Ruth Gordon
pictured in 1919
Born	Ruth Gordon Jones (1896-10-30)October 30, 1896 Quincy, Massachusetts United States
Died	August 28, 1985(1985-08-28) (aged 88) Edgartown, Massachusetts United States
Occupation	Actress/Writer
Years active	1915–1985
Spouse	Gregory Kelly (1921-1927) Garson Kanin (1942-1985)

Ruth Gordon Jones (October 30, 1896 – August 28, 1985), better known as Ruth Gordon, was an American actress and writer.^[1] She was perhaps best known for her film roles such as Minnie Castevet, Rosemary's overly solicitous neighbor in Rosemary's Baby, as the eccentric Maude in Harold and Maude and as the mother of Orville Boggs in the Clint Eastwood film Every Which Way but Loose. In addition to her acting career, Gordon wrote numerous well-known plays, film scripts and books. Gordon won an Academy Award, an Emmy and two Golden Globe awards for her acting, as well as three Academy Award nominations for her writing.

Early life[link]

Gordon was born at 31 Marion Street in Quincy, Massachusetts.^[2] She was the only child of Annie Tapley (née Ziegler) and Clinton Jones, a factory foreman who had been a ship's captain. She was baptized an Episcopalian.^[3][4] Prior to graduating from Quincy High School, she wrote to several of her favorite actresses for an autographed picture. A personal reply she received from Hazel Dawn (whom she had seen in a stage production of The Pink Lady) inspired her to go into acting.^[2] Although her father was skeptical of her chances of success in a difficult profession, he took his daughter to New York in 1914, where he enrolled her in the American Academy of Dramatic Arts.

Early career[link]

Ruth Gordon began her career early, posing as a picture baby for Mellin's food.^[5] In 1915, Gordon appeared as an extra in silent films that were shot in Fort Lee, New Jersey, including as a dancer in The Whirl of Life, a film based on the lives of Vernon and Irene Castle.^[6]

That same year, she made her Broadway debut in a revival of Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up, in the role of Nibs (one of the Lost Boys), appearing onstage with Maude Adams and earning a favorable mention from the powerful critic Alexander Woollcott. Woollcott, who described her favorably as "ever so gay," would become her friend and mentor.^[2] In 1918, Gordon played Lola Pratt in the Broadway adaptation of Booth Tarkington's Seventeen opposite actor Gregory Kelly, who later acted with her in North American tours of Frank Craven's The First Year and Tarkington's Clarence and Tweedles. Kelly became her first husband in 1921, but died of heart disease in 1927, at the age of 36. Gordon in 1927 and 1928, had been enjoying a comeback, appearing on Broadway as Bobby in Maxwell Anderson's Saturday's Children, performing in a serious role after having been typecast for years as a "beautiful, but dumb" character.^[2]

In 1929, Gordon was starring in the title role of "Serena Blandish" when her only child, a son, Jones Harris, was born out of wedlock from a relationship with that Broadway show's producer, Jed Harris.

Gordon continued to act on the stage throughout the 1930s, including notable runs as Mattie in Ethan Frome, Margery Pinchwife in William Wycherley's Restoration comedy The Country Wife at London's Old Vic and on Broadway, and Nora Helmer in Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House at Central City, Colorado, and on Broadway.

Career[link]

Gordon was signed to an MGM film contract for a brief period in the early 1930s but did not make a movie for the company until she acted opposite Greta Garbo in Two-Faced Woman in 1941. She had better luck at other studios in Hollywood, appearing in supporting roles in a string of films, including Abe Lincoln in Illinois (as Mary Todd Lincoln), Dr. Ehrlich's Magic Bullet (as Mrs. Ehrlich) and Action in the North Atlantic, in the early 1940s. Gordon's Broadway acting appearances in the 1940s included Iris in Paul Vincent Carroll's The Strings, My Lord, Are False and Natasha in Katharine Cornell and Guthrie McClintic's revival of Anton Chekhov's Three Sisters, as well as leading roles in her own plays, Over Twenty-One and The Leading Lady.

Gordon married second husband, writer Garson Kanin, who was 16 years her junior, in 1942. Gordon and Kanin collaborated on the screenplays for the Katharine Hepburn – Spencer Tracy films Adam's Rib (1949) and Pat and Mike (1952). Both films were directed by George Cukor. The couple were close friends of Hepburn and Tracy, and incorporated elements of their real personalities in the films. Gordon and Kanin received Academy Awards nominations for both of those screenplays, as well as for that of a prior film, A Double Life (1947), which was also directed by Cukor.

In 1953's The Actress, Gordon's film adaptation of her own autobiographical play, Years Ago, became a Hollywood production, with Jean Simmons portraying the girl from Quincy, Massachusetts, who convinced her sea captain father to let her go to New York to become an actress. Gordon would go on to write three volumes of memoirs in the 1970s: My Side, Myself Among Others and An Open Book.

Gordon continued her on-stage acting career in the 1950s, and was nominated for a 1956 Tony, for Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play, for her portrayal of Dolly Levi in Thornton Wilder's The Matchmaker, a role she also played in London, Edinburgh and Berlin.

In 1966, Gordon was nominated for an Oscar and won a Golden Globe award as Best Supporting Actress for Inside Daisy Clover opposite Natalie Wood. It was her first nomination for acting. Three years later, in 1969, she won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for Rosemary's Baby, a film adaptation of Ira Levin's bestselling horror novel about a satanic cult residing in an Upper West Side apartment building in Manhattan. In accepting the award, Gordon thanked the Academy by saying, "I can't tell you how encouraging a thing like this is...And thank all of you who voted for me, and to everyone who didn't: please, excuse me", which drew laughs because at the time she had been in theater for fifty years and was seventy-two years old.

Gordon won another Golden Globe for Rosemary's Baby, and was nominated again, in 1971, for her role as Maude in the cult classic Harold and Maude (with Bud Cort as her love interest).

She went on to appear in twenty-two more films and at least that many television appearances through her seventies and eighties, including such successful sitcoms as Rhoda (as Carlton the invisible doorman's mother, which earned her another Emmy nomination) and Newhart. She also guest-starred on the episode Columbo: Try and Catch Me. She made countless talk show appearances, in addition to hosting Saturday Night Live in 1977.

Gordon won an Emmy Award for a guest appearance on the sitcom Taxi, for a 1978 episode called "Sugar Mama," in which her character tries to solicit the services of a taxi driver, played by series star Judd Hirsch, as a male escort.

Her last Broadway appearance was as Mrs. Warren in George Bernard Shaw's Mrs. Warren's Profession, produced by Joseph Papp at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre in 1976. In the summer of 1976, Gordon starred in the leading role of her own play, Ho! Ho! Ho! at the Cape Playhouse in Dennis, Massachusetts. She had a minor but memorable role as Ma Boggs the mother of Orville Boggs (Geoffrey Lewis) in the Clint Eastwood films Every Which Way but Loose and Any Which Way You Can.

In 1983, Gordon was awarded the Women in Film Crystal Award for outstanding women who, through their endurance and the excellence of their work, have helped to expand the role of women within the entertainment industry.^[7]

Harold and Maude and Adam's Rib have both been selected for preservation in the National Film Registry of the United States Library of Congress.

Gordon died from a stroke in Edgartown, Massachusetts in 1985. A small theater in Westboro, Massachusetts and an outdoor amphitheater in Quincy, Massachusetts were named in her honor.^[8]

Body of work[link]

Filmography[link]

Television[link]

Writer[link]

Broadway appearances[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Biography portal

• Ruth Gordon at the Internet Movie Database
• Ruth Gordon at the Internet Broadway Database

Hope Lange
in Peyton Place (1957)
Born	Hope Elise Ross Lange (1933-11-28)November 28, 1933 Redding, Connecticut, U.S.
Died	December 19, 2003(2003-12-19) (aged 70) Santa Monica, California, U.S.
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1942–1998
Spouse	Don Murray (1956–1961) Alan J. Pakula (1963–1971) Charles Hollerith, Jr. (1986–2003)

Hope Elise Ross Lange (November 28, 1933 – December 19, 2003)^[1] was an American film, stage and television actress.

Early life[link]

A 15-year-old Hope Lange modeling the "Man-from-Mars, Radio Hat", 1949

Lange was born into a theatrical family in Redding, Connecticut.^[2] Her father, John George Lange (1885–1942), was a cellist and the music arranger for Florenz Ziegfeld and conductor for Henry Cohen; her mother, Minette (née Buddecke) (1898–1970), was an actress.^[3] They had three daughters, Minelda (1922–2004), Joy, (1927–2007), and Hope, and a son, David.^[4][5][6] John worked in New York City and the family moved to Greenwich Village when Hope was a young child.

Hope sang with other children in the play Life, Laughter and Tears, which opened at the Booth Theatre in March 1942.^[7] At age 9, Lange had a speaking part in the award-winning Broadway play The Patriots, which opened in January 1943.^[8][9]

John Lange died in September 1942 but the family stayed in New York City.^[10] Minette ran a restaurant on Macdougal Street near Washington Square Park from 1944 to 1956.^[3] The name was "Minette's of Washington Square", although some sources confuse it with "Minetta Tavern", an Italian restaurant on Macdougal Street founded in 1937. The entire family worked in the restaurant; the oldest daughter, Minelda, ran the cash register while Joy and Hope waited on tables.^[11][12]

While attending high school; Lange studied dance, modeled, and worked in the family restaurant. She sometimes walked the dog of former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, who had a nearby apartment.^[13] When her photo appeared in the newspaper, she received an offer to work as a New York City advertising model.^[14] She appeared on the June 1949 cover of Radio-Electronics magazine wearing the "Man from Mars" Radio Hat. This portable radio built into a pith helmet was a sensation in 1949.^[15]

Lange attended college for two years at Reed College in Oregon and at Barmore Junior College in New York. She met her future husband, Don Murray, at Barmore.^[16]

Career[link]

She began working in television in the 1950s with appearances on Kraft Television Theatre, which caught the eye of a Hollywood producer. Lange came to prominence in her first film role in Bus Stop with Marilyn Monroe and Don Murray, whom she married on April 14, 1956. Murray later said that Monroe grew jealous of another blonde being hired for the movie and asked the studio producers to dye Lange's blonde hair light brown.^[2]

Hope Lange in Death Wish (1974).

As a result of favorable reviews, Lange landed a major role in the then-risqué 1957 film Peyton Place. Her strong performance earned her a nomination for a Golden Globe Award and another for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. She would become a rather well-recognized supporting actress of ingénue roles. Lange later said that she became somewhat typecast in her ingénue film appearances and this is why her movie career was short-lived. ^[17]

She went on to appear in Nicholas Ray's 1957 film, The True Story of Jesse James as James' wife, opposite Robert Wagner. She appeared in The Young Lions alongside Montgomery Clift. She starred as the wife of Jeffrey Hunter's character in Anton Myrer's wartime drama In Love and War in 1958. These roles eventually lead to Lange earning top billing in 1959's The Best of Everything, with Suzy Parker and Joan Crawford.^[2]

Lange appeared as Elvis Presley's older psychologist love interest in Wild in the Country in 1961, despite being only 26 at the time. She then appeared in Frank Capra's final movie, A Pocketful of Miracles, alongside Glenn Ford. The next year, she appeared with Ford again in the romantic comedy Love Is a Ball.^[2]

Lange returned to television for a 1966 role in the series The Fugitive (1963). She starred from 1968 to 1970 in the popular television series, The Ghost & Mrs. Muir for which she earned two Emmy Awards and a Golden Globe Award nomination. This success was followed by three seasons on The New Dick Van Dyke Show as Dick Van Dyke's wife, Jenny Preston, from 1971 to 1974, declining to return for a fourth season of the show.^[2] She also appeared in twelve television movies. In 1977, she returned to the Broadway stage where her acting career had originally begun. She also played the wife of Charles Bronson in the original Death Wish. In 1985, she appeared in A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge and in 1986, she took a role as Laura Dern's mother in David Lynch's Blue Velvet. She took a Broadway role in Same Time, Next Year and then made appearances in the television movie based on Danielle Steel's Message from Nam and in 1994's Clear and Present Danger.

Lange made appearances in the Maine town in which Peyton Place had been filmed during the film's 40th anniversary celebrations in 1998.^[2]

Personal life[link]

Date of birth[link]

Lange's year of birth is often reported as 1931, but the correct year is 1933. A possible source of this error is the Reader's Digest Almanac and Yearbook.^[18] It has shown the 1931 date from as early as 1980 to the 2009 issue. The 1976 and earlier editions give the year of birth as 1933.^[19] Other references such as Chase's Annual Events have always shown 1933,^[1] as does her Social Security Death Index entry.

The 1933 year also matches the ages given in newspaper accounts of Lange in her youth. The New York Times covered the annual "Young People's Concert" awards given at Carnegie Hall. In April 1945, Lange was awarded ^[20] and again in April 1946, when her age was given as 12.^[21] Lange's age of 12 in April 1946 would correspond to a birthdate in November 1933, not 1931.

Also, a short feature story was published in February 1951 about Hope Lange's culinary skills. The first paragraph gives the biography of a seventeen-year-old Hope Lange of Greenwich Village, New York. Her late father was "director of music for Florenz Ziegfield" and her mother had a catering business. In addition to modeling, acting, and dancing; Hope could make "terrific" sandwiches. The article gives her recipes for "Sardine Strips" and "Cheese Ribbon" sandwiches.^[22] Born in 1933, Lange would have been 17 years old in February 1951.

Relationships[link]

Lange's first marriage was to actor, Don Murray, in 1956; they had two children,^[2] actor, Christopher Murray, and photographer, Patricia Murray. Lange left Don Murray in 1961 for actor Glenn Ford, associate producer and co-star of A Pocketful of Miracles. She and Ford never married.^[2] She then left acting for three years after her October 19, 1963, marriage to producer-director, Alan J. Pakula, whom she divorced in 1971.

In 1972 she also dated Frank Sinatra and began a relationship with married novelist, John Cheever.^[23] In 1986 she married theatrical producer, Charles Hollerith, with whom she remained the rest of her life.^[2]

Politics[link]

Lange was a lifelong Democrat and in 1960 she was in attendance at the Democratic Convention in Los Angeles, California^[24].

Death[link]

Lange died on December 19, 2003, at St. John's Hospital in Santa Monica, California, as a result of an ischemic colitis infection at the age of 70.^[25]

Filmography[link]

Awards and nominations[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Hope Lange

• Hope Lange at the Internet Broadway Database
• Hope Lange at the Internet Movie Database
• Hope Lange at the TCM Movie Database
• Hope Lange at AllRovi

Garson Kanin
Spencer Tracy (left) and Garson Kanin (right) at the Long Island Studios of the Army Signal Corps for the recording of Tracy's narration of the "Ring of Steel" on February 19, 1942.
Born	(1912-11-24)November 24, 1912 Rochester, New York, USA
Died	March 13, 1999(1999-03-13) (aged 86) New York City, New York, USA
Spouse	Ruth Gordon (1942-1985) Marian Seldes (1990-1999)

Garson Kanin (November 24, 1912 – March 13, 1999) was a prolific American writer and director of plays and films.

Stage Career[link]

Garson Kanin began his show business career as a jazz musician, burlesque comedian, and actor. He graduated from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City and made his Broadway debut in 1933's "Little Ol' Boy". In 1935, Kanin was cast in a George Abbott play and soon became Mr. Abbott's assitant. Kanin made his Broadway debut as a director in 1936, at the age of twenty-four, with "Hitch Your Wagon".

His 1946 play Born Yesterday, which he also directed, ran for 1,642 performances. Kanin worked, uncredited, on the screenplay of the 1950 film adaptation.^[1]

His other stage work includes directing The Diary of Anne Frank (1955), which ran for 717 performances, and the musical Funny Girl (1964), which ran for 1,348 performances.

Mr. Kanin wrote and directed his last play, "Peccadillo", in 1985, the year he was inducted into the Theatre Hall of Fame.

Film career[link]

His first film as a director was A Man to Remember (1938), which The New York Times considered one of the ten best films of 1938. Kanin was twenty-six at the time. Other directing credits include "The Great Man Votes " (1939),"My Favorite Wife" (1940), "They Knew What they Wanted" (1940) and "Tom Dick and Harry" (1941).

Mr. Kanin's Hollywood career was interrupted by the draft. He served in the United States Army from 1941-1945. During this time Kanin, with Carol Reed, co-directed General Dwight D. Eisenhower's official record of the Allied Invasion, the Academy-award-winning documentary "The True Glory". (It was also during this time he began writing what would become his greatest play, "Born Yesterday").

Kanin's best-remembered screenplays, however, were written in collaboration with his wife, actress Ruth Gordon, whom he married in 1942. Together, they wrote the Spencer Tracy/Katharine Hepburn film comedies Adam's Rib (1949) and Pat and Mike (1952), as well as A Double Life (1947), starring Ronald Colman, all directed by George Cukor.

Television Career[link]

In the 1950's through the 1980's, Mr. Kanin adapted several of his stories and plays for television, most notably "Mr. Broadway" (1964), and "Moviola" (1980).

Kanin's best-selling novel "Smash", about the pre-Broadway tryout of a musical comedy, has recently been adapted into a successful television series.

Personal Life[link]

Mr. Kanin was married to his frequent collaborator, Academy-award winning actress Ruth Gordon from 1942 to her death in 1985.

In 1990, Kanin, married the celebrated stage actress Marian Seldes, who survives him.

In 1999, Kanin died at age 86 in New York City of undisclosed causes.

Acquaintances and memorable sayings[link]

He was a colleague of Thornton Wilder, who mentored him, and an admirer of the work of Frank Capra. Kanin said "I'd rather be Capra than God, if there is a Capra." Kanin and Katharine Hepburn were the only witnesses to Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh's wedding in California on August 31, 1940. In 1941, he and Katharine Hepburn worked with his brother Michael Kanin and Ring Lardner, Jr., on the early drafts of what would become Woman of the Year, right before Garson enlisted in the Army. He is also quoted as saying, "When your work speaks for itself, don't interrupt."

His most famous quote, from his hit play "Born Yesterday", is on a New York City Public Library plaque on a 41st Street sidewalk: "I want everyone to be smart. As smart as they can be. A world of ignorant people is too dangerous to live in."

Selected publications[link]

• Remembering Mr. Maugham; with an introduction by Noël Coward, 1966
• Hollywood..Stars and Starlets, Tycoons, Moviemakers, Frauds, Hopefuls, Great Lovers; New York, Viking Press, 1967
• Moviola, New York, Simon & Shuster, 1979
• Smash. New York: Viking, 1980
• Tracy and Hepburn - an intimate memoir, Viking Press, New York, 1971

Novels

• Blow Up a Storm
• Do Re Mi
• The Rat Race
• Where It's At

Plays

• Born Yesterday
• The Smile of the World
• The Rat Race
• The Live Wire
• Come on Strong

Musicals

• Fledermaus
• Do Re Mi

Filmography[link]

• A Man to Remember (1938) - director
• Next Time I Marry (1938) - director
• The Great Man Votes (1939) - director
• Bachelor Mother (1939) - director
• They Knew What They Wanted (1940) - director
• My Favorite Wife (1940) - director
• Tom, Dick and Harry (1941) - director
• The More the Merrier (1942) - writer
• The True Glory (1945) - director
• From This Day Forward (1946) - writer
• A Double Life (1947) - writer
• Adam's Rib (1949) - writer
• Pat and Mike (1952) - writer
• The Marrying Kind (1952) - writer
• It Should Happen to You (1954) - writer
• The Girl Can't Help It (1956) - original story
• High Time (1960) - original story
• The Rat Race (1960) - writer
• Some Kind of Nut (1968) - writer, director
• Where It's At (1969) - writer, director

References[link]

External links[link]

Biography portal

• Garson Kanin at the Internet Movie Database
• Garson Kanin at the Internet Broadway Database

• Garson Kanin Official Website

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Robert Redford
Robert Redford in 2006
Born	Charles Robert Redford, Jr. (1936-08-18) August 18, 1936 (age 75) Santa Monica, California, United States
Occupation	Actor, film director, producer, businessman, environmentalist, philanthropist
Years active	1959–present
Spouse	Lola van Wagenen (1958–1985; divorced) Sibylle Szaggars (2009–present)[1]
Children	Scott (deceased), Shauna, Jamie, Amy

Charles Robert Redford, Jr. (born August 18, 1936),^[2] better known as Robert Redford, is an American actor, film director, producer, businessman, environmentalist, philanthropist, and founder of the Sundance Film Festival. He has received two Oscars: one in 1981 for directing Ordinary People, and one for Lifetime Achievement in 2002. In 2010 he was awarded French Knighthood in the Legion d'Honneur. At the height of his fame in the 1970s and 1980s, he was often described as one of the world's most attractive men and remains one of the most popular movie stars. His popular films include Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), Downhill Racer (1969), Jeremiah Johnson (1972), The Candidate (1972), The Sting (1973), The Way We Were (1973), The Great Gatsby (1974), Three Days of the Condor (1975), The Great Waldo Pepper (1975), All the President's Men (1976), A Bridge Too Far (1977), The Natural (1984), Out of Africa (1985), Sneakers (1992), Indecent Proposal (1993),The Last Castle and Spy Game (2001). As a filmmaker, his notable films include Ordinary People (1980), The Milagro Beanfield War (1988), A River Runs Through It (1992), Quiz Show (1994), The Horse Whisperer (1998) and The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000).

Early life[link]

Redford's family moved to Van Nuys while his father worked in El Segundo.^[3] He attended Van Nuys High School, where he was classmates with baseball player Don Drysdale.^[3] He has described himself as having been a "bad" student, finding inspiration outside the classroom, and being interested in art and sports.^[3] He hit tennis balls with Pancho Gonzales at the Los Angeles Tennis Club to warm him up. After high school, he attended the University of Colorado for a year and a half,^[3] where he was a member of the Kappa Sigma Fraternity.^[4] While there, he worked at the restaurant/bar The Sink; a painting of his likeness is prominent in the bar's murals.^[5] After being asked to leave the University of Colorado, he traveled in Europe, living in France, Spain, and Italy.^[3] He later studied painting at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn and took classes at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City.^[3]

Career[link]

Television[link]

Redford's career — like that of almost all major stars who emerged in the 1950s — began in New York, where an actor could find work both in television and on stage. Starting in 1959, he appeared as a guest star on numerous programs, including The Untouchables, Whispering Smith, Perry Mason, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Route 66, Dr. Kildare, Playhouse 90, Tate, and The Twilight Zone, among others. He earned an Emmy nomination as Best Supporting Actor for his performance in The Voice of Charlie Pont (ABC, 1962). One of his last television appearances was on October 7, 1963, on Breaking Point, an ABC medical drama about psychiatry.

Theater[link]

Redford's Broadway debut was in a small role in Tall Story (1959), followed by parts in The Highest Tree (1959) and Sunday in New York (1961). His biggest Broadway success was as the stuffy newlywed husband of Elizabeth Ashley in Neil Simon's Barefoot in the Park (1963).

Film[link]

Redford in Barefoot in the Park, 1967

While still largely an unknown, Redford made his screen debut in War Hunt (1962), co-starring with John Saxon in a film set during the last days of the Korean War. This film also marked the debuts of director Sydney Pollack, with whom Redford would often collaborate in the near future, and actor Tom Skerritt. After his Broadway success, he was cast in larger feature roles in movies. He was cast alongside screen legend Alec Guinness in the war comedy Situation Hopeless ... But Not Serious, in which he played a soldier who has to spend years of his life hiding behind enemy lines. In Inside Daisy Clover (1965), which won him a golden globe for best new star, he played a bisexual movie star who marries starlet Natalie Wood, and rejoined her along with Charles Bronson for Pollack's This Property Is Condemned (1966) — again as her lover, though this time in a film which achieved even greater success. The same year saw his first teaming with Jane Fonda, in Arthur Penn's The Chase. This film marked the only time Redford would star with Marlon Brando. Fonda and Redford were paired again in the popular big screen version of Barefoot in the Park (1967)^[3] and were again co-stars much later in Pollack's The Electric Horseman (1979).

After this initial success, Redford became concerned about his blond male stereotype image and turned down roles in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and The Graduate. Redford found the property he was looking for in George Roy Hill's Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), scripted by William Goldman, in which he was paired for the first time with Paul Newman.^[3] The film was a huge success and made him a major bankable star,^[3] cementing his screen image as an intelligent, reliable, sometimes sardonic good guy.

Redford suffered through a few films that did not achieve box office success during this time, including Downhill Racer (1969); Tell Them Willie Boy Is Here (1969); Little Fauss and Big Halsy (1970), and The Hot Rock (1972). But his overall career was flourishing with the critical and box office hit Jeremiah Johnson (1972);^[3] the political satire The Candidate (1972); the hugely popular period drama The Way We Were (1973); and the biggest hit of his career; the blockbuster crime caper The Sting (1973), which became one of the top 20 highest grossing movies of all time when adjusted for inflation and for which he was also nominated for an Oscar.^[3]

Between 1974 and 1976, exhibitors voted Redford Hollywood's top box-office name.^[3] His hits included The Great Gatsby (1974), The Great Waldo Pepper (1975), and Three Days of the Condor (1975). The popular and acclaimed All the President's Men (1976), directed by Alan J. Pakula and scripted once again by Goldman, was a landmark film for Redford. Not only was he the executive producer and co-star, but the film's serious subject matter — the Watergate scandal — and its attempt to create a realistic portrayal of journalism also reflected the actor's offscreen concerns for political causes.^[3]

He also starred in a segment of the war film A Bridge Too Far (1977), the prison drama Brubaker (1980), playing a prison warden attempting to reform the system, and the fantasy baseball drama The Natural (1984).^[3] Redford continued his involvement in mainstream Hollywood movies, though with a newfound focus on directing. The first film he directed, Ordinary People, which followed the disintegration of an upper class American family after the death of a son, was one of the most critically and publicly acclaimed films of the decade, winning a number of Oscars, including the Academy Award for best director for Redford himself. His followup directorial project, The Milagro Beanfield War (1987), failed to generate the same level of attention. Sydney Pollack's Out of Africa (1985), with Redford in the male lead role opposite Meryl Streep, became an enormous critical and box office success and won seven Oscars including Best Picture, proving to be Redford's biggest success of the decade and Redford and Pollack's most successful of their six movies together.^[3] His next film, Legal Eagles (1986), was only a minor success at the box office.

Redford continued as a major star throughout the 1990s and 2000s. He released his third film as a director, A River Runs Through It, in 1992, which was a return to mainstream success for Redford as a director and brought a young Brad Pitt to greater prominence. 1993 brought Redford one of his most popular and recognised roles when he starred as a millionaire businessman who tests people's morals through bribery in Indecent Proposal, which became one of the year's biggest hits. He co-starred with Michelle Pfeiffer in the newsroom romance Up Close & Personal (1996), and with Kristin Scott Thomas in The Horse Whisperer (1998), which he also directed.^[3] Redford also continued work in films with political context, such as Havana (1990), playing Jack Weil, a professional gambler in 1959 Cuba during the Revolution, as well as Sneakers (1992), in which he co starred with the late River Phoenix among others.

He appeared as a disgraced Army general sent to prison in the political thriller The Last Castle (2001), directed by Rod Lurie, someone else with a strong interest in politics. In the same year, Redford reteamed with Brad Pitt for Spy Game, another success for the pair but with Redford switching this time from director to actor. Redford, a leading environmental activist, narrated the IMAX documentary Sacred Planet (2004), a sweeping journey across the globe to some of its most exotic and endangered places. In The Clearing (2004), a thriller co-starring Helen Mirren, Redford was a successful businessman whose kidnapping unearths the secrets and inadequacies that led to his achieving the American Dream.

Redford stepped back into producing with The Motorcycle Diaries (2004), a coming-of-age road film about a young medical student, Ernesto "Che" Guevera, and his friend Alberto Granado. It also explored political and social issues of South America that influenced Guevara and shaped his future. With five years spent in the film's making, Redford was credited by director Walter Salles for being instrumental in getting it made and released.

Back in front of the camera, Redford received good notices for his role in director Lasse Hallstrom's An Unfinished Life (2005) as a cantankerous rancher who is forced to take in his estranged daughter-in-law (Jennifer Lopez) — whom he blames for his son's death — and the granddaughter he never knew he had when they fled an abusive relationship. The film, which sat on the shelf for many months while its distributor Miramax was restructured, was generally dismissed as clichéd and overly sentimental. Meanwhile, Redford returned to familiar territory when he reteamed with Meryl Streep 22 years after they starred in Out of Africa, for his personal project Lions for Lambs (2007), which also starred fellow superstar Tom Cruise. After a great deal of hype, the film opened to mixed reviews and disappointing box office. Redford more recently signed on to direct and star in an update of The Candidate.^{[citation needed]}

Redford appears in the 2011 documentary Buck, where he discusses his experiences with title subject Buck Brannaman during the production of The Horse Whisperer in 1998.

Director[link]

Redford at the 1988 Cannes Film Festival

Redford had long harbored ambitions to work on both sides of the camera. As early as 1969, Redford had served as the executive producer for Downhill Racer.^[3] His first outing as director was in 1980's Ordinary People, a drama about the slow disintegration of an upper-middle class family, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Director.^[3] Redford was credited with obtaining a powerful dramatic performance from Mary Tyler Moore, as well as superb work from Donald Sutherland and Timothy Hutton, who also won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor.

Redford did not direct again until The Milagro Beanfield War (1988), a well-crafted, though not commercially successful, screen version of John Nichols' acclaimed novel of the Southwest. The Milagro Beanfield War is the story of the people of Milagro, New Mexico (based on the real town of Truchas in northern New Mexico), overcoming big developers who set about to ruin their community and force them out because of tax increases. Other directorial projects have included the period drama A River Runs Through It (1992), based on Norman Maclean's novella, and the exposé Quiz Show (1994), about the quiz show scandal of the late 1950s.^[3] In the latter film, Redford worked from a screenplay by Paul Attanasio with noted cinematographer Michael Ballhaus and a strong cast that featured Paul Scofield, John Turturro, Rob Morrow, and Ralph Fiennes. Redford handpicked Morrow for his part in the film (Morrow's only high-profile feature film role to date), because he liked his work on Northern Exposure. Redford also directed Matt Damon and Will Smith in The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000). In 2010, Redford released The Conspirator, a period drama revolving around the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Despite a subject matter of personal interest to Redford, the film received mixed reviews and proved to be a flop at the box office.

Honors[link]

U.S. President George W. Bush and First Lady Laura Bush pose with the Kennedy Center honorees, from left to right, actress Julie Harris, actor Robert Redford, singer Tina Turner, ballet dancer Suzanne Farrell and singer Tony Bennett on December 4, 2005, during the reception in the Blue Room at the White House.

Redford attended the University of Colorado in the 1950s and received an Honorary Degree in 1983.

In 1995, he received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Bard College. He was a 2002 Lifetime Achievement Award/Honorary Oscar recipient at the 74th Academy Awards.^[6]

In 1996, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts.^[7]

In December 2005, he received the Kennedy Center Honors for his contributions to American culture. The Honors recipients are recognized for their lifetime contributions to American culture through the performing arts: whether in dance, music, theater, opera, motion pictures or television.^{[citation needed]}

In 2008 he was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life."^[8]

The University of Southern California (USC) School of Theater announced the first annual Robert Redford Award for Engaged Artists in 2009. According to the school's web site, the award was created "to honor those who have distinguished themselves not only in the exemplary quality, skill and innovation of their work, but also in their public commitment to social responsibility, to increasing awareness of global issues and events, and to inspiring and empowering young people."^[9]

Robert Redford received an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts from Brown University at the 240th Commencement exercises on May 25, 2008.^[10] He also spoke during the ceremonies.

On 14 October 2010, he was appointed Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur.^[11]

Sundance[link]

With the financial proceeds of his acting success, starting with his salaries from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and Downhill Racer, Redford bought an entire ski area on the east side of Mount Timpanogos northeast of Provo, Utah, called "Timp Haven", which was renamed "Sundance".^[3] Redford's wife Lola was from Utah and they had built a home in the area in 1963. Portions of the movie Jeremiah Johnson (1972), a film which is both one of Redford's favorites and one that has heavily influenced him, were shot near the ski area. He founded the Sundance Film Festival, Sundance Institute, Sundance Cinemas, Sundance Catalog, and the Sundance Channel, all in and around Park City, Utah, 30 miles (48 km) north of the Sundance ski area.^[3] The Sundance Film Festival caters to independent filmmakers in the United States and has received recognition from the industry as a place to open films. In 2008, Sundance exhibited 125 feature-length films from 34 countries, with more than 50,000 attendees.^[12] The name Sundance comes from his Sundance Kid character. In addition, Redford owns a celebrated restaurant called Zoom, located on Main Street in the former mining town of Park City.

Mount Timpanogos, panoramic view

Independent films[link]

Since founding the nonprofit Sundance Institute in Park City, in 1981, Redford has been deeply involved with independent film.^[3] Through its various workshop programs and popular film festival, Sundance has provided much-needed support for independent filmmakers. In 1995, Redford signed a deal with Showtime to start a 24-hour cable television channel devoted to airing independent films — the Sundance Channel premiered on February 29, 1996.

Personal life[link]

On August 9, 1958, in Las Vegas, Nevada, Redford married Lola Van Wagenen, who dropped out of college to marry him. They had four children: Scott Anthony, David James "Jamie", Shauna, and Amy Redford.

Son Jamie Redford is a writer/producer.^[13]

Scott — their first child — was born September 1, 1959, and died of sudden infant death syndrome on November 17, 1959, at age 2½ months. His remains have been buried at Provo City Cemetery in Provo, Utah. Lola and Redford divorced in 1985. He has five grandchildren: Dylan and Lena Redford (of son Jamie), Mica and Conor Schlosser (of daughter Shauna) and Eden August (of daughter Amy).^[14]

In July 2009, Redford married his longtime partner, Sibylle Szaggars, at the luxurious Louis C. Jacob Hotel in Hamburg, Germany. She had moved in with Redford in the 1990s and shares his Sundance, Utah, home.^[15] In May 2011 Alfred A Knopf published Robert Redford: The Biography by Michael Feeney Callan, written over fifteen years with Redford's input, and drawn from his personal papers and diaries.

Political activity[link]

Redford with New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson in 2009

Redford is politically liberal, and has supported environmentalism, Native American rights, and the arts. He has been noted as "an admirer of Edward Abbey, the late great anarchist voice of the desert Southwest."^[16] Most of his federal political contributions have been to Democrats (61%) or advocacy groups (34.6%), such as the Political Action Committee of the Directors Guild of America.^[17] Redford has on occasion also supported Republicans, including Brent Cornell Morris in his unsuccessful 1990 race for Utah's 3rd congressional district seat.^[17][18] Redford also supported Gary R. Herbert, another Republican and a friend, in Herbert's successful campaign to be elected Utah's Lieutenant Governor (he is currently the Governor of Utah). Redford is an avid environmentalist and is a trustee of the Natural Resources Defense Council. Redford has been a vocal critic of Barack Obama for his lack of follow-through on environmental policies. He wrote, "One reason I supported President Obama is because he said we must protect clean air, water and lands. But what good is it to say the right thing unless you act on it?" ^[19]

Filmography[link]

Actor[link]

Director[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Robert Redford

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Robert Redford

• Movie, Museum Exhibits Shine New Light on US Civil War is an April 2011 radio and internet report on the Robert Redford movie "The Conspirator." The report aired on Voice of America and was written by VOA's Special English branch.
• Redford interviewed about his life, independent film making and political activism. January 2010, 45 minute video and audio interview with transcript.
• Cinema Retro covers Robert Redford at Trinity College in Dublin
• Robert Redford at the Internet Movie Database
• Sundance Resort
• The Sundance Institute
• Robert Redford slideshow at AMCtv.com
• Redford Teams up to Train Minority Filmmakers NY Daily News, May 15, 2009
• Robert Redford: Through the Years — slideshow by Life magazine

Natalie Wood
Natalie Wood in 1965
Born	Natalia Nikolaevna Zacharenko July 20, 1938 San Francisco, California, United States
Died	November 29, 1981(1981-11-29) (aged 43) Santa Catalina Island, California, United States
Other names	Natasha Gurdin Natalie Wood Wagner
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1943–1981
Spouse	Robert Wagner (m. 1957–1962) «start: (1957)–end+1: (1963)»"Marriage: Robert Wagner to Natalie Wood" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Natalie_Wood) Richard Gregson (m. 1969–1972) «start: (1969)–end+1: (1973)»"Marriage: Richard Gregson to Natalie Wood" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Natalie_Wood) Robert Wagner (m. 1972–1981) «start: (1972)–end+1: (1982)»"Marriage: Robert Wagner to Natalie Wood" Location: (linkback:http://en-wiki.pop.wn.com/index.php/Natalie_Wood)(her death)
Children	Natasha Gregson (b. 1970) Courtney Wagner (b. 1974)
Relatives	Lana Wood (sister)

Natalie Wood (born Natalia Nikolaevna Zakharenko; Russian: Наталья Николаевна Захаренко;^[1] July 20, 1938 – November 29, 1981) was an American film and television actress best known for her screen roles in Miracle on 34th Street, Splendor in the Grass, Rebel Without a Cause, and West Side Story. After first working in films as a child, Wood became a successful Hollywood star as a young adult, receiving three Academy Award nominations before she was 25 years old.

Wood began acting in movies at the age of four and at age eight was given a co-starring role in the classic Christmas film Miracle on 34th Street.^[2] As a teenager, her performance in Rebel Without a Cause (1955) earned her a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. She starred in the musical films West Side Story (1961) and Gypsy (1962), and received Academy Award for Best Actress nominations for her performances in Splendor in the Grass (1961) and Love with the Proper Stranger (1963).

Her career continued with films such as Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969). After this she took a break from acting and had two children, appearing in only two theatrical films during the 1970s. She was married to actor Robert Wagner twice, and to producer Richard Gregson in between the marriages to Wagner. She had one daughter by each: Natasha Gregson and Courtney Wagner. Her younger sister, Lana Wood, is also an actress.

Wood starred in several television productions, including a remake of the film From Here to Eternity (1979) for which she won a Golden Globe Award. During her career, from child actress to adult star, her films represented a "coming of age" for both her and Hollywood films in general.^[3]

At age 43, Wood drowned near Santa Catalina Island, California at the time her last film, Brainstorm (1983), was in production with co-star Christopher Walken. Her death was declared an accident. Although the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department reopened the case in late 2011 based on new witness statements, no evidence to contradict that original conclusion was found.^[4]

Early years[link]

Wood was born Natalia Nikolaevna Zacharenko in San Francisco to Russian immigrant parents Nikolai Stepanovich Zakharenko and Maria Stepanovna (née Zudilova; 1912–1998). As an adult, she stated, "I'm very Russian, you know."^[5] She spoke both Russian and English.^[6] Her father was born in Vladivostok and he, his mother, and two brothers, immigrated to Montreal, Quebec, and later to San Francisco. There, he worked as a day laborer and carpenter.^[7][8] Her paternal grandfather Stepan worked in a chocolate factory in Russia and was killed in street fighting between Red and White Russian soldiers in 1918.^[7] Natalie's mother originally came from Barnaul, southern Siberia, but grew up in the Chinese city of Harbin.^[7] She described her family by weaving mysterious tales of being either gypsies or landowning aristocrats.^[9] In her youth, her mother dreamed of becoming an actress or ballet dancer. She was raised as a Russian Orthodox Christian and remained in the church.

Biographer Warren Harris writes that under the family's "needy circumstances", her mother may have transferred those ambitions to her middle daughter, Natalie. Her mother would take Natalie to the movies as often as she could: "Natalie's only professional training was watching Hollywood child stars from her mother's lap," notes Harris.^[10] Wood would later recall this time period: