1.
Venice Film Festival
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The film festival is part of the Venice Biennale, which was founded by the Venetian City Council in 1895. The film festival has taken place in late August or early September on the island of the Lido, Venice. Screenings take place in the historic Palazzo del Cinema on the Lungomare Marconi, since its inception the Venice Film Festival has grown into one of the most prestigious film festivals in the world. The 74th Venice International Film Festival is scheduled to be held from 30 August to 9 September 2017, the first edition of the Venice Film Festival was carried out from the 6 to the 21 of August in 1932. The festival began with an idea of the president of the Venice Biennale Count Giuseppe Volpi di Misurata and Luciano De Feo, with good reason, the festival was considered the first international event of its type, receiving strong support from authorities. This first edition was held on the terrace of the Hotel Excelsior on the Venice Lido, and at that stage it was not a competitive event. The very first film to be shown in the history of the Festival was Rouben Mamoulians Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the second edition was held two years later, from 1 to 20 of August in 1934. For the first time it included a competition, at least 19 countries took part with over 300 accredited journalists. The Mussolini Cup was introduced for best foreign film and best Italian film, other awards were the Great Gold Medals of the National Fascist Association for Entertainment to best actor and actress. The prize for best foreign film went to Robert J. Flahertys Man of Aran and was a confirmation of the taste of the time for auteur documentaries, starting in 1935, the Festival became a yearly event under the direction of Ottavio Croze. The actors award was renamed Volpi Cup, in 1936 an international jury was nominated for the first time and in 1937 the new Cinema Palace, designed by the architect Luigi Quagliata, was inaugurated. The 1940s represent one of the most difficult moments for the review, the conclusion of the Second World War divides the decade in two. Before 1938 political pressures distorted and ruined the festival, in addition, few countries participated and there was an absolute monopoly of institutions and directors that were members of the Rome-Berlin Axis. The festival resumed full speed in 1946, after the war, with the return of normalcy, Venice once again became a great icon of the film world. In 1947 the festival was held at the Doges Palace, a most magnificent backdrop for hosting a record 90 thousand participants, surely it can be considered one of the greatest editions in the history of the festival. For the next twenty years the festival continued its development and expansion in accordance with the plan set in motion after the war. In 1963 the winds of change blow strongly during Luigi Chiarini’s directorship of the festival, during the years of his presidency, Chiarini aspired to renew the spirit and the structures of the festival, pushing for a total reorganization of the entire system. The social and political unrest of 1968 had strong repercussions on the Venice Bienniale, from 1969 to 1979 no prizes were awarded and the festival returned to the non-competitiveness of the first edition
2.
Soviet Union
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The Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a socialist state in Eurasia that existed from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a union of national republics, but its government. The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 and this established the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and started the Russian Civil War between the revolutionary Reds and the counter-revolutionary Whites. In 1922, the communists were victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian, following Lenins death in 1924, a collective leadership and a brief power struggle, Joseph Stalin came to power in the mid-1920s. Stalin suppressed all opposition to his rule, committed the state ideology to Marxism–Leninism. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and collectivization which laid the foundation for its victory in World War II and postwar dominance of Eastern Europe. Shortly before World War II, Stalin signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact agreeing to non-aggression with Nazi Germany, in June 1941, the Germans invaded the Soviet Union, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the effort of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin in 1945, the territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged by 1947 as the Soviet bloc confronted the Western states that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949. Following Stalins death in 1953, a period of political and economic liberalization, known as de-Stalinization and Khrushchevs Thaw, the country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took a lead in the Space Race with Sputnik 1, the first ever satellite, and Vostok 1. In the 1970s, there was a brief détente of relations with the United States, the war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters. In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of glasnost. The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing the economic stagnation, the Cold War ended during his tenure, and in 1989 Soviet satellite countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective communist regimes. This led to the rise of strong nationalist and separatist movements inside the USSR as well, in August 1991, a coup détat was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a role in facing down the coup. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned and the twelve constituent republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states
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Russia
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Russia, also officially the Russian Federation, is a country in Eurasia. The European western part of the country is more populated and urbanised than the eastern. Russias capital Moscow is one of the largest cities in the world, other urban centers include Saint Petersburg, Novosibirsk, Yekaterinburg, Nizhny Novgorod. Extending across the entirety of Northern Asia and much of Eastern Europe, Russia spans eleven time zones and incorporates a range of environments. It shares maritime borders with Japan by the Sea of Okhotsk, the East Slavs emerged as a recognizable group in Europe between the 3rd and 8th centuries AD. Founded and ruled by a Varangian warrior elite and their descendants, in 988 it adopted Orthodox Christianity from the Byzantine Empire, beginning the synthesis of Byzantine and Slavic cultures that defined Russian culture for the next millennium. Rus ultimately disintegrated into a number of states, most of the Rus lands were overrun by the Mongol invasion. The Soviet Union played a role in the Allied victory in World War II. The Soviet era saw some of the most significant technological achievements of the 20th century, including the worlds first human-made satellite and the launching of the first humans in space. By the end of 1990, the Soviet Union had the second largest economy, largest standing military in the world. It is governed as a federal semi-presidential republic, the Russian economy ranks as the twelfth largest by nominal GDP and sixth largest by purchasing power parity in 2015. Russias extensive mineral and energy resources are the largest such reserves in the world, making it one of the producers of oil. The country is one of the five recognized nuclear weapons states and possesses the largest stockpile of weapons of mass destruction, Russia is a great power as well as a regional power and has been characterised as a potential superpower. The name Russia is derived from Rus, a state populated mostly by the East Slavs. However, this name became more prominent in the later history, and the country typically was called by its inhabitants Русская Земля. In order to distinguish this state from other states derived from it, it is denoted as Kievan Rus by modern historiography, an old Latin version of the name Rus was Ruthenia, mostly applied to the western and southern regions of Rus that were adjacent to Catholic Europe. The current name of the country, Россия, comes from the Byzantine Greek designation of the Kievan Rus, the standard way to refer to citizens of Russia is Russians in English and rossiyane in Russian. There are two Russian words which are translated into English as Russians
4.
Katharine Hepburn
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Katharine Houghton Hepburn was an American actress. Known for her independence and spirited personality, Hepburn was a leading lady in Hollywood for more than 60 years. She appeared in a range of genres, from comedy to literary drama. In 1999, Hepburn was named by the American Film Institute as the greatest female star of Classic Hollywood Cinema, raised in Connecticut by wealthy, progressive parents, Hepburn began to act while studying at Bryn Mawr College. After four years in the theatre, favorable reviews of her work on Broadway brought her to the attention of Hollywood. Hepburn masterminded her own comeback, buying out her contract with RKO Radio Pictures and acquiring the rights to The Philadelphia Story. In the 1940s, she was contracted to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, where her career focused on an alliance with Spencer Tracy, the screen-partnership spanned 25 years and produced nine movies. Hepburn challenged herself in the half of her life, as she regularly appeared in Shakespearean stage productions. She found a niche playing middle-aged spinsters, such as in The African Queen, three more Oscars came for her work in Guess Whos Coming to Dinner, The Lion in Winter, and On Golden Pond. In the 1970s, she began appearing in films, which became the focus of her career in later life. She remained active into old age, making her screen appearance in 1994 at the age of 87. After a period of inactivity and ill health, Hepburn died in 2003 at the age of 96, Hepburn famously shunned the Hollywood publicity machine and refused to conform to societys expectations of women. She was outspoken, assertive, athletic, and wore trousers before it was fashionable for women to do so and she married once, as a young woman, but thereafter lived independently. A 26-year affair with her co-star Spencer Tracy was hidden from the public, Hepburn was born on May 12,1907 in Hartford, Connecticut, the second of six children. Her parents were Thomas Norval Hepburn, a urologist at Hartford Hospital, and Katharine Martha Houghton, as a child, Hepburn joined her mother on several Votes For Women demonstrations. The Hepburn children were raised to exercise freedom of speech and encouraged to think and her parents were criticized by the community for their progressive views, which stimulated Hepburn to fight against barriers she encountered. Hepburn said she realized from an age that she was the product of two very remarkable parents, and credited her enormously lucky upbringing with providing the foundation for her success. She remained close to her throughout her life
5.
Bette Davis
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Ruth Elizabeth Bette Davis was an American actress of film, television, and theater. After appearing in Broadway plays, Davis moved to Hollywood in 1930, however, her early films for Universal Studios were unsuccessful. She joined Warner Bros. in 1932 and established her career with several critically acclaimed performances, in 1937, she attempted to free herself from her contract. Although she lost the legal case against the studio, it marked the beginning of the most successful period of her career. Until the late 1940s, she was one of American cinemas most celebrated leading ladies, known for her forceful, Davis gained a reputation as a perfectionist who could be highly combative and confrontational. She clashed with executives and film directors as well as many of her co-stars. Her forthright manner, idiosyncratic speech and ubiquitous cigarette contributed to a public persona, Davis was the co-founder of the Hollywood Canteen, and was the first female president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Her career went through periods of eclipse, and she admitted that her success had often been at the expense of her personal relationships. Married four times, she was widowed and three times divorced, and raised her children as a single parent. In 1999, Davis was placed second behind Katharine Hepburn on the American Film Institutes list of the greatest female stars of classic Hollywood cinema. Bettys younger sister, Barbara Harriet Bobby, was born October 25,1909, at 55 Ward Street in Somerville, Massachusetts, in 1915, Daviss parents separated and Betty and Bobby attended a Spartan boarding school called Crestalban in Lanesborough, which is located in the Berkshires. In 1921, Ruth Davis moved to New York City with her daughters, Betty changed the spelling of her name to Bette after Honoré de Balzacs La Cousine Bette. Davis attended Cushing Academy, a school in Ashburnham, Massachusetts. In 1926, she saw a production of Henrik Ibsens The Wild Duck with Blanche Yurka and Peg Entwistle, Davis later recalled for Al Cohn of Newsday, The reason I wanted to go into theater was because of an actress named Peg Entwistle. She auditioned for admission to Eva LeGalliennes Manhattan Civic Repertory, but was rejected by LeGallienne who described her attitude as insincere, upon graduating from Cushing Academy, Bette enrolled in John Murray Andersons Dramatic School. In 1929, Davis was chosen by Blanche Yurka to play Hedwig, after performing in Philadelphia, Washington and Boston, she made her Broadway debut in 1929 in Broken Dishes, and followed it with Solid South. In 1930, Davis moved to Hollywood to screen test for Universal Studios, Davis and her mother traveled by train to Hollywood and arrived on December 13,1930. She would later recount her surprise that nobody from the studio was there to meet her at the train, in fact, a studio employee had waited for her, but left because he saw nobody who looked like an actress
6.
Anna Magnani
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Anna Magnani was an Italian stage and film actress. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress, along with four international awards. Born in Rome, she worked her way through Romes Academy of Dramatic Art by singing at night clubs, during her career, her only child was stricken by polio when he was 18 months old and remained crippled. She was referred to as La Lupa, the perennial toast of Rome, time magazine described her personality as fiery, and drama critic Harold Clurman said her acting was volcanic. In the realm of Italian cinema she was passionate, fearless, and exciting, director Roberto Rossellini called her the greatest acting genius since Eleonora Duse. Playwright Tennessee Williams became an admirer of her acting and wrote The Rose Tattoo specifically for her to star in, a role for which she received an Oscar in 1955. As an actress she became recognized for her dynamic and forceful portrayals of earthy lower-class women in films as LAmore, Bellissima, The Rose Tattoo, The Fugitive Kind. As early as 1950 Life magazine had stated that Magnani was one of the most impressive actresses since Garbo. Magnanis parentage and birthplace are uncertain, some sources suggest she was born in Rome, others in Egypt. Magnani herself stated that her mother was married in Egypt but returned to Rome before giving birth to her at Porta Pia and she was enrolled in a French convent school in Rome where she learned to speak French and play the piano. She also developed a passion for acting from watching the stage their Christmas plays. This period of formal education lasted until the age of fourteen and she was a plain, frail child with a forlornness of spirit. Her grandparents compensated by pampering her with food and clothes, yet while growing up, she is said to have felt more at ease around more earthly companions, often befriending the toughest kid on the block. This trait carried over into her life when she proclaimed. Give me the life of the streets, of common people, at age 17, she went on to study at the Eleonora Duse Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in Rome for two years. To support herself, Magnani sang in nightclubs and cabarets, leading to her being dubbed the Italian Édith Piaf, however, an actor friend Micky Knox, writes that she never studied acting formally and started her career in Italian music halls singing traditional Roman Folk songs. She had the ability to call up emotions at will, to move an audience, stage She was considered an outstanding theatre actress in Anna Christie and The Petrified Forest and had a successful career in variety shows. Early film roles In 1933 she was acting in plays in Rome when she was discovered by Italian filmmaker Goffredo Alessandrini
7.
Olivia de Havilland
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Olivia Mary de Havilland is a retired American actress whose career spanned from 1935 to 1990. She appeared in 49 feature films, and was one of the movie stars during the golden age of Classical Hollywood. Born in Tokyo to British parents, de Havilland and her younger sister Joan moved to California in 1919 and they were brought up by their mother Lilian, a former stage actress who taught them dramatic art, music, and elocution. De Havilland made her debut in amateur theatre in Alice in Wonderland. Olivia de Havilland made her debut in Reinhardts A Midsummer Nights Dream in 1935. She began her career playing demure ingénues opposite popular leading men, including Errol Flynn and they became one of Hollywoods most popular romantic on-screen pairings. She achieved her initial popularity in romantic films, such as The Great Garrick. Her natural beauty and refined acting style made her particularly effective in historical dramas, such as Anthony Adverse. In her later career, she was most successful in films, such as Light in the Piazza. In addition to her career, de Havilland continued her work in the theatre. For her contributions to the picture industry, she received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. After romantic relationships with Howard Hughes, James Stewart, and John Huston, de Havilland married author Marcus Goodrich, with whom she had a son, Benjamin. Following her divorce from Goodrich in 1953, she moved to Paris and married Pierre Galante, in 1962, she published Every Frenchman Has One, an account of her life in France. De Havilland and Joan Fontaine are the siblings to have won Academy Awards in a lead acting category. A lifelong rivalry between the two resulted in an estrangement that lasted over three decades. She has lived in Paris since 1956, and celebrated her 100th birthday on July 1,2016, De Havilland was born on July 1,1916, in Tokyo, Japan, to English parents. Her father, Walter de Havilland, served as an English professor at the Imperial University in Tokyo before becoming a patent attorney and her mother, Lilian Fontaine, was educated at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London and became a stage actress. Lilian also sang with the Master of the Kings Music, Sir Walter Parratt, Olivias paternal cousin was Sir Geoffrey de Havilland, an aircraft designer and founder of the de Havilland aircraft company
8.
Vivien Leigh
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Vivien Leigh was a British stage and film actress. She also won a Tony Award for her work in the Broadway musical version of Tovarich, after her drama school education, Leigh appeared in small roles in four films in 1935 and progressed to the role of heroine in Fire Over England. Lauded for her beauty, Leigh felt that her physical attributes sometimes prevented her from being seriously as an actress. Despite her fame as an actress, Leigh was primarily a stage performer. Later in life, she performed as an actress in a few films. At the time, the public strongly identified Leigh with her second husband Laurence Olivier, Leigh and Olivier starred together in many stage productions, with Olivier often directing, and in three films. Although her career had periods of inactivity, in 1999 the American Film Institute ranked Leigh as the 16th greatest female star of classic Hollywood cinema. Leigh was born Vivian Mary Hartley on 5 November 1913 in British India on the campus of St. Pauls School and she was the only child of Ernest Richard Hartley, an English broker, and his wife, Gertrude Mary Frances. Her father was born in Scotland in 1882, while her mother, Ernest and Gertrude Hartley were married in 1912 in Kensington, London. In 1917, Ernest Hartley was transferred to Bangalore as an officer in the Indian Cavalry, while Gertrude, at the age of three, young Vivian made her first stage appearance for her mothers amateur theatre group, reciting Little Bo Peep. At the age of six, Vivian was sent by her mother to the Convent of the Sacred Heart then situated in Roehampton, southwest London, from Loreto Convent, Darjeeling. One of her friends there was future actress Maureen OSullivan, two years her senior, to whom Vivian expressed her desire to become a great actress, the family returned to Britain in 1931. She attended A Connecticut Yankee, one of OSullivans films playing in Londons West End, shortly after, her father enrolled Vivian at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. Vivian met Herbert Leigh Holman, known as Leigh Holman, a barrister 13 years her senior, on 12 October 1933 in London, she gave birth to a daughter, Suzanne, later Mrs. Robin Farrington. Leighs friends suggested she take a role as a schoolgirl in the film Things Are Looking Up. She engaged an agent, John Gliddon, who believed that Vivian Holman was not a name for an actress. After rejecting his many suggestions, she took Vivian Leigh as her professional name, Gliddon recommended her to Alexander Korda as a possible film actress, but Korda rejected her as lacking potential. She was cast in the play The Mask of Virtue, directed by Sidney Carroll in 1935 and received excellent reviews, followed by interviews, John Betjeman, the future Poet Laureate, described her as the essence of English girlhood
9.
Ingrid Bergman
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Ingrid Bergman was a Swedish actress who starred in a variety of European and American films. She won three Academy Awards, two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards, a BAFTA Award, and the Tony Award for Best Actress. She is best remembered for her roles as Ilsa Lund in Casablanca and as Alicia Huberman in Notorious, before becoming a star in American films, Bergman had been a leading actress in Swedish films. Her introduction to American audiences came with her role in the English-language remake of Intermezzo. Selznicks financial problems meant that Bergman was often loaned to other studios, apart from Casablanca, her performances from this period include Victor Flemings remake of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, For Whom the Bell Tolls, Gaslight, and The Bells of St. Marys. Her last films for Selznick were Alfred Hitchcocks Spellbound and Notorious and her final film for Hitchcock was Under Capricorn. After a decade in American films, she starred in Roberto Rossellinis Stromboli, many of her personal and film documents can be seen in the Wesleyan University Cinema Archives. According to the St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture, Bergman quickly became the ideal of American womanhood, in 2007, the American Film Institute ranked Bergman as the fourth-greatest female screen legend of classic American cinema. Bergman, named after Princess Ingrid of Sweden, was born on 29 August 1915 in Stockholm, to a Swedish father, Justus Bergman, when she was two years old, her mother died. Her father, who was an artist and photographer, died when she was 13, in the years before he died, he wanted her to become an opera star, and had her take voice lessons for three years. But she always knew from the beginning that she wanted to be an actress, sometimes wearing her mothers clothes and her father documented all her birthdays with a borrowed camera. After his death, she was sent to live with an aunt and she then moved in with her Aunt Hulda and Uncle Otto, who had five children. Another aunt she visited, Elsa Adler, first told Ingrid, when she was 11, that her mother may have had some Jewish blood, but her aunt also cautioned her about telling others about her possible ancestry as there might be some difficult times coming. Biographer Aleksandra Ziolkowska-Boehm, however, notes that the claim of Jewish blood was likely an embellishment, after being forced to do an in-depth genealogical investigation, Bergmans maternal cousin found there to be no Jewish ancestry on Bergmans mothers side. Later, she received a scholarship to the state-sponsored Royal Dramatic Theatre School, after several months she was given a part in a new play, Ett Brott, written by Sigfrid Siwertz. Chandler notes that this was totally against procedure at the school, during her first summer break, she was also hired by a Swedish film studio, which led to her leaving the Royal Dramatic Theatre after just one year, to work in films full-time. Her first film role after leaving the Royal Dramatic Theatre was a part in 1935s Munkbrogreven. She went on to act in a films in Sweden, including En kvinnas ansikte, which was later remade as A Womans Face with Joan Crawford
10.
Sophia Loren
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Sophia Loren is an Italian film actress. Encouraged to enroll in acting lessons after entering a beauty pageant and she appeared in several bit parts and minor roles in the early part of the decade, until her five-picture contract with Paramount in 1956 launched her international career. Notable film appearances around this time include The Pride and the Passion, Houseboat, after starting her family in the early 1970s, Loren spent less time on her acting career and chose to make only occasional film appearances. In later years, she has appeared in American films such as Grumpier Old Men, in 1995, she received the Cecil B. DeMille Award for lifetime achievements, one of such awards. In 1999, Loren was acknowledged as one of the top 25 female American Screen Legends in the American Film Institutes survey, AFIs 100 Years.100 Stars. Loren was born Sofia Villani Scicolone in the Clinica Regina Margherita in Rome, Italy, the daughter of Romilda Villani and Riccardo Scicolone, Riccardo Scicolone refused to marry Villani, leaving the piano teacher and aspiring actress without support. Lorens parents had another child together, her sister Maria, in 1938, Loren has two younger paternal half-brothers, Giuliano and Giuseppe. Romilda, Sofia, and Maria lived with Lorens grandmother in Pozzuoli, during World War II, the harbour and munitions plant in Pozzuoli was a frequent bombing target of the Allies. During one raid, as Loren ran to the shelter, she was struck by shrapnel, after that, the family moved to Naples, where they were taken in by distant relatives. After the war, Loren and her returned to Pozzuoli. Lorens grandmother Luisa opened a pub in their room, selling homemade cherry liquor. Romilda Villani played the piano, Maria sang, and Loren waited on tables, the place was popular with the American GIs stationed nearby. When she was 14, Sofia entered a beauty pageant, Miss Italia 1950 and, later, she enrolled in acting class and was selected as an uncredited extra in Mervyn LeRoys film Quo Vadis, at the age of 15. In 1951, she appeared in Italian film Era lui. sì. sì. where she played an odalisque. She appeared in bit parts and minor roles in the early part of the decade. She began using her current stage name in La Favorita, the new name being a twist on the name of the Swedish actress Märta Torén and was suggested by Goffredo Lombardo or Carlo Ponti and her first starring role was in Aida, for which she received critical acclaim. After playing the role in Two Nights with Cleopatra, her breakthrough role was in The Gold of Naples
11.
Shirley MacLaine
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Shirley MacLaine is an American film, television and theater actress, singer, dancer, activist and author. She is known for her New Age beliefs, and has an interest in spirituality and she has written a series of autobiographical works that describe these beliefs, document her world travels, and describe her Hollywood career. She has also won five competitive Golden Globe Awards and received the Golden Globe Cecil B, deMille Award at the 1998 ceremony. Named after Shirley Temple, Shirley MacLean Beaty was born in Richmond, MacLaines younger brother is the actor, writer and director Warren Beatty, he changed the spelling of his surname when he became an actor. Their parents raised them as Baptists and her uncle was A. A. MacLeod, a Communist member of the Ontario legislature in the 1940s. MacLaine played baseball in a team, holding the record for most home runs which earned her the nickname Powerhouse. During the 1950s, the family resided in the Dominion Hills section of Arlington. As a toddler she had weak ankles and would fall over with the slightest misstep and this was the beginning of her interest in performing. Strongly motivated by ballet, she never missed a class, in classical romantic pieces like Romeo and Juliet and The Sleeping Beauty, she always played the boys roles due to being the tallest in the group and the absence of males in the class. Ultimately she decided against making a career of professional ballet because she had grown too tall and was unable to acquire perfect technique and she explained that she didnt have the ideal body type, lacking the requisite beautifully constructed feet of high arches, high insteps and a flexible ankle. Also slowly realizing ballets propensity to be too all-consuming, and ultimately limiting, she moved on to forms of dancing, acting. She attended Washington-Lee High School, where she was on the cheerleading squad, the summer before her senior year, she went to New York City to try acting on Broadway, and had some success. After she graduated, she returned and within a year became an understudy to actress Carol Haney in The Pajama Game, Haney broke her ankle, a few months after, with Haney still injured, film producer Hal B. Wallis saw MacLaines performance, and signed her to work for Paramount Pictures and she later sued Wallis over a contractual dispute, a suit that has been credited with ending the old-style studio star system of actor management. MacLaine made her debut in Alfred Hitchcocks The Trouble with Harry. This was quickly followed by her role in the Martin and Lewis film Artists, soon afterwards, she had a role in Around the World in 80 Days. This was followed by Hot Spell and a role in Some Came Running, for the latter film she gained her first Academy Award nomination. Her second Oscar nomination came two years later for The Apartment, starring with Jack Lemmon, the film won five Oscars, including Best Director for Billy Wilder
12.
Annie Girardot
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Annie Girardot was a three-time César Award winning French actress. She often played strong-willed, independent, hard-working, and often women, imbuing her characters with an earthiness. Over the course of a career, she starred in nearly 150 films. In 1955, she began her career, making her film debut in Treize à table. Her performance in Jean Cocteaus play La Machine à écrire in 1956 was admired by the author who called her The finest dramatic temperament of the Postwar period, in 1958, Luchino Visconti directed her opposite Jean Marais in a French stage adaptation of William Gibsons Two for the Seesaw. In 1962, she married Italian actor Renato Salvatori, in 1968, she also starred in the cult anti-consumerism French film Erotissimo. The film was nominated for a Golden Globe, and remains Girardots biggest box office hit in France and she Talks or Philippe de Brocas Dear Detective. In 1974, she starred in the hit teen movie, La Gifle, as Isabelle Adjanis mother. In 1972, she said in an interview to The New York Times, citing as Exhibit A her role as a freak in The Ape Woman. I believe that the acting of any role — from duchess to kitchen slavey — must be a form of transformation, in 1977, she won her first César Award for Best Actress portraying the title character in the drama Docteur Françoise Gailland. Throughout the 1970s, she was the highest paid actress in France, indeed, between the release of Live for Life in 1967 and Jupiters Thigh in 1980,24 of her films have attracted more than one million admissions in France. In her 1989 autobiography, Vivre daimer, she wrote of her popularity that People didnt come to watch a beautiful, vamp-like creature, I played a judge, a lawyer, a taxi driver, a cop, a surgeon. I was never a glamorous star, the 1980s were less kind, as her career floundered and parts dwindled. In 1983, she lost a fortune when Revue Et Corrigée and she subsequently battled depression, but bounced back with several television series in France and Italy. However, Girardot had a comeback on the big screen playing a peasant wife in Claude Lelouchs Les Misérables. The role won her a second César Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1996, upon accepting the award, a joyous and tearful Girardot expressed her happiness that she had not been forgotten by the film industry in a speech that remained very famous. In 1992, she was the Head of the Jury at the 42nd Berlin International Film Festival, in 2002, she was awarded the César Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in The Piano Teacher. She collaborated with director Michael Haneke again, in Caché, on stage she had a triumph in 1974 with Madame Marguerite, which became her signature role that she reprised on numerous occasions until 2002
