Oscars for supporting actresses have on occasion been called the “old lady’s” award but the award has rarely gone to old ladies or even younger actresses playing old ladies. It has more frequently been won by ingenues or lately, leading ladies shoehorned into the supporting actress category.
Intended for character actresses, the award has seldom gone to those who have spent their careers in supporting roles, although it has gone to several actresses who could play leads but were mostly seen in supporting roles in their later years.
Among veteran performers known primarily for their character work who have won just one Oscar for playing older characters are Peggy Ashcroft, Fay Bainter, Ethel Barrymore, Alice Brady, Jane Darwell, Olympia Dukakis, Judi Dench, Brenda Fricker, Ruth Gordon, Lee Grant, Eileen Heckart, Wendy Hiller, Josephine Hull, Hattie McDaniel, Anne Revere, Margaret Rutherford, Octavia Spencer, Maureen Stapleton, Claire Trevor, and Yuh-Jung Youn. That’s not a bad showing, but it’s only twenty out of eighty-four winners in eighty-six years. It doesn’t include Ingrid Bergman and Helen Hayes who previously won in the lead category or Dianne Wiest and Shelley Winters won the award twice. Nor does it include actresses primarily known for TV work such as Cloris Leachman, Patricia Arquette, Allison Janney, and Regina King.
Here are six veterans of numerous great films, all nominated in the category at least once, whose performances have stood the test of time:
Beulah Bondi (1889-1981) was a character actress on stage who made her debut reprising her stage role as the neighborhood gossip in 1931’s Street Scene. Nominated for Oscars for 1936’s The Gorgeous Hussy and 1938’s Of Human Hearts, she had her greatest role in-between with 1937’s Make Way for Tomorrow in which she starred as a 70-year-old woman at the age of 48. With memorable performances in such films as Vivacious Lady, On Borrowed Time, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Remember the Night, Our Town, Penny Serenade, The Southerner, It’s a Wondaful Life, Track of the Cat, A Summer Place, and Tammy and the Doctor, she won an Emmy for her two-episode 1976 guest-starring role on The Waltons.
Billie Burke (1884-1970) was the daughter of a circus clown who had great success on the stage from 1902. Married to showman Florenz Ziegfeld from 1914 to his death in 1932, she made her film debut in 1916 and starred in 16 films through 1921 when she retired. She returned to films in a supporting role 1932’s A Bill of Divorcement and gave memorable performances in such films as Dinner at Eight, Craig’s Wife, Topper, The Young in Heart, Merrily We Live, for which she received her only Oscar nomination, The Wizard of Oz, The Man Who Came to Dinner, In This Our Life, The Cheaters, The Barkleys of Broadway, Father of the Bride, The Young Philadelphians, Sergeant Rutledge, and Pepe.
Gladys Cooper (1888-1971) was a renown London and Broadway stage star, the British pinup queen of World War I in a pose in which she daintily raised her skirt above her ankles. In Hollywood from 1940’s Rebecca on, she received Oscar nominations for Now, Voyager, The Song of Bernadette, and My Fair Lady. She gave equally memorable performances in such films as The White Cliffs of Dover, Mrs. Parkington, The Valley of Decision, Love Letters, The Green Years. Green Dolphin Street, The Bishop’s Wife, The Secret Garden, Thunder on the Hill, At Sword’s Point, Separate Tables, The List of Adrian Messenger, and The Happiest Millionaire. She received Tony nominations for The Chalk Garden and A Passage to India.
Agnes Moorehead (1900-1974) was a member of Orson Welles’ radio Mercury Theatre Players and made her film debut in Welles’ Citizen Kane and received her first Oscar nomination for his The Magnificent Ambersons. Nominated three more times for Mrs. Parkington, Johnny Belinda, and Hush…Hush. Sweet Charlotte, the five-time Emmy nominee for TV’s Bewitched also gave memorable performances in such films as Dark Passage, The Stratton Story, Caged, Show Boat, The Blue Veil, Magnificent Obsession, All That Heaven Allows, The Swan, The Opposite Sex, Raintree County, The Story of Mankind, The Bat, Pollyanna, How the West Was Won, and The Singing Nun.
Edna May Oliver (1883-1942) played so many old ladies in the decade before her death that it came as a shock to many that she was only 59 when she passed away on her birthday. The descendent of two presidents, John and John Quincy Adams, Oliver received her only Oscar nomination for 1939’s Drums Along the Mohawk. Her unforgettable performances in Cimarron, Penguin Pool Murder, Little Women, and David Copperfield were given in films released prior to the Academy’s supporting awards eligibility. She was eligible for two of her best, A Tale of Two Cities and Romeo and Juliet in the first year of eligibility but was passed over for both. Her last films were Pride and Prejudice and Lydia.
Thelma Ritter (1902-1969) was a radio actress whose first film role was an uncredited one, her two-scene stealer in 1947’s Miracle on 34th Street. From there it was a leap and a jump to a memorable supporting role in A Letter to Three Wives followed by consecutive Oscar nominated performances in All About Eve, The Mating Season, With a Song in My Heart, and Pickup on South Street. Surprisingly passed over for Rear Window, she rebounded with further nominations for Pillow Talk and Birdman of Alcatraz. Always a treat to see, she was equally impressive in such films as As Young as You Feel, Titanic, Daddy Long Legs, A Hole in the Head, Boing Boeing, and The Incident. In-between films, she won a Tony for Broadway’s New Girl in Town.
