
Jessica Tandy
Personal Info
Known for
Acting
Gender
Female
Birthday
1909-06-07
Day of Death
1994-09-11 (85 years old)
Place of Birth
London, England
Jessica Tandy
Biography
Jessie Alice "Jessica" Tandy (June 7, 1909 – September 11, 1994) was an English-American stage and film actress.
She first appeared on the London stage in 1926 at the age of 16, 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 marriage to Jack Hawkins, she moved to New York, where she met Canadian actor Hume Cronyn. He became her second husband and frequent partner on stage and screen.
She won the Tony Award for her performance as Blanche Dubois in the original Broadway production of A Streetcar Named Desire in 1948, sharing the prize with Katherine Cornell (who won for Antony and Cleopatra) and Judith Anderson (for the latter's portrayal of Medea). Over the following three decades, her career continued sporadically and included a substantial role in Alfred Hitchcock's film, The Birds (1963), and a Tony Award-winning performance in The Gin Game (playing in the two-character play opposite her husband, Cronyn) in 1977. She, along with Cronyn was a member of the original acting company of The Guthrie Theater.
In the mid 1980s she enjoyed a career revival. She appeared opposite Hume Cronyn in the Broadway production of Foxfire in 1983 and its television adaptation four years later, winning both a Tony Award and an Emmy Award for her portrayal of Annie Nations. During these years, she appeared in films such as Cocoon (1985), also with Cronyn.
She became the oldest actress to receive the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in Driving Miss Daisy (1989), for which she also won a BAFTA and a Golden Globe, and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for Fried Green Tomatoes (1991). At the height of her success, she was named as one of People's "50 Most Beautiful People". She was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 1990, and continued working until shortly before her death.
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Known For
Acting
(2006)
A Streetcar on Broadway
as Self (archive footage)
(2003)
Miss Daisy's Journey: From Stage to Screen
as Daisy Werthan (archive footage) (uncredited)
(2003)
Jessica Tandy: Theatre Legend to Screen Star
as Self (archive footage)
(1994)
Nobody's Fool
as Beryl Peoples
(1994)
Camilla
as Camilla Cara
(1993)
To Dance with the White Dog
as Cora Peek
(1992)
Used People
as Freida
(1991)
Fried Green Tomatoes
as Ninny Threadgoode
(1991)
The Story Lady
as Grace McQueen
(1990)
Night of 100 Stars III
as Self
(1989)
Driving Miss Daisy
as Daisy Werthan
(1988)
Cocoon: The Return
as Alma Finley
(1988)
The House on Carroll Street
as Miss Venable
(1987)
*batteries not included
as Faye Riley
(1987)
Foxfire
as Annie Nations
(1985)
Cocoon
as Alma Finley
(1984)
The Bostonians
as Miss Birdseye
(1982)
Still of the Night
as Grace Rice
(1982)
The World According to Garp
as Mrs. Fields
(1982)
Best Friends
as Eleanor McCullen
(1981)
Honky Tonk Freeway
as Carol
(1981)
The Gin Game
as Fonsia Dorsey
(1974)
Butley
as Edna Shaft
(1973)
(1963)
The Birds
as Lydia Brenner
(1962)
Hemingway’s Adventures of a Young Man
as Mrs. Helen Adams
(1959)
The Moon and Sixpence
as Blanche Stroeve
(1958)
The Light in the Forest
as Myra Butler
(1958)
The Christmas Tree
as Mrs. Martin
(1955)
(1951)
The Desert Fox: The Story of Rommel
as Frau Lucie Marie Rommel
(1950)
September Affair
as Catherine Lawrence
(1948)
A Woman's Vengeance
as Janet Spence
(1947)
Forever Amber
as Nan Britton
(1946)
Dragonwyck
as Peggy O'Malley
(1946)
The Green Years
as Kate Leckie
(1945)
The Valley of Decision
as Louise Kane
(1944)
The Seventh Cross
as Liesel Roeder
(1944)
Blonde Fever
as Restaurant Patron (uncredited)
(1938)
Murder in the Family
as Ann Osborne
(1932)
Indiscretions of Eve
as Penelope, the Maid