JESSICA TANDY
Name: Jessica Tandy.
Born: 7 June 1909 London, England, UK
Died: 11 September 1994 Easton,Connecticut, U.S.
Jessie Alice Tandy (June 7, 1909 – September 11, 1994) was an Academy Award-winning
British-born American stage and film actress.
Tandy, the last of three children, was born in Geldeston Road in the London
Borough of Hackney to Jessie Helen Horspool, the head of a school for
mentally handicapped children, and Harry Tandy, a travelling salesman for a rope
manufacturer. Her father died when Tandy was 12, and as a result her mother
taught evening courses to increase the family's income. Tandy was educated at
the Dame Alice Owen's School in the London Borough of Islington.
After an acting career spanning some 65 years, Tandy found latter-day movie
stardom in major studio releases and intimate dramas alike. From a young age she
was determined to be an actress, and first appeared on the London stage in 1926,
playing, among others, Katherine opposite Laurence Olivier's Henry V, and
Cordelia opposite John Gielgud's "King Lear". She also worked in British films.
Following the end of her first marriage (to Jack Hawkins), she moved to New York
and met Canadian actor Hume Cronyn, who became her second husband and frequent
partner on stage and screen. She made her American film debut in The Seventh
Cross (1944). She also appeared in The Valley of Decision (1945), The Green
Years (1946, ironically enough as Cronyn's daughter!), Dragonwyck (1946)
starring Gene Tierney and Forever Amber (1947).
After her Tony-winning performance as Blanche DuBois in the original Broadway
production of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire, (she lost the film
role to actress Vivien Leigh) she concentrated on the stage. She became a
naturalized citizen of the United States in 1952. For the next 30 years, she
appeared sporadically in films such as The Light in the Forest (1958), The Birds
(1963), The World According to Garp (1982, as Glenn Close's mother) and Cocoon (1985,
the latter two opposite Cronyn).
Jessica Tandy in Driving Miss Daisy, 1989.
The beginning of the 1980s saw a resurgence in her film career, with character
roles in The World According to Garp, Best Friends, Still of the Night (all 1982)
and The Bostonians (1984), and the hit film Cocoon (1985), opposite Cronyn, with
whom she reteamed for *batteries not included (1987) and Cocoon: The Return (1988).
She and Cronyn had been working together more and more, on stage and television,
to continued acclaim, notably in 1987's Foxfire which won her an Emmy Award (recreating
her Tony winning Broadway role). However, it was her colorful performance in
Driving Miss Daisy (1989), as an aging, stubborn Southern-Jewish matron, that
made her a bona fide Hollywood star and earned her an Oscar. She was the oldest
actor to ever win an Academy Award, beating out George Burns by less than a year.
Tandy was chosen by People magazine as one of the 50 Most Beautiful People in
the world in 1990. She earned a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her work
in the grassroots hit Fried Green Tomatoes (1992), and co-starred in The Story
Lady (1991 telefilm, with daughter Tandy Cronyn), Used People (1992, as Shirley
MacLaine's mother), To Dance with the White Dog (1993 telefilm, with husband
Hume Cronyn), Nobody's Fool (1994), and Camilla (also 1994, with Cronyn).
Camilla was to be her last performance, and it was bold in one way that she, at
the age of about 84 and knowing that she was dying, had a brief nude scene,
which could also be called "cheeky".
Name: Jessica Tandy.
Born: 7 June 1909 London, England, UK
Died: 11 September 1994 Easton,Connecticut, U.S.
Jessie Alice Tandy (June 7, 1909 – September 11, 1994) was an Academy Award-winning
British-born American stage and film actress.
Tandy, the last of three children, was born in Geldeston Road in the London
Borough of Hackney to Jessie Helen Horspool, the head of a school for
mentally handicapped children, and Harry Tandy, a travelling salesman for a rope
manufacturer. Her father died when Tandy was 12, and as a result her mother
taught evening courses to increase the family's income. Tandy was educated at
the Dame Alice Owen's School in the London Borough of Islington.
After an acting career spanning some 65 years, Tandy found latter-day movie
stardom in major studio releases and intimate dramas alike. From a young age she
was determined to be an actress, and first appeared on the London stage in 1926,
playing, among others, Katherine opposite Laurence Olivier's Henry V, and
Cordelia opposite John Gielgud's "King Lear". She also worked in British films.
Following the end of her first marriage (to Jack Hawkins), she moved to New York
and met Canadian actor Hume Cronyn, who became her second husband and frequent
partner on stage and screen. She made her American film debut in The Seventh
Cross (1944). She also appeared in The Valley of Decision (1945), The Green
Years (1946, ironically enough as Cronyn's daughter!), Dragonwyck (1946)
starring Gene Tierney and Forever Amber (1947).
After her Tony-winning performance as Blanche DuBois in the original Broadway
production of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire, (she lost the film
role to actress Vivien Leigh) she concentrated on the stage. She became a
naturalized citizen of the United States in 1952. For the next 30 years, she
appeared sporadically in films such as The Light in the Forest (1958), The Birds
(1963), The World According to Garp (1982, as Glenn Close's mother) and Cocoon (1985,
the latter two opposite Cronyn).
Jessica Tandy in Driving Miss Daisy, 1989.
The beginning of the 1980s saw a resurgence in her film career, with character
roles in The World According to Garp, Best Friends, Still of the Night (all 1982)
and The Bostonians (1984), and the hit film Cocoon (1985), opposite Cronyn, with
whom she reteamed for *batteries not included (1987) and Cocoon: The Return (1988).
She and Cronyn had been working together more and more, on stage and television,
to continued acclaim, notably in 1987's Foxfire which won her an Emmy Award (recreating
her Tony winning Broadway role). However, it was her colorful performance in
Driving Miss Daisy (1989), as an aging, stubborn Southern-Jewish matron, that
made her a bona fide Hollywood star and earned her an Oscar. She was the oldest
actor to ever win an Academy Award, beating out George Burns by less than a year.
Tandy was chosen by People magazine as one of the 50 Most Beautiful People in
the world in 1990. She earned a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her work
in the grassroots hit Fried Green Tomatoes (1992), and co-starred in The Story
Lady (1991 telefilm, with daughter Tandy Cronyn), Used People (1992, as Shirley
MacLaine's mother), To Dance with the White Dog (1993 telefilm, with husband
Hume Cronyn), Nobody's Fool (1994), and Camilla (also 1994, with Cronyn).
Camilla was to be her last performance, and it was bold in one way that she, at
the age of about 84 and knowing that she was dying, had a brief nude scene,
which could also be called "cheeky".