Julie Harris (actress)
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Julie Harris | |
|---|---|
 Publicity photo of Julie Harris (1973) | |
| Born | Julia Ann Harris (1925-12-02)December 2, 1925 Grosse Pointe, Michigan, U.S. |
| Died | August 24, 2013(2013-08-24) (aged 87) West Chatham, Massachusetts, U.S. |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1948–2009 |
| Spouse(s) | Jay Julian (m. 1946; div. 1954) Manning Gurian (m. 1954; div. 1967) Walter Carroll (m. 1977; div. 1982) |
| Children | 1 |
Julia Ann Harris (December 2, 1925 – August 24, 2013), was an American actress renowned for classical and contemporary stage work that brought her five "best actress in a play" Tony Awards.
Debuting on Broadway in 1945, much against the wishes of her mother who wanted her to 'come out' as a society debutante, she was acclaimed for a complex performance as an isolated 12-year-old girl in the 1950 play The Member of the Wedding and the following year her range was demonstrated as Sally Bowles in the original production of I Am a Camera, for which she won her first Tony award. She appeared in a film version in 1955 and the director Elia Kazan cast her opposite James Dean in East of Eden. After a lull in the quality of motion pictures she had parts in, the '60s saw Harris give acclaimed performances in classic films, including The Haunting, and what is sometimes considered the screen role that allowed her to best display her talents Reflections in a Golden Eye, in which she played opposite Marlon Brando. Known for her attention to preparation and research, Harris's superb intonation and phrasing gave her a pleasing silvery voice. A rare method acting star actress, she won Tony awards for The Lark (1956), Forty Carats (1969), The Last of Mrs. Lincoln (1973), and The Belle of Amherst (1977). She also won three Emmy Awards, a Grammy Award, and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for the 1952 film The Member of the Wedding.
She was inducted into the American Theatre Hall of Fame in 1979, received the National Medal of Arts in 1994,[1] and the 2002 Special Lifetime Achievement Tony Award.[2]
Contents
1 Early life and education
2 Career
3 Later years
4 Personal life
5 Work
5.1 Stage
5.2 Television
5.3 Film
6 References
7 Further reading
8 External links
Early life and education
Julia Ann Harris was born in Grosse Pointe, Michigan, the daughter of Elsie L. (née Smith), a nurse, and William Pickett Harris, an investment banker and authority on zoology.[3] She had an older brother, William, and a younger brother, Richard.[4] She graduated from Grosse Pointe Country Day School, which later merged with two others to form the University Liggett School. In New York City, she attended The Hewitt School.[5] As a teenager, she also trained at the Perry-Mansfield Performing Arts School & Camp in Colorado with Charlotte Perry, a mentor who encouraged Harris to apply to the Yale School of Drama, which she soon attended for a year.[6] Harris was an early member of Lee Strasberg's Actor's Studio and was able to successfully use the techniques of method acting, which have been found difficult to shine with in female roles.[6]
Career
In 1952, Harris won her first Best Actress Tony for originating the role of insouciant Sally Bowles in I Am a Camera, the stage version of Christopher Isherwood's Goodbye to Berlin (later adapted as the Broadway musical Cabaret (1966) and as the 1972 film, with Liza Minnelli as Sally). Harris repeated her stage role in the film version of I Am a Camera (1955).
Of particular note is her Tony-winning performance in The Belle of Amherst, a one-woman play (written by William Luce and directed by Charles Nelson Reilly) based on the life and poetry of Emily Dickinson. She received a Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Recording for the audio recording of the play. She first performed the play in 1976 and subsequently appeared in other solo shows, including Luce's Bronte.[7] Other Broadway credits include The Playboy of the Western World, Macbeth, The Member of the Wedding, A Shot in the Dark, Skyscraper, And Miss Reardon Drinks a Little, Forty Carats, The Glass Menagerie, A Doll's House, and The Gin Game, and a North American tour in 1992 of Lettice and Lovage in the lead part originated by Maggie Smith on Broadway.
In 1983, Harris also became a company member of The Mirror Theater Ltd's Mirror Repertory Company.[8] Julie Harris became a mentor to the company, having urged Founding Artistic Director Sabra Jones to create the company from 1976 forward, when Jones married John Strasberg. Harris and Jones met at a performance of The Belle of Amherst, a revival of which The Mirror Theater Ltd recently performed in their summer home in Vermont.[9]
In an Actors Studio play, Marathon '33 (1963)
With Chita Rivera, Harris holds the record for the most individual Tony Award nominations, with 10 nominations. She held the record for most competitive Tony wins (five) until Angela Lansbury tied her in 2009. Audra McDonald has passed them both, with six acting Tony Award wins.[2] In 1966, Harris won the Sarah Siddons Award for her work in Chicago theatre.
President George W. Bush and Laura Bush pose with the Kennedy Center honorees: From left to right: 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
Harris's screen debut was in 1952, repeating her Broadway success as the lonely teenaged girl Frankie in Carson McCullers' The Member of the Wedding, for which she was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress. Harris played the ethereal Eleanor Lance in The Haunting (1963), director Robert Wise's screen adaptation of a novel by Shirley Jackson, a classic film of the horror genre. Another cast member recalled Harris maintaining a social distance from the other actors while not on set, later explaining that she had done so as a method of emphasizing the alienation from the other characters experienced by her character in the film. She reprised her Tony-winning role as Mary Todd Lincoln in The Last of Mrs. Lincoln (1973) in the film version (1976). Another noteworthy film appearance was the World War II drama The Hiding Place (1975). She also appeared in such films as East of Eden (also 1955), with James Dean (with whom she became close friends), Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962), with Paul Newman in the private-detective film Harper (1966), and Reflections in a Golden Eye (1967).
For her television work, Harris had won three Emmy Awards, and had been nominated 11 times. One of her most famous television roles was as Queen Victoria, in the 1961 Hallmark Hall of Fame production of Laurence Housman's Victoria Regina, for which she won an Emmy. Earlier, also for the Hallmark Hall of Fame, she starred as Nora Helmer opposite Christopher Plummer in A Doll's House (1959), a 90-minute television adaptation of Ibsen's play. She made more appearances in leading roles on the Hallmark program than any other actress, also appearing in two different adaptations of the play Little Moon of Alban.[10] In her later career, she was perhaps best known as country singer Lilimae Clements, the eccentric and protective mother of Valene Ewing (played by Joan Van Ark) on Knots Landing. The role was as a guest appearance in 1980 before returning as a series regular from 1981–87. In 1986, she provided the voice-over of the adult Clara in Nutcracker: The Motion Picture.
On December 5, 2005, she was named a Kennedy Center Honoree. At a White House ceremony, President George W. Bush remarked, "It's hard to imagine the American stage without the face, the voice, and the limitless talent of Julie Harris. She has found happiness in her life's work, and we thank her for sharing that happiness with the whole world."[11]
Later years
Harris continued to work until 2009, well into her eighties, narrating five historical documentaries by Christopher Seufert and Mooncusser Films, as well as being active as a director on the board of the independent Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater.[12] She also did extensive voice work for documentary maker Ken Burns: the voices of Emily Warren Roebling in Brooklyn Bridge, Ann Lee in The Shakers: Hands to Work, Hearts to God, Susan B. Anthony in Not For Ourselves Alone: Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony and most notably Southern diarist Mary Boykin Chesnut for Burns' 1990 series The Civil War.
In the summer of 2008, she appeared on stage again in Chatham, Massachusetts as "Nanny" in a Monomoy Theater production of The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds.[13]
Personal life
Harris lived in West Chatham, Cape Cod, for many years until her death.[14] Three times divorced, she had one son, Peter Gurian. A breast cancer survivor,[5] she suffered a severe fall requiring surgery,[when?] a stroke in 2001, and a second stroke in 2010.[15]
Harris died on August 24, 2013, of congestive heart failure at her home in West Chatham, Massachusetts.[16][11] Ben Brantley, theater critic for The New York Times, considered her "the actress who towered most luminously ... rather like a Statue of Liberty for Broadway."[17]Alec Baldwin, with whom she appeared in Knots Landing, praised her in a tribute in the Huffington Post: "Her voice was like rainfall. Her eyes connected directly to and channeled the depths of her powerful and tender heart. Her talent, a gift from God."[18] Harris was cremated after her death.[19]
On August 28, 2013, Broadway theaters dimmed their lights for one minute in honor of Harris.[20]
Work
Stage
It's a Gift as Atlanta (1945)
Henry IV, Part 2 (1946)
Oedipus Rex (1946)
The Playboy of the Western World as Nelly (1946-1947)
Alice in Wonderland as White Rabbit (1947)
Macbeth as Witch (1948)
Sundown Beach as Ida Mae (1948)
The Young and Fair as Nancy Gear (1948-1949)
Magnolia Alley as Angel Tuttle (1949)
Montserrat as Felisa (1949)
The Member of the Wedding as Frankie Addams (1950-1951)
I Am a Camera^ as Sally Bowles (1951-1952)
Mademoiselle Colombe as Colombe (1954)
The Lark^ as Joan (1955-1956)
The Country Wife as Mrs. Margery Pinchwife (1957-1958)
The Warm Peninsula as Ruth Arnold (1959-1960)
Little Moon of Alban as Brigid Mary Mangan (1960)
A Shot in the Dark as Josefa Lantenay (1961-1962)
Marathon '33* as June (1963-1964)
Ready When You Are, C.B.! as Annie (1964-1965)
Skyscraper* as Georgina (1965-1966)
Forty Carats^ as Ann Stanley (1968-1970)
And Miss Reardon Drinks a Little as Anna Reardon (1971)
Voices as Claire (1972)
The Last of Mrs. Lincoln^ as Mary Todd Lincoln (1972-1973)
The au Pair Man* as Mrs. Rogers (1973-1974)
In Praise of Love as Lydia Cruttwell (1974-1975)
The Belle of Amherst^ as multiple characters (1976)
Break a Leg as Gertie Kessel (1979)
Mixed Couples as Clarice (1980-1981)
Lucifer's Child* as Isak Dinesen, Baroness Karen Blixen (1991)
The Glass Menagerie as Amanda Wingfield (1994-1995)
The Gin Game as Fonsia Dorsey (1997)
The asterisk (*) indicates a Tony Award nomination for Best Actress, and the caret (^) indicates a win.
Television
Actors Studio (4 episodes, 1948–1949)
Starlight Theatre as Bernice (1 episode, 1951)
Goodyear Television Playhouse (2 episodes, 1951–1953)
The United States Steel Hour as Shivawn (1 episode, 1955)
The Good Fairy (1956) as Lu
The Lark (1957) as Joan of Arc
Little Moon of Alban (1958) as Brigid Mary (Emmy award)
Johnny Belinda (1958) as Belinda
A Doll's House (1959) as Nora Helmer
Sunday Showcase as Francesca (1 episode, 1960)
Play of the Week (1 episode, 1961)
The Heiress (1961) as Catherine Sloper
The DuPont Show of the Month as Julia (2 episodes, 1960–1961)
The Power and the Glory (1961) as Maria
Victoria Regina[21] (1961) as Queen Victoria (Emmy award)
Pygmalion (1963) as Eliza Doolittle
Little Moon of Alban (1964) as Brigid Mary
Kraft Suspense Theatre as Lucy Bram (1 episode, 1964)
The Holy Terror (1965) as Florence Nightingale
Rawhide as Emma Teall (1 episode, 1965)
Laredo as Annamay (1 episode, 1965)
Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre as Isobel Cain (1 episode, 1966)
Anastasia (1967) as Anastasia
Garrison's Gorillas as Therese (1 episode, 1968)
Run for Your Life as Lucrece Lawrence (1 episode, 1968)
Tarzan as Charity Jones (4 episodes, 1967–1968)
Daniel Boone as Faith (1 episode, 1968)
Bonanza as Sarah Carter (1 episode, 1968)
The Big Valley as Jennie Hall (1 episode, 1968)
Journey to the Unknown as Leona Gillings (1 episode, 1969)
House on Greenapple Road (1970) as Leona Miller
The Name of the Game as Ruth Harmon (2 episodes, 1969–1970)
How Awful About Allan (1970) as Katherine
The Virginian as Jenny (1 episode, 1971)
Home for the Holidays (1972) as Elizabeth Hall Morgan
Thicker Than Water as Nellie Paine (9 episodes, 1973)
Medical Center as Helen (1 episode, 1973)
Columbo: Any Old Port in a Storm as Karen Fielding (1 episode, 1973)
Hawkins as Janet Hubbard (1 episode, 1973)
The Evil Touch as Aunt Carrie (2 episodes, 1973)
The Greatest Gift (1974) as Elizabeth Holvak
The Family Holvak as Elizabeth Holvak (10 episodes, 1975)
Match Game as herself (1975) (5 daily episodes & 1 syndicated episode)
The Belle of Amherst (1976) as Emily Dickinson
The Last of Mrs. Lincoln (1976) as Mary Todd Lincoln
Stubby Pringle's Christmas (1978) as Georgia Henderson
Backstairs at the White House as Mrs. Helen 'Nellie' Taft (1 episode, 1979)
Tales of the Unexpected as Mrs. Bixby (2 episodes, 1979)
The Gift (1979) as Anne Devlin- ' 'Family Ties as Margaret Hollings (1 episode, 1986)
The Love Boat as Irene Culver (1 episode, 1987)
Knots Landing as Lilimae Clements (165 episodes, 1980–1987)
The Woman He Loved (1988) as Alice
Too Good to Be True (1988) as Margaret Berent
The Christmas Wife (1988) as Iris
Single Women Married Men (1989) as Lucille Frankyl
The Civil War as Mary Chesnut (9 episodes, 1990)
They've Taken Our Children: The Chowchilla Kidnapping (1993) as Odessa Ray
When Love Kills: The Seduction of John Hearn (1993) as Alice Hearn
Scarlett as Eleanor Butler (1 episode, 1994)
One Christmas (1994) as Sook
Lucifer's Child (1995) as Isak Dinesen
Secrets (1995) as Caroline Phelan
Little Surprises (1996) as Ethel
The Christmas Tree (1996) as Sister Anthony
Ellen Foster (1997) as Leonora Nelson
The Outer Limits as Hera (1 episode, 1998)
Love Is Strange (1999) as Sylvia McClain
Film
Julie Harris and James Dean in East of Eden (1955)
The Member of the Wedding (1952) as Frances 'Frankie' Addams
East of Eden (1955) as Abra Bacon
I Am a Camera (1955) as Sally Bowles
The Truth About Women (1957) as Helen Cooper
Sally's Irish Rogue (1958) as Sally Hamil
Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962) as Grace Miller
The Haunting (1963) as Eleanor 'Nell' Lance
Hamlet (1964) as Ophelia
Harper (1966) as Betty Fraley
You're a Big Boy Now (1966) as Miss Nora Thing
Reflections in a Golden Eye (1967) as Alison Langdon
The Split (1968) as Gladys
Journey to Midnight (1968) as Leona Gillings (episode "The Indian Spirit Guide")
The People Next Door (1970) as Gerrie Mason
The Hiding Place (1975) as Betsie ten Boom
Voyage of the Damned (1976) as Alice Fienchild
The Bell Jar (1979) as Mrs. Greenwood
Brontë (1983) as Charlotte Brontë
Crimewave (1985) (uncredited)
Nutcracker: The Motion Picture (1986) as Clara (voice)
Gorillas in the Mist (1988) as Roz Carr
HouseSitter (1992) as Edna Davis
The Dark Half (1993) as Reggie Delesseps
Carried Away (1996) as Joseph's Mother
Bad Manners (1997) as Professor Harper
Passage to Paradise (1998) as Martha McGraw
The First of May (1999) as Carlotta
The Way Back Home (2006) as Jo McMillen
The Golden Boys (2008) as Melodeon Player
The Lightkeepers (2009) as Mrs. Deacon (final film role)
References
^ "Lifetime Honors – National Medal of Arts". National Endowment for the Arts. Archived from the original on July 21, 2011. Retrieved December 15, 2012..mw-parser-output cite.citationfont-style:inherit.mw-parser-output qquotes:"""""""'""'".mw-parser-output code.cs1-codecolor:inherit;background:inherit;border:inherit;padding:inherit.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-free abackground:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/65/Lock-green.svg/9px-Lock-green.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-registration abackground:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d6/Lock-gray-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-gray-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center.mw-parser-output .cs1-lock-subscription abackground:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/aa/Lock-red-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-red-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registrationcolor:#555.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription span,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration spanborder-bottom:1px dotted;cursor:help.mw-parser-output .cs1-hidden-errordisplay:none;font-size:100%.mw-parser-output .cs1-visible-errorfont-size:100%.mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration,.mw-parser-output .cs1-formatfont-size:95%.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-left,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-leftpadding-left:0.2em.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-right,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-rightpadding-right:0.2em
^ ab "Tony Awards Facts & Trivia". Tony Awards. Retrieved August 25, 2013.
^ "Julie Harris profile at". FilmReference.com. Retrieved November 15, 2012.
^ 1940 United States Federal Census
^ ab Mula, Rose Madeline. "Julie Harris – Too Good to be True?". Senior Women Web. Retrieved November 15, 2012.
^ ab Weber, Bruce (August 24, 2013). "Julie Harris, Celebrated Actress of Range and Intensity, Dies at 87". The New York Times. Retrieved August 25, 2013.
^ "William Luce's Bronte – Press". Samuel French, Inc. Retrieved August 25, 2013.
^ Gussow, Mel (March 11, 1984). "Theater: Mirror Rep, in a Revival of 'Rain'". Retrieved December 9, 2018 – via NYTimes.com.
^ [Rodgers, D. (2016, September 14). Dickinson Brought to Life by Schaffel. Hardwick Gazette]
^ Paller, Rebecca (January 16, 2009). "Julie Harris... A Bit of Magic on a Cold Winter's Day". Paley Center for Media. Archived from the original on June 15, 2010. Retrieved November 15, 2012.
^ ab Weil, Martin (August 24, 2013). "Tony-Winning Actress Julie Harris Dies at 87". The Washington Post. Retrieved August 25, 2013.
^ "WHAT Board". Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater. Archived from the original on November 7, 2012. Retrieved November 15, 2012.
^ Rizzo, Frank (August 28, 2008). "Julie Harris Returns To Stage". Hartford Courant. Retrieved November 15, 2012.
^ Rose, Judy (November 4, 2012). "Michigan House Envy: Windmill Pointe palace offers medieval charm". Detroit Free Press. Retrieved November 15, 2012.
^ Jon Caswell (July–August 2007). "The Belle of Aphasia". Stroke Connection. nxtbook.com. Retrieved November 15, 2012.
^ Kennedy, Mark (August 24, 2013). "Julie Harris, Broadway Star, Dies at 87". Associated Press. Archived from the original on August 25, 2013. Retrieved August 25, 2013.
^ Brantley, Ben (August 25, 2013). "Luminous Julie Harris, Close Up and Afar". The New York Times. Retrieved August 30, 2013.
^ Baldwin, Alec (August 30, 2013). "A Public Farewell to Julie Harris". Huffington Post. Retrieved August 30, 2013.
^ Wilson, Scott (August 19, 2016). "Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons, 3d ed". McFarland. Retrieved December 9, 2018 – via Google Books.
^ Snetiker, Marc (August 27, 2013). "Broadway Theaters to Dim Lights in Honor of Stage Legend Julie Harris". Broadway.com. Retrieved August 30, 2013.
^ Hallmark Hall of Fame adaptation of Laurence Housman's play Victoria Regina
Further reading
- Young, Jordan R. (1989). Acting Solo: The Art of One-Person Shows. Beverly Hills: Past Times Publishing Co. Intro by Julie Harris.
External links
 | Wikimedia Commons has media related to Julie Harris. |
Julie Harris at the Internet Broadway Database
Julie Harris on IMDb
Julie Harris at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
Julie Harris at Find a Grave- TonyAwards.com Interview with Julie Harris
- Senior Women Web Interviews: Julie Harris – Too Good to be True?
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