage. She had her own casino in Las Vegas with a home for her collection of Hollywood memorabilia until its closure in 1997. She took the time to personally write a long letter that is on display in the Judy Garland museum in Grand Rapids, Minnesota and to provide that museum with replicas of Garland's costumes. The originals are in her newly-opened museum in Hollywood.
Nearly all the money she makes is spent toward her goal of creating a Hollywood museum. Her collection numbers more than 3000 costumes and 46,000 square-feet worth of props and equipment.
With musician/actor Eddie Fisher, she was the mother of filmmaker Todd Fisher and actress Carrie Fisher. Debbie died of a stroke on December 28, 2016, one day after the death of her daughter Carrie. She was survived by her son and granddaughter, up-and-coming actress Billie Lourd.- Actress
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Carrie Frances Fisher was born on October 21, 1956 in Burbank, California, to singers/actors Eddie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds. She was an actress and writer known for Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977), Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980) and Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi (1983). Fisher is also known for her book, "Postcards from the Edge", and she wrote the screenplay for the movie based on her novel. Carrie Fisher and talent agent Bryan Lourd have a daughter, Billie Lourd (Billie Catherine Lourd), born on July 17, 1992.- Actress
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Heather Langenkamp was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA. She got her start in acting when she was cast as an extra in the Francis Ford Coppola films The Outsiders (1983) and Rumble Fish (1983), which were both filmed in Tulsa. Her scenes were deleted from the final cut of both films. While studying at Stanford University, she rose to international prominence when Wes Craven cast her as Nancy Thompson in A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984). After a string of television guest appearances, she returned as Nancy in the 1987 sequel A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987). Subsequently, she became known for her role as the moralistic Marie Lubbock on the ABC television series Just the Ten of Us (1987), a spin-off of the popular ABC situation comedy Growing Pains (1985) (on which she guest-starred), from 1988 to 1990. In 1994, she portrayed fictionalized versions of herself in New Nightmare (1994) and the figure skater Nancy Kerrigan in Tonya & Nancy: The Inside Story (1994). The following year, she had a supporting role as the reporter Christy Carruthers in the horror film The Demolitionist (1995). She served as executive producer and narrator for the documentary Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy (2010), followed by roles in The Butterfly Room (2012), Star Trek Into Darkness (2013), and Truth or Dare (2017). She has since starred in a variety of independent films. She co-owns AFX Studio, a company responsible for the special effects for films such as Dawn of the Dead (2004) and The Cabin in the Woods (2011). She has been married to David LeRoy Anderson since 1990. They have two children. She was previously married to Alan Pasqua.- Actress
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Elsa Sullivan Lanchester was born into an unconventional a family at the turn of the 20th century. Her parents, James "Shamus" Sullivan and Edith "Biddy" Lanchester, were socialists - very active members of the Social Democratic Federation (SDF) in a rather broad sense - and did not believe in the institution of marriage and being tied to any conventions of legality, for that matter. Her mother had actually been committed to an asylum in 1895 by her father and older brothers because of her unmarried state with James. The incident received worldwide press as the "Lanchester Kidnapping Case."
Elsa had a great desire to become a classical dancer and to that end at age 10 her mother enrolled her at the famed Isadora Duncan's Bellevue School in Paris in 1912. But the uncertainties of WW1 brought her home after only two years. At age 12, she was sent to a co-educational boarding school in Kings Langley, Hertfordshire, England, to teach dance classes in exchange for her education and board. In 1918, she was hired as a dance teacher at Margaret Morris's school on the Isle of Wight.
Next to dance, she loved the music halls of the period, so in 1920 she debuted in a music hall act as an Egyptian dancer. About the same time she founded the Children's Theater in Soho, London and taught there for several years. She made her stage debut in 1922 in the West End play "Thirty Minutes in a Street." In 1924 she and her partner, Harold Scott, opened a London nightclub called the Cave of Harmony. They performed one-act plays by Pirandello and Chekhov and sang cabaret songs. She would later collect and record these and many others. The spot was frequented by literati like Aldous Huxley, H.G. Wells and also James Whale, working in London theater and soon to be directing on Broadway and Hollywood's most famous horror films. Lanchester kept busy including, on her own admission, posing nude for artists. During a 1926 comic performance in the Midnight Follies at London's Metropole, a member of the British Royal family walked out as she sang, "Please Sell No More Drink to My Father." She closed her nightclub in 1928 as her film career began in earnest.
Perhaps not beautiful in the more conventional sense, Lanchester was certainly pretty as a young woman with a turned-up nose that gave her a pert, impish expression, all the more striking with her large, expressive dark eyes and full lips. She had a lithe figure that she carried with the assuredness of her dancing background. Her voice was bright and distinctive, and had a delightful rush and trill that had an almost Scottish burr quality. What clicked on stage would do the same in the movies.
Her first film appearance was actually in an amateur movie by friend and author Evelyn Waugh called The Scarlet Woman: An Ecclesiastical Melodrama (1925). Her formal film debut was in the British movie One of the Best (1927). She continued stage work and became associated in 1927 with a rather self-possessed but keenly dedicated actor, Charles Laughton. He appeared with her in three of four films Lanchester did in 1928. (Three of these were written for her by H.G. Wells). They did a few plays as well and wed in 1929. According to Lanchester, after two years, she discovered Laughton was homosexual but they remained married until his death in 1962. Lanchester declared in a 1958 interview that she kept to a separate career path from her husband. They appeared together on occasion, moving through 1931 with several smart play-like films including Potiphar's Wife (1931) with Laurence Olivier. She had done the play "Payment Deferred" in London in 1930 and followed it to Broadway in 1931.
MGM offered her a contract in 1932. In 1933 Alexander Korda was casting his The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933) and decided that Laughton was the perfect choice - and his wife would be just as perfect as one of Henry's six wives. Her versatility pointed to a part with some comedic elements and fitting more into a caricature. She looked most like Hans Holbein's famous portrait of Anne of Cleves (Henry's fourth wife who was actually somewhat more homely than the painter depicted). In costume Lanchester was charming if not striking. Her interpretation of Anne was a perfect integration with herself, and her scene with Laughton informally playing cards on the marriage bed and deciding on annulment is a high point of the movie.
Of course, it would be hard to mention her film career of the 1930s without mentioning the one role that would forever dog her, Bride of Frankenstein (1935). Having come to Hollywood with Laughton in 1932 (but not permanently until 1939), Lanchester did only a few films up to 1935 and was disappointed enough with Hollywood's reception to return to London for a respite. She was quickly called back by an old friend from London, stage and film associate James Whale, now the noted director of Frankenstein (1931) and The Invisible Man (1933). He wanted her for two parts in Bride: author Mary Shelley and the bride. A central joke of the movie build-up was the tag lines: "WHO will be The Bride of Frankenstein? WHO will dare?"
Indeed, it was no honeymoon for her. For some ten days, Lanchester was wrapped in yards of bandage and covered in heavy makeup. The stand-on-end hairdo was accomplished by combing it over a wire mesh cage. Lanchester was in real agony with her eyes kept taped wide open for long takes - and it showed in her looks of horror. Her monster's screaming and hissing sounds (based on the sounds of Regents Park swans in London) were taped and then run backward to spook-up the effect. She was delightfully melodramatic and picturesque as Wollstonecraft, and her bride would become iconic. Many have considered Bride of Frankenstein (1935) the best of the golden age horror movies.
Lanchester stood out in her next movie with Laughton the next year, Korda's dark Rembrandt (1936), but she only did a few more films for the remainder of the decade. Through the 1940s she was doubly busy - a couple of films per year while regenerating her beloved musical revue sketches. She performed for 10 years at the Turnabout Theater in Hollywood, using old London music hall/cabaret songs and others written for her. Later she would have to split her time further doing a similar act at a supper club called The Bar of Music. By the later 1940s she had become rather matronly, and the roles would settle appropriately. But she always lent her sparkle, as with her charming maid Matilda in The Bishop's Wife (1947). She would be nominated for best supporting actress in Come to the Stable (1949).
She entered the 1950s busy with road touring of her nightclub act with pianist J. Raymond Henderson (who went by "Ray" and who is sometimes confused with popular songwriter Ray Henderson). There was a series of tours to complement Laughton's famous reading tours, called Elsa Lanchester's Private Music Hall which ended in 1952; Elsa Lanchester--Herself which ended in 1961; and once more in 1964 at the Ivar Theater. She was equally busy with a stock of film roles and a large share of TV playhouse theater. She made ten movies with Laughton, the last of which, Witness for the Prosecution (1957) garnered her second supporting actress nomination. But her dizzy Aunt Queenie Holroyd of Bell Book and Candle (1958) is a fond remembrance of that time.
With the two decades from the 1960s to early 1980s, Lanchester was a fixture on episodic TV and an institution in Disney and G-rated fare - perhaps a bit ironic for the unconventional Lanchester. She wrote two autobiographies: "Charles Laughton and I" (1938) and "Elsa Lanchester: Herself" (1983), both recalling her nearly 100 roles before the camera. Lanchester remained humorously reflective in regard to her film career, describing it as "...large parts in lousy pictures and small parts in big pictures." It was the mix of silly, bawdy, and outrageous in her revues that was her great joy: "I was content because I was fully aware that I did not like straight acting but preferred performing direct to an audience. You might call what I do vaudeville. Making a joke, especially impromptu, and getting a big laugh is just plain heaven."- Actress
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Krysten Ritter stars as Jessica Jones in the Peabody, Hugo, and Emmy Award-winning Netflix original series, Marvel's Jessica Jones (2015). Her performance, which earned her a prestigious Critics Choice nomination, a Saturn nomination, a Webby Award and a Glamour Best International TV Actress Award, has received rave reviews with the show being celebrated by critics and audiences alike for its groundbreaking depiction of a reluctant anti-super-heroine with an alcohol problem and a wicked case of PTSD who will not let a sexual assault from her past define her. She will also play Jessica Jones in The Defenders (2017) and the second season of Marvel's "Jessica Jones."
Additional acting roles include her critically acclaimed turn as Jane Margolis on AMC's hit series, Breaking Bad (2008), the titular character in the cult favorite Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 (2012), Big Eyes (2014) directed by Tim Burton, indie darling Listen Up Philip (2014), Life Happens (2011) which she co-wrote and co-produced, as well as roles in Veronica Mars (2014), The Blacklist (2013), Confessions of a Shopaholic (2009), and She's Out of My League (2010).
Growing up in a small-town farm in rural Pennsylvania, Ritter started her career in front of the camera as a model at 15-years-old. Her body of work has subsequently spanned film, television, theatre, writing, producing, music, and fashion design.
In 2012, Ritter launched her production company Silent Machine where she juggles many projects in various stages of development, always with the objective of highlighting complex female protagonists.
Ritter and her dog Mikey split their time between New York and Los Angeles.- Producer
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Since melting audiences' hearts at the age of just six in E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), Drew Barrymore has emerged as one of the most beloved and singularly gifted actresses of her generation. Born in Culver City, California to John Drew Barrymore and Jaid Barrymore, the clutches of fame were near inescapable for young Drew, her father being a member of the esteemed showbiz dynasty fronted by stage star Maurice Barrymore, his thespian wife Georgiana and their three children: Lionel Barrymore, Ethel Barrymore, and John Barrymore.
Tailgating a turbulent adolescence that saw her grapple with insobriety, substance abuse, and cutthroat media vitriol, a diligent Barrymore threw herself into her career throughout the early-mid nineties, first with a succession of 'bad girl' parts in cultish B-pictures like Poison Ivy (1992), Guncrazy (1992) and - fittingly - Bad Girls (1994); then warmly received turns in prestige vehicles such as Boys on the Side (1995), Woody Allen's Everyone Says I Love You (1996), and Wes Craven's game-changing Scream (1996). Equal portions of goofball - The Wedding Singer (1998), Never Been Kissed (1999), Charlie's Angels (2000) - and gravitas - Riding in Cars with Boys (2001), Donnie Darko (2001), Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002) - came next, with a Golden Globe-grabbing pièce de résistance - her divine incarnation of Edith Bouvier Beale in Grey Gardens (2009) - confirming that her skill set was every bit as forceful and far-reaching as imagined.
Having already set in motion a bunch of lucrative projects via production house Flower Films (co-est. with Nancy Juvonen in '95), Barrymore fastened an additional string to her bow when she spearheaded the sports dramedy Whip It (2009), her glowingly appraised directorial debut. Fresh off a healthy run of movie parts at the launch of the 2010s, her star turn as zombified suburban realtor Sheila Hammond - a tour de force at once dizzy and detailed - on Netflix's Santa Clarita Diet (2017) saw her step with trademark resolve into newer territory still: the flourishing world of small screen entertainment, a metamorphosis she continues to espouse with her role as compère of spirited daytime staple The Drew Barrymore Show (2020).- Actress
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Rose McGowan is an American actress and director, known for her contribution to independent film. Since the age of nineteen, she has appeared in acclaimed films by Gregg Araki, Wes Craven, Brian De Palma, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino. In 2014, her directorial debut Dawn (2014) was nominated for the Short Film Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival. Rose Arianna McGowan was born on September 5, 1973 in Florence, Tuscany, Italy, to American parents Terri and Daniel Patrick McGowan. She is the second eldest of six siblings, and has Irish, French, and English ancestry. As a young child, she was raised within the Italian chapter of the Children of God. During the early 1980s, her family severed ties with the community and migrated to Eugene, Oregon, USA. Following the divorce of her parents, Rose relocated to Gig Harbor, Washington, to live with her grandmother. At age 14, McGowan was accused of drug use by a family friend and committed to rehabilitation. She has consistently maintained the decision was unjustified. Upon release, she spent a year without a home and was emancipated from her parents by the age of 15. McGowan's career as an actor began with The Doom Generation (1995). Originally intended for Jordan Ladd, the character of Amy Blue was, coincidentally, awarded to McGowan by an associate of director Gregg Araki. For her performance, she was nominated at the 1995 Independent Spirit Awards for Best Debut Performance. Subsequently cast in Wes Craven's Scream (1996), she experienced further success when the project defied expectations to become one of the highest grossing films of the year. The innovative career of McGowan was overshadowed throughout much of the 1990s by her high-profile relationship with musician Brian Warner (aka Marilyn Manson). Strong performances in Going All the Way (1997), Lewis & Clark & George (1997), Southie (1998) and Jawbreaker (1999) were largely unseen by the general public. When the relationship ended between Rose and Manson in 2001, she remarked: "There is great love, but our lifestyle difference is, unfortunately, even greater". Rose continued to work solidly, appearing in a string of soft-sounding studio and independent films. Performances from this period included: a political activist in Showtime's The Killing Yard (2001), a grifter in Roads to Riches (2002) and a factory worker in "Stealing Bess" (aka Vacuums (2003)). She was re-introduced to the mainstream as Paige Matthews in Aaron Spelling's Charmed (1998), a popular television series for which she devoted five consecutive years. When "Charmed" finished its run in 2006, McGowan emerged in top form. Critics praised her efforts in Robert Rodriguez's Planet Terror (2007), and Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof (2007). In several interviews, McGowan has expressed a general apathy and disdain for Hollywood. Despite this, her work ethic remains strong. Following her recent marriage to LA-based artist Davey Detail, the actress has resolved to purse further projects as a director.- A marvelously quirky and distinctive 4' 3" character actress, with a larger-than-life presence on film and TV, Zelda Rubinstein gave up a long and stable career in the medical field as a lab technician in order to strive for something more self-fulfilling as middle age settled in. At the age of 45, the feisty lady gave up the comfort of a stable paycheck and attempt an acting career, a daunting task for anyone but especially someone of her stature and type. Within a few years, she had beaten the odds and became a major movie celebrity thanks to one terrific showcase in a Steven Spielberg horror classic. In the process, she served as an inspiration to all the "little people" working in Hollywood who are forced to toil in cruel and demeaning stereotypes.
Zelda May Rubinstein was born on May 28, 1933 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to Dolores and George Rubinstein, who were Polish Jewish immigrants. Zelda was the youngest of three children, and the only "little person" in the family. Her childhood and teenage years were decidedly difficult in terms of coping with her "interesting variation," which was caused by a pituitary gland deficiency. With no designs on acting at the time, she went the normal route of college and received a scholarship to study at the University of Pittsburgh. She earned her degree in bacteriology and worked for a number of years as a lab technician in blood banks. In 1978, Zelda, in a pursuit of something more creative in her life, abandoned her cushy but mundane job and threw herself completely into acting. She made her movie debut as one of the little people in the Chevy Chase slapstick comedy Under the Rainbow (1981). It all came together so quickly with her second film Poltergeist (1982) in the scene-stealing role of Tangina, the saucy, self-confident, prune-faced "house cleaner" with the whispery, doll-like voice who is brought in to rid a suburban home of demonic possession. Co-writer/producer Spielberg claims he designed the psychic role specifically for a "little person". The film became an instant summertime hit and Zelda created absolute magic and wonderment with the testy role, receiving some of the movie's best reviews. The character actress went on to appear in the two "Poltergeist" sequels. The "Poltergeist" movie projects were eventually dubbed "cursed" due to the untimely deaths of some of its performers, particularly two of the three children of film parents Craig T. Nelson and JoBeth Williams. 22-year-old Dominique Dunne was slain in 1982 by a jealous ex-boyfriend only a few months after the first film's release, and angelic little Heather O'Rourke, age 12, died of an intestinal obstruction just months before Poltergeist III (1988) made it to the screen.
Although Zelda would not find a role quite up to the standards and popularity of Tangina, her subsequent career remained surprisingly active with a number of weird parts woven into both comedies and chillers -- often variations of her eccentric Tangina role. She played a mental patient in the Frances Farmer biopic Frances (1982), which showcased Jessica Lange in the Oscar-nominated title role; a squeaky-shoed organist in John Hughes sweet-sixteen comedy classic Sixteen Candles (1984) co-starring Brat Packers Molly Ringwald and Anthony Michael Hall; the demented mom in the gruesome, Spanish-made horror-thriller Anguish (1987) [aka Anguish], which has since reached cult status; a mentor witch in the comic fantasy Teen Witch (1989); a hermit in a National Lampoon-based slapstick Last Resort (1994); a betting clerk in the Sci-Fi adventure Timemaster (1995); an ill-fated nun in the thriller Little Witches (1996), and; a theatre director in the flick Critics and Other Freaks (1997).
Into the millennium, she made some odd, slapdash appearances in such minor fare as Maria & Jose (2000), Wishcraft (2002), Cages (2005), Angels with Angles (2005), Unbeatable Harold (2006) and Southland Tales (2006). In her last film, she furthered her horror icon status with a small cameo in the slim-budgeted indie Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon (2006) that also featured Robert Englund of "Freddy Krueger" fame. Zelda also found an "in" doing voiceovers, her doll-like tones ideal for cartoons and such, and in commercials promoting such items as Skittles candy. She enjoyed extended popularity on TV with a regular series role on the first couple of seasons of Picket Fences (1992). Her character later was killed off in a freakish accident (fell into a freezer!). In her last years she narrated, and "Exorcist" child star Linda Blair hosted, TV's Scariest Places on Earth (2000). The actress also appeared on stage in such productions as "Deathtrap" (as a psychic, of course), "To Kill a Mockingbird," "Suddenly, Last Summer," "The Slab Boys" and "Black Comedy". She also appeared as Yente in a production of "Fiddler on the Roof".
An outspoken social activist, Zelda was a staunch advocate for the rights of little people who formed the nonprofit Michael Dunn Memorial Repertory Theater Company in Los Angeles in 1985. The actress gained additional attention and respect, if not popularity (her career suffered for a time as a result), as an early and outspoken HIV/AIDS activist. As the poster mom for AIDS awareness, she valiantly appeared in a series of maternal newspaper/billboard advertisements imploring her gay son to practice safe sex. The series of ads ran from the mid-to-late 1980s. Zelda also participated in the first AIDS Project Los Angeles AIDS Walk and attended the 25th Anniversary Walk on October 12, 2009.
A couple of months before her death on January 27, 2010, Zelda suffered a heart attack. Complications set in (kidney and lung failure) and she passed away at age 76 on January 27, 2010, at Barlow Respiratory Hospital in Los Angeles, California. - Actress
- Soundtrack
Judy Holliday was born Judith Tuvim in New York City on June 21, 1921. Her mother, a piano teacher, was attending a play when she went into labor and made it to the hospital just in time. Judy was an only child. By the age of four, her mother had her enrolled in ballet school which fostered a life-long interest in show business. Two years later her parents divorced. In high school, Judy began to develop an interest in theater. She appeared in several high school plays. After graduation, she got a job in the Orson Welles Mercury Theater as a switchboard operator. Judy worked her way on the stage with appearance in Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C. and New York City. Judy toured on the nightclub circuit with a group called "The Revuers" founded by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. She went to Hollywood to make her first foray into the film world in Greenwich Village (1944). Most of her scenes ended up on the cutting room floor. Disappointed, but not discouraged, Judy earned two more roles that year in Something for the Boys (1944) and Winged Victory (1944). In the latter, Judy had a few lines of dialogue. Judy returned to New York to continue her stage career. She returned to Hollywood after five years to appear in Adam's Rib (1949) as Doris Attinger opposite screen greats Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy and Tom Ewell. With her success in that role, Judy was signed to play Billie Dawn in Born Yesterday (1950), a role which she originated on Broadway. She was nominated for and won the best actress Oscar for her performance. After filming The Marrying Kind (1952), Judy was summoned before the Un-American Activities Committee to testify about her political affiliations. Fortunately for her, she was not blacklisted as were many of her counterparts, but damage was done. Her film career was curtailed somewhat, but rebounded. She continued with her stage and musical efforts, but with limited time on the screen. After filming The Solid Gold Cadillac (1956), she was off-screen for four years. Her last film was the MGM production of Bells Are Ringing (1960) with Dean Martin and it was one of her best. Judy died two weeks before her 44th birthday in New York City on June 7, 1965.- Actress
- Soundtrack
The blonde, sultry, dreamy-eyed beauty of Dorothy Malone, who was born Mary Maloney in Chicago on January 29, 1924, took some time before it made an impact with American film-going audiences. But once she did, she played it for all it was worth in her one chance Academy Award-winning "bad girl" performance, a role quite unlike the classy and strait-laced lady herself.
Raised in Dallas, she was one of five children born to an accountant father and housewife mother. Two older sisters died of polio. Attending Ursuline Convent and Highland Park High School, she was quite popular (as "School Favorite"). She was also a noted female athlete while there and won several awards for swimming and horseback riding. Following graduation, she studied at Southern Methodist University with the intent of becoming a nurse, but a role in the college play "Starbound" happened to catch the eye of an RKO talent scout and she was offered a Hollywood contract.
The lovely brunette started off in typical RKO starlet mode with acting/singing/dancing/diction lessons and bit parts (billed as Dorothy Maloney) in such films as the Frank Sinatra musicals Higher and Higher (1943) and Step Lively (1944), a couple of the mystery "Falcon" entries and a showier role in Show Business (1944) with Eddie Cantor and George Murphy. RKO lost interest, however, after the two-year contract was up. Warner Bros., however, stepped up to the plate and offered the actress a contract. Now billed as Dorothy Malone, her third film offering with the studio finally injected some adrenaline into her floundering young career, when she earned the small role of a seductive book clerk in the Bogart/Bacall classic The Big Sleep (1946). Critics and audiences took notice of her captivating little part. As a reward, the studio nudged her up the billing ladder with more visible roles in Two Guys from Texas (1948), Romance on the High Seas (1948), South of St. Louis (1949) and Colorado Territory (1949), with the westerns showing off her equestrian prowess if not her acting ability.
Despite this positive movement, Warner Bros. did not extend Dorothy's contract in 1949 and she returned willingly back to her tight-knit family in her native Dallas. Taking a steadier job with an insurance agency, she happened to attend a work-related convention in New York City and grew fascinated with the big city. Deciding to recommit to her acting career, she moved to the Big Apple and studied at the American Theater Wing. In between her studies, she managed to find work on TV, which spurred freelancing "B" movie offers in the routine form of Saddle Legion (1951), The Bushwhackers (1951), the Martin & Lewis romp Scared Stiff (1953), Law and Order (1953), Jack Slade (1953), Pushover (1954) and Private Hell 36 (1954).
Things picked up noticeably once Dorothy went platinum blonde, which seemed to emphasize her overt and sensual beauty. First off was as a sister to Doris Day in Young at Heart (1954), a musical remake of Four Daughters (1938), back at Warner Bros. She garnered even better attention when she appeared in the war picture Battle Cry (1955), in which she shared torrid love scenes with film's newest heartthrob Tab Hunter, and continued the momentum with the reliable westerns Five Guns West (1955) and Tall Man Riding (1955) but not with melodramatic romantic dud Sincerely Yours (1955) which tried to sell to the audiences a heterosexual Liberace.
By this time she had signed with Universal. Following a few more westerns for good measure (At Gunpoint (1955), Tension at Table Rock (1956) and Pillars of the Sky (1956), Dorothy won the scenery-chewing role of wild, nymphomaniac Marylee Hadley in the Douglas Sirk soap opera Written on the Wind (1956) co-starring Rock Hudson, Lauren Bacall and Robert Stack. Stack and Malone had the showier roles and completely out-shined the two leads, both earning supporting Oscar nominations in the process. Stack lost in his category but Dorothy nabbed the trophy for her splendidly tramp, boozed-up Southern belle which was highlighted by her writhing mambo dance.
Unfortunately, Dorothy's long spell of mediocre filming did not end with all the hoopla she received for Written on the Wind (1956). The Tarnished Angels (1957), which reunited Malone with Hudson and Stack faltered, and Quantez (1957) with Fred MacMurray was just another run-of-the-mill western. Two major film challenges might have changed things with Man of a Thousand Faces (1957) as the unsympathetic first wife of James Cagney's Lon Chaney Sr, and as alcoholic actress Diana Barrymore in the biographic melodrama Too Much, Too Soon (1958). Cagney, however, overshadowed everyone in the first and the second was fatally watered down by the Production Code committee.
To compensate, Dorothy, at age 35 in 1959, finally was married -- to playboy actor Jacques Bergerac (Ginger Rogers's ex-husband). A daughter, Mimi, was born the following year. Fewer film offers, which included Warlock (1959) and The Last Voyage (1960), came her way as Dorothy focused more on family life. While a second daughter, Diane, was born in 1962, the turbulent marriage wouldn't last and their divorce became final in December 1964. A bitter custody battle ensued with Dorothy eventually winning primary custody.
It took the small screen to rejuvenate Dorothy's career in the mid-1960s when she earned top billing of TV's first prime time soap opera Peyton Place (1964). Dorothy, starring in Lana Turner's 1957 film role of Constance MacKenzie, found herself in a smash hit. The run wasn't entirely happy however. Doctors discovered blood clots on her lungs which required major surgery and she almost died. Lola Albright filled in until she was able to return. Just as bad, her the significance of her role dwindled with time and 20th Century-Fox finally wrote her and co-star Tim O'Connor off the show in 1968. Dorothy filed a breach of contract lawsuit which ended in an out-of-court settlement.
Her life on- and off-camera did not improve. Dorothy's second marriage to stockbroker Robert Tomarkin in 1969 would last only three months, and a third to businessman Charles Huston Bell managed about three years. Now-matronly roles in the films Winter Kills (1979), Vortex (1982), The Being (1981) and Rest in Pieces (1987), were few and far between a few TV-movies -- which included some "Peyton Place" revivals, did nothing to advance her. Malone returned and settled for good back in her native Dallas, returning to Hollywood only on occasion.
Dorothy's last film was a cameo in the popular thriller Basic Instinct (1992) as a friend to Sharon Stone. She will be remembered as one of those Hollywood stars who proved she had the talent but somehow got the short end of the stick when it came to quality films offered. She retired to Texas and died in Dallas shortly before her 94th birthday on January 19, 2018.- Writer
- Producer
- Actress
Brit Heyworth Marling was born in Chicago, Illinois, to Heidi (Johnson) and John Marling, both of whom work in real estate. She graduated from Georgetown University, with a bachelor's in economics, and was offered a job with Goldman Sachs, which she turned down in favour of a career as an artist.
She moved to Los Angeles to act and, after spending a couple of years exploring the movie industry and being offered roles as "the cute blonde in horror movies", she taught herself to write, reasoning that the best way to get decent parts was to write them, herself. She worked on two movies, simultaneously - one in the mornings, one in the afternoons - and eventually both Another Earth (2011) and Sound of My Voice (2011) premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2011.- Actress
- Producer
- Additional Crew
Born in New York City to legendary screen star Henry Fonda and Ontario-born New York socialite Frances Seymour Brokaw, Jane Seymour Fonda was destined early to an uncommon and influential life in the limelight. Although she initially showed little inclination to follow her father's trade, she was prompted by Joshua Logan to appear with her father in the 1954 Omaha Community Theatre production of "The Country Girl". Her interest in acting grew after meeting Lee Strasberg in 1958 and joining the Actors Studio. Her screen debut in Tall Story (1960) (directed by Logan) marked the beginning of a highly successful and respected acting career highlighted by two Academy Awards for her performances in Klute (1971) and Coming Home (1978), and five Oscar nominations for Best Actress in They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969), Julia (1977), The China Syndrome (1979), The Morning After (1986) and On Golden Pond (1981), which was the only film she made with her father. Her professional success contrasted with her personal life, which was often laden with scandal and controversy. Her appearance in several risqué movies (including Barbarella (1968)) by then-husband Roger Vadim was followed by what was to become her most debated and controversial period: her espousal of anti-establishment causes and especially her anti-war activities during the Vietnam War. Her political involvement continued with fellow activist and husband Tom Hayden in the late 1970s and early 1980s. In the 1980s she started the aerobic exercise craze with the publication of the "Jane Fonda's Workout Book". She and Hayden divorced, and she married broadcasting mogul Ted Turner in 1991.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Theresa Harris appeared with more stars of the Golden Era of Hollywood than anyone else. She sang, she danced, she appeared in movies and TV. She graced the screen with her magnetic presence and most times stole scenes from the top stars of the day every chance she got and made a lot of dull films worthwhile. Although stereotyped by receiving only maid roles, Theresa stepped outside the stereotype any chance she got, to show she was glamorous, classy, beautiful, and a true actress. While she often played maids, she always showed dignity, grace, and demanded respect. Theresa didn't exactly fit the mammy/maid stereotype fore she was a petite beauty, a stark contrast from Louise Beavers and Hattie McDaniel, and Theresa was one of the very few black women to not fit that stereotype on screen.
There were quite a few movies in which Theresa got a chance to let her light shine and make you forget her maid costume and see her as a talented actress. In the pre-Code classic Baby Face (1933), she and Barbara Stanwyck had equal screentime, which was rare between black and white actors at that time. Playing Chico, Stanwyck's friend and co-worker, Harris gave a moving and memorable performance that contributed to the film becoming one of the essentials of the classic genre. Theresa was allowed to be sexy, glamorous, and her own person, not simply a servant who jumped at her employer's every beck and call, a rarity for a black actress in a maid part in the 1930s, and a true friendship was shared between Stanwyck and Harris' characters, another rarity. In Professional Sweetheart (1933), Harris played a spunky, sexy maid who teaches Ginger Rogers a thing or two about being "hot", and ends up replacing Rogers as a singer, singing a hot song on the radio that turns on the white male listeners, another shocker and rarity at the time for a black actress. But pre-Code movies usually pushed the envelope, which shows in both 'Baby Face' and 'Professional Sweetheart'. Though Theresa played maid roles most of her movie career, she had showed moments of excellence in many other films such as Hold Your Man (1933), Black Moon (1934), Gangsters on the Loose (1937), Jezebel (1938), The Toy Wife (1938), Tell No Tales (1939), Buck Benny Rides Again (1940), Love Thy Neighbor (1940), Blossoms in the Dust (1941), Cat People (1942), and I Walked with a Zombie (1943), among others.
Theresa was a versatile talent; besides acting, she could sing beautifully and dance divinely, when she had the chance in such movies as Thunderbolt (1929), 'Baby Face', 'Professional Sweetheart', Banjo on My Knee (1936), 'Buck Benny Rides Again', What's Buzzin', Cousin? (1943), and The French Line (1953). When Theresa got the chance to show her beauty and sex appeal, it was often with her screen boyfriend, Eddie 'Rochester' Anderson; they were dynamic on screen together in 'Buck Benny Rides Again' and 'What's Buzzin', Cousin?'. In the former, they sing and dance tap, classical, Spanish, and swing in a musical number, "My, My".
Theresa Harris was perhaps the hardest-working woman in Hollywood, appearing in close to 90 films, working at every major studio with most of the big stars. She was respected by studio executives, producers, directors, and co-workers alike, who sometimes went out of their way to get her more lines and screentime. Harris married a doctor and retired from the movies in the late 1950s, living comfortably after having carefully invested the money she made during her career in the films. She was a patient woman who never gave up hope that there would come a time when she would be able to play more than just maid parts. Nevertheless, in every role, she displayed class, dignity, beauty, and true acting talent, not simply the old stereotypes associated with black actors at that time.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Theresa Harris appeared with more stars of the Golden Era of Hollywood than anyone else. She sang, she danced, she appeared in movies and TV. She graced the screen with her magnetic presence and most times stole scenes from the top stars of the day every chance she got and made a lot of dull films worthwhile. Although stereotyped by receiving only maid roles, Theresa stepped outside the stereotype any chance she got, to show she was glamorous, classy, beautiful, and a true actress. While she often played maids, she always showed dignity, grace, and demanded respect. Theresa didn't exactly fit the mammy/maid stereotype fore she was a petite beauty, a stark contrast from Louise Beavers and Hattie McDaniel, and Theresa was one of the very few black women to not fit that stereotype on screen.
There were quite a few movies in which Theresa got a chance to let her light shine and make you forget her maid costume and see her as a talented actress. In the pre-Code classic Baby Face (1933), she and Barbara Stanwyck had equal screentime, which was rare between black and white actors at that time. Playing Chico, Stanwyck's friend and co-worker, Harris gave a moving and memorable performance that contributed to the film becoming one of the essentials of the classic genre. Theresa was allowed to be sexy, glamorous, and her own person, not simply a servant who jumped at her employer's every beck and call, a rarity for a black actress in a maid part in the 1930s, and a true friendship was shared between Stanwyck and Harris' characters, another rarity. In Professional Sweetheart (1933), Harris played a spunky, sexy maid who teaches Ginger Rogers a thing or two about being "hot", and ends up replacing Rogers as a singer, singing a hot song on the radio that turns on the white male listeners, another shocker and rarity at the time for a black actress. But pre-Code movies usually pushed the envelope, which shows in both 'Baby Face' and 'Professional Sweetheart'. Though Theresa played maid roles most of her movie career, she had showed moments of excellence in many other films such as Hold Your Man (1933), Black Moon (1934), Gangsters on the Loose (1937), Jezebel (1938), The Toy Wife (1938), Tell No Tales (1939), Buck Benny Rides Again (1940), Love Thy Neighbor (1940), Blossoms in the Dust (1941), Cat People (1942), and I Walked with a Zombie (1943), among others.
Theresa was a versatile talent; besides acting, she could sing beautifully and dance divinely, when she had the chance in such movies as Thunderbolt (1929), 'Baby Face', 'Professional Sweetheart', Banjo on My Knee (1936), 'Buck Benny Rides Again', What's Buzzin', Cousin? (1943), and The French Line (1953). When Theresa got the chance to show her beauty and sex appeal, it was often with her screen boyfriend, Eddie 'Rochester' Anderson; they were dynamic on screen together in 'Buck Benny Rides Again' and 'What's Buzzin', Cousin?'. In the former, they sing and dance tap, classical, Spanish, and swing in a musical number, "My, My".
Theresa Harris was perhaps the hardest-working woman in Hollywood, appearing in close to 90 films, working at every major studio with most of the big stars. She was respected by studio executives, producers, directors, and co-workers alike, who sometimes went out of their way to get her more lines and screentime. Harris married a doctor and retired from the movies in the late 1950s, living comfortably after having carefully invested the money she made during her career in the films. She was a patient woman who never gave up hope that there would come a time when she would be able to play more than just maid parts. Nevertheless, in every role, she displayed class, dignity, beauty, and true acting talent, not simply the old stereotypes associated with black actors at that time.- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Paulette Goddard was a child model who debuted in "The Ziegfeld Follies" at the age of 13. She gained fame with the show as the girl on the crescent moon, and was married to a wealthy man, Edgar James, by the time she was 17. After her divorce she went to Hollywood in 1931, where she appeared in small roles in pictures for a number of studios. A stunning natural beauty, Paulette could mesmerize any man she met, a fact she was well aware of. One of her bigger roles in that period was as a blond "Goldwyn Girl" in the Eddie Cantor film The Kid from Spain (1932). In 1932 she met Charles Chaplin, and they soon became an item around town. He cast her in Modern Times (1936), which was a big hit, but her movie career was not going anywhere because of her relationship with Chaplin. They were secretly married in 1936, but the marriage failed and they were separated by 1940. It was her role as Miriam Aarons in The Women (1939), however, that got her a contract with Paramount. Paulette was one of the many actresses tested for the part of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind (1939), but she lost the part to Vivien Leigh and instead appeared with Bob Hope in The Cat and the Canary (1939), a good film but hardly in the same league as GWTW. The 1940s were Paulette's busiest period. She worked with Chaplin in The Great Dictator (1940), Cecil B. DeMille in Reap the Wild Wind (1942) and Burgess Meredith in The Diary of a Chambermaid (1946). She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in So Proudly We Hail! (1943). Her star faded in the late 1940s, however, and she was dropped by Paramount in 1949. After a couple of "B" movies, she left films and went to live in Europe as a wealthy expatriate; she married German novelist Erich Maria Remarque in the late 1950s. She was coaxed back to the screen once more, although it was the small screen, for the television movie The Female Instinct (1972).- Actress
- Soundtrack
Actress and singer Ann-Margret is one of the most famous sex symbols and actresses of the 1960s and beyond. She continued her career through the following decades and into the 21st century.
Ann-Margret was born Ann-Margret Olsson in Valsjöbyn, Jämtland County, Sweden, to Anna Regina (Aronsson) and Carl Gustav Olsson, who worked for an electrical company. She came to America at age 6. She studied at Northwestern University and left for Las Vegas to pursue a career as a singer. Ann-Margret was discovered by George Burns and soon afterward got both a record deal at RCA and a film contract at 20th Century Fox. In 1961, her single "I Just Don't Understand" charted in the Top 20 of the Billboard Hot 100 Charts. Her acting debut followed the same year as Bette Davis' daughter in Frank Capra's Pocketful of Miracles (1961). She appeared in the musical State Fair (1962) a year later before her breakthrough in 1963. With Bye Bye Birdie (1963) and Viva Las Vegas (1964) opposite Elvis Presley, she became a Top 10 Box Office star, teen idol and even Golden Globe nominated actress. She was marketed as Hollywood's hottest young star and in the years to come got awarded the infamous nickname "sex kitten." Her following pictures were sometimes ripped apart by critics (Bus Riley's Back in Town (1965) and The Swinger (1966)), sometimes praised (The Cincinnati Kid (1965)). She couldn't escape being typecast because of her great looks. By the late 1960s, her career stalled, and she turned to Italy for new projects. She returned and, by 1970, she was back in the public image with Hollywood films (R.P.M. (1970) opposite Anthony Quinn), Las Vegas sing-and-dance shows and her own television specials. She finally overcame her image with her Oscar-nominated turn in Mike Nichols' Carnal Knowledge (1971) and succeeded in changing her image from sex kitten to respected actress. A near-fatal accident at a Lake Tahoe show in 1972 only momentarily stopped her career. She was again Oscar-nominated in 1975 for Tommy (1975), the rock opera film of the British rock band The Who. Her career continued with successful films throughout the late 1970s and into the 1980s. She starred next to Anthony Hopkins in Magic (1978) and appeared in pictures co-starring Walter Matthau, Gene Hackman, Glenda Jackson and Roy Scheider. She even appeared in a television remake of Tennessee Williams's masterpiece play "A Streetcar Named Desire" in 1983. Another late career highlight for her was Grumpy Old Men (1993) as the object of desire for Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau. She continues to act in movies today.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Jenny Agutter was born on December 20, 1952, in Taunton, Somerset, England, UK. The daughter of an army officer, she spent her childhood traveling and living in different countries. Her film career began at the age of 12 in East of Sudan (1964), which was quickly followed by Ballerina: Part 1 (1966) and Ballerina: Part 2 (1966), and A Man Could Get Killed (1966). Other films and television appearances in her early career include Gates to Paradise (1968), Long After Summer (1967), Star! (1968), I Start Counting (1970), The Great Inimitable Mr. Dickens (1970), and The Wild Duck (1971).
In 1970, she appeared in what was her real big break as a child star: The Railway Children (1970), as "Bobbie". The next year, Hollywood called and she spent several years there, appearing in such works as The Cherry Orchard (1971), Walkabout (1971), and The Snow Goose (1971) with Richard Harris, for which she received an Emmy Award. She also appeared in the critically acclaimed A War of Children (1972) and Shelley (1972).
In 1976, Jenny really came to the attention of US film audiences with her starring role in the science-fiction classic Logan's Run (1976) with Michael York. Though not a critical favorite, it was a huge box-office success and spawned a television series. She also starred alongside Richard Chamberlain in a well-received made-for-TV version of the famous Dumas tale The Man in the Iron Mask (1977) and turned in a solid performance in the WW II thriller The Eagle Has Landed (1976) with Michael Caine and Donald Sutherland. The next year, she starred in Peter Shaffer's weighty Equus (1977) as "Jill Mason", alongside Richard Burton. Among her other TV and film work during the 1970s were Dominique (1979), School Play (1979), and The Riddle of the Sands (1979).
In 1981, she played "Desdemona" opposite William Marshall in The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice (1981). Other Shakespeare performances include "King Lear", Love's Labour's Lost (1985) as "Rosaline" for the BBC and Romeo & Juliet (1993) as "Lady Capulet". During this time, she was in numerous films and television series, including Sweet William (1980), Beulah Land (1980), The Survivor (1981), Amy (1981), and one of the films for which she is most fondly remembered, An American Werewolf in London (1981). She also appeared in This Office Life (1984), Secret Places (1984), Silas Marner (1985), Dark Tower (1987), Miss Right (1982), and King of the Wind (1990).
In the 1990s, she concentrated mainly on television, with roles in TECX (1990); Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less (1990); Red Dwarf (1988); The All New Alexei Sayle Show (1994); The Buccaneers (1995); And the Beat Goes On (1996); September (1996) with Edward Fox, Michael York, Virginia McKenna, and Jacqueline Bisset; A Respectable Trade (1998) with Warren Clarke, Anna Massey, and Richard Briers. Her theatrical films during this period included Darkman (1990) with Liam Neeson; and Blue Juice (1995) with Sean Pertwee, Ewan McGregor, and Catherine Zeta-Jones. She also appeared as "Mrs. Bruce" in two feature-length episodes of the popular ITV series Bramwell (1995) in which she starred with Jemma Redgrave. She has also made several guest appearances in TV shows such as The Red Dwarf (1998); Boon (1986); The Equalizer (1985) with Edward Woodward; The Twilight Zone (1985); Magnum, P.I. (1980) and The Six Million Dollar Man (1974).
Jenny married to Johan Tham in August 1990. They have one son Jonathan, born in December 1990 and live in Cornwall, England, UK. Her particular love is charity work for The Diabetic Association and NCH Action for Children - a charity which provides home and other help for homeless children - with which she has been involved for many years.- Actress
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She won a beauty contest at age fourteen. In 1920 her mother, Edith Shearer, took Norma and her sister Athole Shearer (Mrs. Howard Hawks) to New York. Ziegfeld rejected her for his "Follies," but she got work as an extra in several movies. She spent much money on eye doctor's services trying to correct her cross-eyed stare caused by a muscle weakness. Irving Thalberg had seen her early acting efforts and, when he joined Louis B. Mayer in 1923, gave her a five year contract. He thought she should retire after their marriage, but she wanted bigger parts. In 1927, she insisted on firing the director Viktor Tourjansky because he was unsure of her cross-eyed stare. Her first talkie was in The Trial of Mary Dugan (1929); four movies later, she won an Oscar in The Divorcee (1930). She intentionally cut down film exposure during the 1930s, relying on major roles in Thalberg's prestige projects: The Barretts of Wimpole Street (1934) and Romeo and Juliet (1936) (her fifth Oscar nomination). Thalberg died of a second heart attack in September, 1936, at age 37. Norma wanted to retire, but MGM more-or-less forced her into a six-picture contract. David O. Selznick offered her the part of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind (1939), but public objection to her cross-eyed stare killed the deal. She starred in The Women (1939), turned down the starring role in Mrs. Miniver (1942), and retired in 1942. Later that year she married Sun Valley ski instructor Martin Arrouge, eleven years younger than she (he waived community property rights). From then on, she shunned the limelight; she was in very poor health the last decade of her life.- Actress
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Jennifer Jason Leigh was born Jennifer Lee Morrow in Los Angeles, California, the daughter of writer Barbara Turner and actor Vic Morrow. Her father was of Russian Jewish descent and her mother was of Austrian Jewish ancestry. She is the sister of Carrie Ann Morrow and half-sister of actress Mina Badie.
Jennifer's parents divorced when she was two. Jennifer worked in her first film at the age of nine, in a nonspeaking role for the film Death of a Stranger (1973). At 14 she attended summer acting workshops given by Lee Strasberg and later landed a role in the Disney TV movie The Young Runaways (1978). She received her Screen Actors Guild membership for an episode of the TV series Baretta (1975) when she was 16. Jennifer performed in several TV movies and dropped out of Pacific Palisades High School six weeks short of graduation for her major role in the film Eyes of a Stranger (1981). Her first major success came as the female lead in Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982).
Jennifer was married to writer/director Noah Baumbach from 2005 to 2013, and the two have a son.- Actress
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Lauren Bacall was born Betty Joan Perske on September 16, 1924, in New York City. She was the daughter of Natalie Weinstein-Bacal, a Romanian Jewish immigrant, and William Perske, who was born in New Jersey, to Polish Jewish parents. Her family was middle-class, with her father working as a salesman and her mother as a secretary. They divorced when she was five and she rarely saw her father after that.
As a school girl, she originally wanted to be a dancer, but later switched gears to head into acting. She studied at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York, after attending She was educated at Highland Manor, a private boarding school in Tarrytown, New York (through the generosity of wealthy uncles), and then at Julia Richman High School, which enabled her to get her feet wet in some off-Broadway productions.
Out of school, she entered modeling and, because of her beauty, appeared on the cover of Harper's Bazaar, one of the most popular magazines in the US. The wife of famed director Howard Hawks spotted the picture in the publication and arranged with her husband to have Lauren take a screen test. As a result, which was entirely positive, she was given the part of Marie Browning in To Have and Have Not (1944), a thriller opposite Humphrey Bogart, when she was just 19 years old. This not only set the tone for a fabulous career but also one of Hollywood's greatest love stories (she married Bogart in 1945). It was also the first of several Bogie-Bacall films.
After 1945's Confidential Agent (1945), Lauren received second billing in The Big Sleep (1946) with Bogart. The mystery, in the role of Vivian Sternwood Rutledge, was a resounding success. Although she was making one film a year, each production would be eagerly awaited by the public. In 1947, again with her husband, Lauren starred in the thriller Dark Passage (1947). The film kept movie patrons on the edge of their seats. The following year, she starred with Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, and Lionel Barrymore in Key Largo (1948). The crime drama was even more of a nail biter than her previous film.
In 1950, Lauren starred in Bright Leaf (1950), a drama set in 1894. It was a film of note because she appeared without her husband - her co-star was Gary Cooper. In 1953, Lauren appeared in her first comedy as Schatze Page in How to Marry a Millionaire (1953). The film, with co-stars Marilyn Monroe and Betty Grable, was a smash hit all across the theaters of America.
After filming Designing Woman (1957), which was released in 1957, Humphrey Bogart died on January 14 from throat cancer. Devastated at being a widow, Lauren returned to the silver screen with The Gift of Love (1958) in 1958 opposite Robert Stack. The production turned out to be a big disappointment. Undaunted, Lauren moved back to New York City and appeared in several Broadway plays to huge critical acclaim. She was enjoying acting before live audiences and the audiences in turn enjoyed her fine performances.
Lauren was away from the big screen for five years, but she returned in 1964 to appear in Shock Treatment (1964) and Sex and the Single Girl (1964). The latter film was a comedy starring Henry Fonda and Tony Curtis. In 1966, Lauren starred in Harper (1966) with Paul Newman and Julie Harris, which was one of former's signature films.
Alternating her time between films and the stage, Lauren returned in 1974's Murder on the Orient Express (1974). The film, based on Agatha Christie's best-selling book was a huge hit. It also garnered Ingrid Bergman her third Oscar. Actually, the huge star-studded cast helped to ensure its success. Two years later, in 1976, Lauren co-starred with John Wayne in The Shootist (1976). The film was Wayne's last - he died from cancer in 1979. In late 1979, Lauren appeared with her good friend, James Garner, in a double episode, Lions, Tigers, Monkeys and Dogs (1979), of his Rockford Files series.
For Lauren's next film role, she appeared in a large ensemble film, HealtH (1980), which again paired her with James Garner, and in 1981, she played an actress being stalked by a crazed admirer in The Fan (1981). The thriller was absolutely fascinating with Lauren in the lead role, again playing opposite her good friend James Garner, making three straight screen roles with Lauren opposite James Garner. After that production, Lauren was away from films again, this time for seven years. In the interim, she again appeared on the stages of Broadway. When she returned, it was for the filming of 1988's Appointment with Death (1988) and Mr. North (1988). After 1990's Misery (1990) and several made for television films, Lauren appeared in 1996's My Fellow Americans (1996), a comedy romp with Jack Lemmon and James Garner as two ex-presidents and their escapades. In 1997, Lauren appeared in The Mirror Has Two Faces (1996), in one of the best roles of her later career, opposite Barbra Streisand, where Lauren was nominated as Best Actress in a Supporting Role by both the Academy and the Golden Globes, winning the Golden Globe for the role.
Despite her age and failing health, she made a small-scale comeback in the English-language dub of Hayao Miyazaki's Howl's Moving Castle (2004) ("Howl's Moving Castle," based on the young-adult novel by Diana Wynne Jones) as the Witch of the Waste, and several other roles through 2008, but thereafter acting endeavors for the beloved actress became increasingly rare. Lauren Bacall died on 12 August 2014, five weeks short of her 90th birthday.