Shirley Knight |
||
|
|
||
Career Highlights |
||
Actor Credits
|
||
Shirley Knight Biography |
||
|
Shirley Knight (born July 5, 1936 in Goessel, Kansas) is an award-winning American stage, screen, and television actress. She has been nominated twice for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, in 1960 for The Dark at the Top of the Stairs and in 1962 for Sweet Bird of Youth.
Knight`s other feature films include Sidney Lumet`s The Group (1966), Richard Lester`s Petulia (1968), Francis Ford Coppola`s The Rain People (1969), and As Good As It Gets (1997). Knight`s theatre credits include The Three Sisters (1964), We Have Always Lived in the Castle (1966), Kennedy`s Children (1975), which earned her the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play, and A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur (1979). She was nominated for the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actress in a Play twice, for Landscape of the Body and The Young Man from Atlanta, which also garnered her a Tony nomination for Best Leading Actress in a Play. Knight`s many television credits include Maggie Winters, L.A. Law, Murder, She Wrote, Law & Order, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, House M.D., Crossing Jordan, Cold Case, and ER, among others, in addition to many television movies, including Indictment: The McMartin Trial, for which she won both the Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie and the Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television. She also appeared in the first segment of If These Walls Could Talk, the HBO series about the various faces of abortion co-written and directed by Nancy Savoca, and has played the recurring role of Bree Hodge`s mother-in-law Phyllis Van De Kamp on Desperate Housewives. Knight was married twice, to Gene Persson from 1959 until they divorced in 1969, and to John Hopkins from 1969 until his death in 1998. She has two daughters, actress Kaitlin and television writer Sophie. Biography Credit: www.imdb.com/name/nm0004309/bio |
||
Top News Stories |
||
|
||
Snapshot |
||
Photo Gallery |
||
|
|
||
Fans |
||
|
|
||
Trivia |
||
Quotes They said this is Vanity Fair, and I said, Oh, I already take the magazine. They said Annie Leibovitz wants to take your picture and I thought, How nice! I got an agent and went up for the part of my first film, Five Gates to Hell. It`s no accident that Tony Hopkins is a wonderful film actor. This house was our dream-the gardens, the study, even the swimming pool. Even though I can`t see John when I wake up in the morning, I can always feel him here with me. Film actors reach a certain level, but they don`t get beyond it unless they work in the theater. So many directors are solely focused on their own success in Hollywood and multimillion dollar budgets and deals. I plan to work ever day they`ll let me. I did a whole bunch of really bad movies. I took individual photographs of Annie Liebovitz, I kept taking her picture. I instinctively knew that if I only did films I`d probably become a movie star and earn a lot of money but I wouldn`t be a great artist. I moved to LA and decided to do films and television, mainly because the theater in New York is totally dead. My goal was not to be famous or rich but to be good at what I did. And that required going to New York and studying and working in the theater. The thing that separates a so-so director and a great director is a love and caring for film. I just let the character speak to me and things appear. My acting career helped pull me through the rough times. My career has been odd in the sense that I did a lot of films early in my career and then for years I only worked in the theater in New York. When you`re a woman in your 40s, it`s not the best time to do films, because there really aren`t that many roles. Then you reach 50 and there are more roles again. Mother parts. There are things that you cannot talk to your mother and father about, there are things that you cannot talk to your children about. The only people you can really share certain things with in secret are your girlfriends. I`m writing a book and working on my one-woman show, Learning To Be Human. Men are allowed to get older and women are not. I did the occasional odd film, like Endless Love. There`s a great difference between being popular and being an artist. There`s no place to act in Kansas. You`re supressed.Trivia 1959 Deb Star. Won Broadway`s 1976 Tony Award as Best Actress (Featured Role - Play) for "Kennedy`s Children." She was also nominated in 1997 as Best Actress (Play) for "The Young Man from Atlanta." Ex-mother-in-law of Daniel Passer. She refused the play "Kennedy`s Children" by Robert Patrick in London, but accepted it in New York. At first rehearsal she began to read the role she`d been offered in England (a drab schoolteacher), and was astonished to learn that she was instead wanted for another lead (a glamorous actress), for which she won a "Tony" award. Appeared in the L.A. stage and British film version of Dutchman (1967), a racial drama, which was produced by her then-husband Eugene Persson. She won the Venice Film Festival award for her cinematic performance. A lovely, talented, highly promising film ingenue in the early 60s, Shirley was very vocal about her dissatisfaction with the Hollywood scene and abandoned potential film stardom for Broadway roles. She later moved to England and thrived on the London stage for a number of years before returning to Hollywood as a plus-sized character support. Two daughters: Kaitlin Hopkins and Sophie C. Hopkins Spouse: John Hopkins (1969 - 23 July 1998) (his death) 1 child; Eugene Persson (14 March 1959 - 1969) (divorced) 1 child
Born in Goessel, Kansas, USA | ||
Top Contributors |
||
|
Top editors for this profile:
|
||
Related Links |
||
 Super Star Sites Silver Sites Star Sites Fan Sites
|
||
Related Profiles |
||
Comments
Submit a Comment