Anne Revere
Anne Revere | |
|---|---|
 Revere in the 1940s | |
| Born | June 25, 1903 New York City, U.S. |
| Died | December 18, 1990 (aged 87) Locust Valley, New York, U.S. |
| Resting place | Mount Auburn Cemetery |
| Education | Wellesley College American Laboratory Theatre |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1931–1977 |
| Spouse |
Samuel Rosen
(m. 1935; died 1984) |
Anne Revere (June 25, 1903 – December 18, 1990) was an American actress and a liberal member of the board of the Screen Actors' Guild. She was best known for her work on Broadway and her portrayals of mothers in a series of critically acclaimed films. An outspoken critic of the House Un-American Activities Committee, her name appeared in Red Channels: The Report on Communist Influence in Radio and Television in 1950 and she was subsequently blacklisted.
Revere won an Academy Award for her supporting role in the film National Velvet (1945). She was also nominated in the same category for The Song of Bernadette (1943) and Gentleman's Agreement (1947). She won a Tony Award for her performance in Lillian Hellman's play Toys in the Attic in 1960.
Early life
[edit]Born in New York City, Revere was a direct descendant of American Revolution hero Paul Revere.[1] Her father, Clinton, was a stockbroker,[2] and she was raised on the Upper West Side and in Westfield, New Jersey, where she graduated from Westfield High School.[3] In 1926, she graduated from Wellesley College. Despite her unsuccessful attempts to join dramatic groups in high school and (initially) in college, she eventually was successful at Wellesley and studied dramatics there.[4] She went on to enroll at the American Laboratory School to study acting with Maria Ouspenskaya and Richard Boleslavsky.[2]
Career
[edit]
Revere gained early acting experience in regional and stock theater troupes.[5] She made her Broadway debut in 1931 in The Great Barrington. Three years later, she went to Hollywood to reprise her stage role in the film adaptation of Double Door. She returned to Broadway to create the role of Martha Dobie in the original 1934 production of The Children's Hour, and in later years, she appeared on the New York stage in As You Like It, The Three Sisters, and Toys in the Attic,[6] for which she won the 1960 Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play.[7]
Revere worked steadily as a character actress in films, appearing in nearly three dozen between 1934 and 1951.[2] She was frequently cast in the role of a matriarch and played mother to Elizabeth Taylor, Jennifer Jones, Gregory Peck, John Garfield, and Montgomery Clift. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress three times and won for her performance in National Velvet.[8] Additional screen credits included The Song of Bernadette, Gentleman's Agreement, The Keys of the Kingdom, Body and Soul, and A Place in the Sun.
In 1951, Revere resigned from the board of the Screen Actors Guild. At the time, she was an active member of the American Communist Party. She later pleaded the Fifth Amendment and refused to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee.[9] A Place in the Sun was her last film role for two decades.[2] She returned to the screen in Tell Me That You Love Me, Junie Moon.
In 1962, television director Joseph Hardy fought for Revere to appear in the popular soap opera A Time for Us. ABC finally agreed to cast Revere in the role and after that Revere appeared frequently in television soap operas like A Flame in the Wind, The Edge of Night, Search for Tomorrow, and Ryan's Hope.[10]
Revere and her husband, theatre director Samuel Rosen, moved to New York and opened an acting school, and she continued to work in summer stock and regional theater productions and on television.[citation needed]
Personal life
[edit]Revere married Rosen on April 11, 1935, and they remained wed until his death in 1984.[5] Revere supported Progressive Party candidate Henry A. Wallace's campaign in 1948 and Adlai Stevenson in 1952.[11][12]
Illness and death
[edit]Revere died of pneumonia in her home at Locust Valley, New York, on December 18, 1990, at the age of 87.[13][2] She was survived by one sister.[9] She was buried at Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts.[14]
Filmography
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ Robertson, Patrick, The Guinness Book of Almost Everything You Didn't Need to Know About the Movies. Guinness Superlatives Ltd. 1986. ISBN 0-85112-481-X, p. 34
- ^ a b c d e Peter B. Flint (December 19, 1990). "Anne Revere, 87, Actress, Dies; Was Movie Mother of Many Stars". The New York Times.
- ^ "Miss Anne Revere, Westfield, Works In Picture of Her Stage Success", Courier News, March 5, 1934. Accessed March 5, 2024, via Newspapers.com. "Miss Revere is a graduate nf Westfield High School and of Wellesley College, and has had a most interesting career."
- ^ Coons, Robin (April 13, 1944). "Anne Revere Already Has A Job". Big Spring Daily Herald. Big Spring, Texas. p. 4. Retrieved March 19, 2016 – via Newspapers.com.
- ^ a b Nissen, Axel (2007). Actresses of a Certain Character: Forty Familiar Hollywood Faces from the Thirties to the Fifties. McFarland. pp. 163–167. ISBN 9780786427468. Retrieved September 16, 2018.
- ^ "Anne Revere". Playbill Vault. Retrieved January 11, 2016.
- ^ "Anne Revere". Tony Awards. Archived from the original on August 31, 2016. Retrieved January 11, 2016.
- ^ "Anne Revere". Academy Awards. Retrieved January 11, 2016.[permanent dead link]
- ^ a b "Anne Revere, 87; won Oscar, blacklisted in '50s". Chicago Tribune. December 20, 1990. p. 8-Section 2. Retrieved January 11, 2016.
- ^ Taylor, Clarke (June 20, 1976). "Blacklist: A Horror Show for Anne Revere". The New York Times.
- ^ Revere Blasts Filmland Ban; The Harvard Crimson, February 20, 1952
- ^ Motion Picture and Television Magazine, November 1952, page 33, Ideal Publishers
- ^ Obituary Variety, December 24, 1990.
- ^ Wilson, Scott (August 17, 2016). Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons, 3d ed. McFarland. ISBN 9780786479924 – via Google Books.
External links
[edit]
- 1903 births
- 1990 deaths
- Revere family
- Actresses from Manhattan
- Actresses from New Jersey
- American stage actresses
- American film actresses
- American television actresses
- Deaths from pneumonia in New York (state)
- Tony Award winners
- Best Supporting Actress Academy Award winners
- Hollywood blacklist
- People from Locust Valley, New York
- People from Westfield, New Jersey
- Burials at Mount Auburn Cemetery
- 20th-century American actresses
- Wellesley College alumni
- Westfield High School (New Jersey) alumni
- New York (state) Democrats
- New Jersey Democrats
- California Democrats
- Massachusetts Democrats
- People from the Upper West Side
- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer contract players
- Warner Bros. contract players
- 20th Century Studios contract players
- Actors from Union County, New Jersey