The Three Faces of Eve

Background:

“There aren't a lot of movies for people our age and I was never terribly enamored of making movies, mainly because I like to work on stage. I didn't make a lot of movies. I'm very happy doing what I'm doing now. I like to direct and act occasionally on stage. Once in a while, I do television. It's more likely that somebody my age can find a part in television.” Joanne Woodward

A gifted, attractive, sometimes tomboyish performer from the New York stage, Joanne Woodward first came to fame starring as a woman with multiple personalities in “The Three Faces of Eve” (1957), from which she won an Oscar, a Golden Globe Award and a BAFTA nomination. Combined with her performance in “No Down Payment” (1957), she also collected a National Board of Review Award. The actress continued to give strong portrayals in such vehicles as “The Long Hot Summer” (1958), “Rally 'Round the Flag, Boys!” (1958), ”The Fugitive Kind” (1959, won a San Sebastián International Film Festival Award), ”The Stripper” (1963) and ”A Big Hand for the Little Lady” (1966). Following a setback due to a series of box office flops, she scored an Oscar nomination for ”Rachel, Rachel” (1968), husband Paul Newman's first directorial effort. For her brilliant performance in the film, she was handed a Golden Globe Award, a Kansas City Film Critics Circle Award and a New York Film Critics Circle Award. She won a Cannes Film Festival Award and Kansas City Film Critics Circle Award for her work in “The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds” (1972, also directed by Newman) and picked up her third Oscar nomination in ”Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams” (1973). In 1960, Woodward became the first actress to earn a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Despite her prominent movie career, in the mid-1970s, Woodward chose to concentrate on television. She won Emmy Awards for her roles as Betty Quinn in “See How She Runs” (1978) and Barbara Wyatt-Hollis in “Do You Remember Love” (1985), and received praise for her performances in such projects as ”Crisis at Central High” (1981), ”Blind Spot” (1993), ”Breathing Lessons” (1994, won a Golden Globe Award and a SAG Award) and more recently, ”Empire Falls” (2005). In 1990, she shared an Emmy Award for her producing effort in the American Masters presentation, “Broadway's Dreamers: The Legacy of the Group Theatre” (PBS, 1989). It was also in 1990 that Woodward was noticed for her work in the movie ”Mr. & Mrs. Bridge” (1990), which brought her an Oscar nomination, a Golden Globe nomination, a Kansas City Film Critics Circle Award and a New York Film Critics Circle Award. The actress was also seen in the Tom Hanks hit ”Philadelphia” (1993).

Woodward is known for her dedication to the stage. She has performed in a number of plays and enjoyed a secondary career as a stage director since the mid-1970s. In 1999, she was selected as co-chair of the Artistic Advisory Council of the Westport Country Playhouse.

“Being married to Paul is being married to the most considerate, romantic man.” Joanne Woodward

Out of the limelight, Woodward is happily married to actor-director Paul Newman, with whom she has worked in a number of projects. The couple has three daughters, Nell, Melissa and Claire Newman. She was once engaged to novelist, essayist and screenwriter Gore Vidal. In her free time, Woodward enjoys ballet and horse-back riding. She mentions ”Gone with the Wind” (1939), ”Wuthering Heights” (1939), ”The Philadelphia Story” (1940) and ”Jezebel” (1938) as her favorites movies, and Bette Davis and Laurence Olivier as her all-time favorite actors. She also idolizes John Garfield, Vivien Leigh, Katharine Hepburn and Clark Gable.

Joey

Childhood and Family:

Joanne Gignilliat Trimmier Woodward was born on February 27, 1930, in Thomasville, Georgia, to Wade and Elinor Woodward. Her parents divorced when she was a child. When Joanne was in the second grade, her family relocated to Marietta, Georgia. They moved again when she was in the junior high school. She was educated at Greenville High School in Greenville, South Carolina, and after graduating in 1947, went on to study drama at Louisiana State University. She also honed in on her craft at The Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre in New York and later, in 1990, earned a degree from Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, NY. Joey, as her family and close friends often called her, has an older brother named Wade Jr., who is an architect.

On January 29, 1958, Joanne married actor/director Paul Newman (born on January 26, 1925), whom she met when she was an understudy in the Broadway production of William Inge's “Picnic” (1953). They have three girls, Elinor Terese Newman (born on April 8, 1959), Melissa Stewart Newman (born in September 1961) and Claire Olivia Newman (born in 1965).

Do You Remember Love

Career:

Joanne Woodward knew that she wanted to be an actress at a very young age. At age 9, she accompanied her mother to Atlanta to attend the premiere of “Gone with the Wind” (1939). It was during the parade that she leaped into a limo and sat on the lap of Laurence Olivier. Many years later when the two had an opportunity to act together in a TV film, Olivier stated that he vividly remembered the incident. In her teen years, attractive Woodward won a number of beauty contests. After completing her drama studies at Louisiana State University, she headed to New York City where she trained with acting coach Sanford Meisner.

In 1953, Woodward signed on as an understudy in the Broadway production of William Inge's “Picnic,” where she first worked with future husband Paul Newman. After starring in 1954's “The Lovers,” she made a switch to television and appeared in numerous TV programs throughout the 1950s, including “Kraft Television Theater,” “The Alcoa Hour,” “Four Star Playhouse” and “Studio One.” She did not make her film debut until 1955 when she landed the lead role in ”Count Three and Pray” opposite Van Heflin. Her next film, 1956's “Kiss Before Dying,” created some controversy due to its advertising campaign and the movie only appeared briefly in theaters.

Woodward was next cast in the starring role of a woman with multiple personality disorder in director Nunnally Johnson's schizophrenia drama ”The Three Faces of Eve” (1957). Delivering an intense performance, she won an Academy Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role, a Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture Actress-Drama, as well as a BAFTA nomination in the category of Best Foreign Actress. It was followed by another fine turn, as Leola Boone, in the Martin Ritt “No Down Payment” (1957). She picked up a National Board of Review for Best Actress for her work in both films.

The next year saw Woodward star with Newman in ”The Long Hot Summer,” the couple's first film together, and after the marriage, the couple rejoined for Leo McCarey's ”Rally 'Round the Flag, Boys” (1958), from which she was nominated for a Golden Laurel for Top Female Comedy Performance. She went on to star in the adaptation of the William Faulkner classic, ”The Sound and the Fury” (1959) and in ”The Fugitive Kind” (1959), opposite Marlon Brando and Anna Magnani, before teaming up again with her husband in the 1960 hit ”From the Terrace” and the 1961 ”Paris Blues.” For her fine turn in “The Fugitive Kind,” the actress was handed a 1960 San Sebastián International Film Festival for Best Actress.

Next, Woodward took a two year break from film to focus on her family. She resurfaced in 1963 with ”The Stripper,” where she played Lila Green, the role originally planned for Marilyn Monroe. It was considered a failed comeback because the film was ill-received at the box office. Her next vehicle, “A New Kind of Love” (1963), another project with Newman, did not fare much better. ”Signpost to Murder” (1964) also performed poorly at the box office.

Woodward returned two years later with ”A Fine Madness,” opposite Sean Connery, and ”A Big Hand for the Little Lady,” with Henry Fonda. Despite her compelling performances, the films were not hits. When she re-emerged in 1968, the talented actress made a huge impact with her role as a spinster attempting to modify her introverted ways in Newman's directorial debut, “Rachel, Rachel.” Together, the couple led the film to four Academy Award nominations, including a Best Actress in a Leading Role honor for Woodward and a Best Picture honor for Newman. Woodward also netted a Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture Actress- Drama, and a Kansas City Film Critics Circle and New York Film Critics Circle for Best Actress.

Woodward and Newman reunited onscreen for the auto racing drama “Winning” (1969) and again starred together in the 1970 political themed ”W.U.S.A.” The next year, she was cast alongside George C. Scott as a female doctor in ”They Might Be Giants,” but when the project proved a failure, Newman directed his wife in the big screen version of the Pulitzer-winning ”The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds” (1972). Finely playing Beatrice, a middle-aged widowed eccentric with two daughters, she picked up a Cannes Film Festival and Kansas City Film Critics Circle for Best Actress, and a Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture Actress – Drama. In between, Woodward found herself returning to the small screen after more than a decade in the “Hallmark Hall of Fame” production of ”All the Way Home” (1971, NBC).

In 1973, Woodward again proved herself outstanding by nabbing her third Oscar nomination after playing Rita Walden in the Gilbert Cates directed “Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams.” The role also brought the performer Best Actress honors at BAFTA, the Kansas City Film Critics Circle and the New York Film Critics Circle. Two years later, she appeared with Newman in “The Drowning Pool,” her last feature film for three years. During this absence, she turned to television and won an Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama or Comedy Special for her portrayal of Betty Quinn, a 40-year-old divorced teacher whose life is changed by her decision to compete in the Boston Marathon, in the CBS film ”See How She Runs” (1978). She also costarred with Sally Field in the award-winning “Sybil” (1976) and with Laurence Oliver in the TV remake of “Come Back, Little Sheba” (1977).

Woodward revisited feature films in 1978 for ”The End,” a slapstick comedy starring and jointly directed by Burt Reynolds, and was seen in ”The Shadow Box” (1980) and CBS's ”Crisis at Central High” (1981), where she received an Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for her starring role as an Arkansas teacher named Elizabeth Huckaby. After reprising her stage role for the TV remake of George Bernard Shaw's ”Candida” (1982), she wrote and directed the made-for-TV film ”Come Along With Me” (1982), based on an unfinished novel by Shirley Jackson. In 1985's “Do You Remember Love,” she won her second Emmy Award for playing English professor Barbara Wyatt-Hollis. In 1984, she was spotted making a brief return to the big screen in a cameo role in ”Harry & Son,” penned, produced and helmed by Newman, who also co-starred.

After receiving her second Emmy, Woodward took up a hosting gig from 1986 to 1988 in the PBS “Live at the Me,” and jointly won an Emmy as the co-producer of the “American Masters presentation, “Broadway's Dreamers: The Legacy of the Group Theatre” (PBS, 1989). Meanwhile on the wide screen, Woodward portrayed Amanda Wingfield in the Newman-directed remake of Tennessee Williams' “The Glass Menagerie” (1987). However, it was the actress' next film performance, as Mrs. Bridge, in James Ivory's ”Mr. & Mrs. Bridge” (1990), that garnered Woodward an Oscar and Golden Globe nomination, in addition to Kansas City Film Critics Circle and New York Film Critics Circle Awards.

In 1993, Woodward enjoyed a major revitalization by appearing in two high-profile theatrical releases, the AIDS drama “Philadelphia” (as Tom Hanks' mother) and Martin Scorsese's ”The Age of Innocence” (which she narrated), as well as ”Foreign Affairs” and ”Blind Spot,” where her role as a U.S. congresswoman brought her an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or a Special. Her TV career shone even brighter the following year when she nabbed a Golden Globe for Best Performance by an Actress in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for TV, a SAG for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a TV Movie or Miniseries, as well as an Emmy nomination for her work in the TV adaptation of the Anne Tyler Pulitzer-winner “Breathing Lessons” (1994). In 1996, she continued her TV career by appearing as herself in “James Dean: A Portrait,” and two years later narrated “My Knees Were Jumping: Remembering the Kindertransports,” a documentary about kids saved from Nazi concentration camps.

Following this, Woodward focused her work on theater where she has also enjoyed a secondary career as a director since the mid-1970s. In 1999, she was appointed co-chair of the Artistic Advisory Council of the Westport Country Playhouse. The following year saw her star with husband Newman in a one-week run in A R Gurney's play “Ancestral Voices.” The same year, she also acted in a one-night only staged reading of “Arsenic and Old Lace.” Woodward became Artistic Director of the Westport Country Playhouse in 2001.

More recently, in 2005, she made a victorious comeback to the small screen by playing Francine Whiting on the HBO adaptation of Richard Russo's novel, ”Empire Falls.” For her bright effort, she took home Emmy, Golden Globe and SAG nominations for Best Supporting Actress. The TV film also featured an outstanding performance by Paul Newman.

Awards:

• Golden Globe: Best Performance by an Actress in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for TV, “Breathing Lessons,” 1995

• Screen Actors Guild: Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a TV Movie or Miniseries, “Breathing Lessons,” 1995

• Kansas City Film Critics Circle: Best Actress, “Mr. & Mrs. Bridge,” 1991

• New York Film Critics Circle: Best Actress, “Mr. & Mrs. Bridge,” 1990

• Emmy: Outstanding Informational Special, “American Masters: Broadway's Dreamers: The Legacy of the Group Theatre, “ 1990

• Screen Actors Guild: Life Achievement, 1986

• Emmy: Outstanding Lead Actress in a Limited Series or a Special, “Do You Remember Love,” 1985

• Emmy: Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama or Comedy Special, “See How She Runs,” 1978

• Golden Apple: Female Star of the Year, 1976

• BAFTA: Best Actress, “Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams,” 1975

• Kansas City Film Critics Circle: Best Actress, “Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams,” 1975

• New York Film Critics Circle: Best Actress, “Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams,” 1974

• Kansas City Film Cr tics Circle: Best Actress, "The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigold," 1974

• Cannes Film Festival: Best Actress, "The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds," 1973

• Golden Globe: Best Motion Picture Actress – Drama, “Rachel, Rachel,” 1969

• Kansas City Film Critics Circle: Best Actress, “Rachel, Rachel,” 1969

• New York Film Critics Circle: Best Actress, “Rachel, Rachel,” 1968

• San Sebastián International Film Festival: Zulueta Prize, Best Actress, “The Fugitive Kind,” 1960

• Hasty Pudding Theatricals: Woman of the Year, 1959

• Golden Laurel: Top New Female Personality, 1958

• Oscar: Best Actress in a Leading Role, “The Three Faces of Eve,” 1958

• Golden Globe: Best Motion Picture Actress – Drama, “The Three Faces of Eve,” 1958

• National Board of Review: Best Actress, “The Three Faces of Eve,” 1957 (also for “No Down Payment”)