
Dorothy Jeakins
Personal Info
Known for
Costume & Make-Up
Gender
Female
Birthday
1914-01-11
Day of Death
1995-11-21 (81 years old)
Place of Birth
San Diego, California, USA
Dorothy Jeakins
Biography
Dorothy Jeakins (January 11, 1914 – November 21, 1995) was an American costume designer.
Born in San Diego, California, she attended public school in Los Angeles from first grade through high school. As a senior at Fairfax High School, she was offered a scholarship to study at the Otis Art Institute (now known as Otis College of Art and Design). She also attended the Art Students League of Los Angeles, under Stanton Macdonald-Wright. She was later awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Otis College in 1987.
Jeakins worked on WPA projects and as a Disney artist in the 1930s. Her fashion career began as a designer at I. Magnin's, where she was spotted by director Victor Fleming. Hired as a sketch artist for Joan of Arc (1948), Jeakins worked on the costumes with Barbara Karinska and shared an Oscar with her in the color category. This was the first Oscar ever awarded for costumes outside the black and white category.
Jeakins was unusual in that she freelanced, never signing a long-term contract with any one studio. She worked steadily for the next thirty-nine years, winning another two Oscars, for Samson and Delilah (1949, shared with Edith Head and others), The Night of the Iguana (1964), and another 12 nominations. She designed period costumes for The Ten Commandments (1956), The Music Man (1962), The Sound of Music (1965), Little Big Man (1970), The Way We Were (1973), Young Frankenstein (1974) and The Dead (1987). Her modern dress excursions included Niagara (1953), Three Coins in the Fountain (1954), South Pacific (1958), and On Golden Pond (1981).
Jeakins also worked on stage productions, including South Pacific (in which Motley was the principal costume designer), King Lear, Winesburg, Ohio, and The World of Suzie Wong (for which she received her third Tony nomination), and such television productions as the 1957 production of Annie Get Your Gun, and Mayerling. For ten years beginning in 1953, she served as designer for the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera. In 1961 she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship to study in Japan. She spent a year there, studying theater costume. From 1967 to 1970, Ms. Jeakins was Curator of Costumes and Textiles at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. In 1987, she was awarded the Women in Film Crystal Award for outstanding women who, through their endurance and excellence of their work, have helped to expand women's roles within the entertainment industry. Jeakins, who retired in 1990, once summed up her designing: "I can put my world down to two words: Make beauty. It's my cue and my private passion."
Acting
(1966)
Hawaii
as Hepzibah Hale
Crew
(1987)
The Dead
Costume Designer
(1981)
The Postman Always Rings Twice
Costume Design
(1981)
On Golden Pond
Costume Design
(1979)
Love and Bullets
Costume Design
(1979)
North Dallas Forty
Costume Design
(1978)
The Betsy
Costume Design
(1977)
Audrey Rose
Costume Design
(1976)
I Will, I Will...For Now
Costume Design
(1975)
The Hindenburg
Costume Design
(1974)
Young Frankenstein
Costume Design
(1974)
The Savage Is Loose
Costume Design
(1974)
The Yakuza
Costume Design
(1973)
The Way We Were
Costume Design
(1972)
Fuzz
Costume Design
(1972)
Fat City
Costume Design
(1970)
The Molly Maguires
Costume Design
(1969)
True Grit
Costume Design
(1968)
The Stalking Moon
Costumer
(1968)
Finian's Rainbow
Costume Design
(1968)
The Fixer
Costume Design
(1967)
Reflections in a Golden Eye
Costume Design
(1967)
The Flim-Flam Man
Costume Design
(1966)
Hawaii
Costume Designer
(1966)
Any Wednesday
Costume Design
(1965)
The Sound of Music
Costume Design
(1965)
The Fool Killer
Costume Design
(1964)
The Best Man
Costume Supervisor
(1964)
The Night of the Iguana
Costume Design
(1964)
Ensign Pulver
Costume Design
(1962)
All Fall Down
Costume Design
(1962)
The Music Man
Costume Design
(1961)
The Children's Hour
Costume Design
(1960)
The Unforgiven
Costume Design
(1960)
Let's Make Love
Costume Design
(1960)
Elmer Gantry
Costume Design
(1959)
Green Mansions
Costume Design
(1958)
Desire Under the Elms
Costume Design
(1958)
South Pacific
Costume Design
(1957)
Annie Get Your Gun
Costume Design
(1957)
Mayerling
Costume Design
(1956)
Friendly Persuasion
Costume Design
(1956)
The Ten Commandments
Costume Design
(1954)
Three Coins in the Fountain
Costume Design
(1953)
White Witch Doctor
Costume Design
(1953)
Beneath the 12-Mile Reef
Costume Design
(1953)
City of Bad Men
Costume Design
(1953)
Niagara
Costume Design
(1953)
Inferno
Costume Design
(1953)
Treasure of the Golden Condor
Costume Design
(1952)
Belles on Their Toes
Costume Design
(1952)
Les Miserables
Costume Design
(1952)
The Outcasts of Poker Flat
Costume Design
(1952)
My Cousin Rachel
Costume Design
(1952)
Stars and Stripes Forever
Costume Design
(1952)
The Big Sky
Costume Design
(1952)
The Greatest Show on Earth
Costume Design
(1950)
Cyrano de Bergerac
Costume Design
(1949)
Samson and Delilah
Costume Design
(1948)
Joan of Arc
Costume Design