CELESTE HOLM

'Celeste Holm' (b. April 29 1919; some sources indicate 1917) is an American stage, film, and television actress.
She is perhaps best remembered for her Academy Award-winning role in ''Gentleman's Agreement'' (1947), as well as for her Oscar-nominated performance in ''All About Eve'' (1950).

Contents

Early life

Career

Private life

External links

Early life

Born in New York City, and grew up in Long Valley, New Jersey as an only child. Her mother, Jean Parke, was an American portrait artist and author, while her father, Theodor Holm, was a Norwegian insurance adjuster for Lloyd's of London. Holm studied acting at the University of Chicago before becoming a stage actress in the late 1930s following a brief first marriage, which produced her first child, son Ted Nelson.

Career

Her first professional theatrical role was in a production of ''Hamlet'' starring Leslie Howard, and Holm quickly rose to prominence with her portrayal of "Ado Annie" in the original Broadway production of ''Oklahoma!'' in 1943.
After starring in the Broadway production of ''Bloomer Girl'', 20th Century Fox signed Holm to a movie contract in 1946, and in her first two years as a film actress Holm cemented herself immediately as a formidable performer, especially when winning her Oscar and Golden Globe for best supporting actress in ''Gentleman's Agreement''. After her famous performance in ''All About Eve'', however, Holm realized she preferred working in live theater than on movie sets, and took on very few filmed roles over the following decade. The most successful of these was in the 1956 musical, ''High Society'', in which she duetted with Frank Sinatra.
In 1965, she starred alongside Lesley Ann Warren as the Fairy Godmother in the tv production of ''Cinderella''. In the 1970s and 1980s, Holm returned more fully to screen acting, with roles in films such as ''Tom Sawyer'', ''Three Men and a Baby'' and in television series (often as a guest star) such as ''Columbo'' and
''Falcon Crest''. In the 1990s, Holm was a series regular on the ABC soap opera ''Loving'' as Isabella Alden #2 (1991-1992) and the CBS primetime series ''Promised Land'' (1996-1999).
Celeste Holm has received many honors in her lifetime: the 1968 Sarah Siddons Award for distinguished achievement in Chicago theatre; she was appointed to the National Arts Council by then-President Ronald Reagan, knighted by King Olav of Norway, and inducted into the American Theatre Hall of Fame in 1992. She remains active for social causes as a spokesperson for UNICEF, and for occasional professional engagements.

Private life

Holm's first marriage was to Ralph Nelson around 1938. Their son, Ted Nelson, is the co-creator of Hypertext. Holm and her son are reportedly estranged.
She married Francis E. Davies, a Roman Catholic (for whom she was received into the Roman Catholic church for the purposes of their wedding) in 1940, but they divorced shortly thereafter.
From 1946 until 1952 she was married to airline executive A. Schuyler Dunning, with whom she had a second son, Daniel Dunning.
Holm was married to fellow actor Wesley Addy from 1966 until his death in 1996. It was by far her longest marriage. They had no children. They played a married couple on ''Loving''.
On April 29 2004, on her 85th (or 87th) birthday, she married forty-something opera singer, Frank Basile. [1]
In 2006, Holm was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award by the SunDeis Film Festival at Brandeis University.[2]

External links

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★ Official Website of Celeste Holm

★ Time Magazine