Born May 28, 1931 in Johnstown, Pennsylvania to a travelling salesman and his wife, Carroll Baker studied at Actors Studio under Lee Strasberg where her classmates included Marilyn Monroe, Shelley Winters, Rod Steiger, and James Dean.
Baker began acting in TV commercials in 1951, which led to small roles in TV dramas. She made her film debut in a walk-on role in 1953’s Easy to Love, the year she was briefly married to her first husband, Louie Ritter. She then appeared in two Broadway stage productions.
Married to Jack Garfein in 1955, she was recommended by James Dean for the female lead opposite him in 1955’s Rebel Without a Cause, she auditioned for the role but lost to Natalie Wood. She then auditioned for the same year’s Picnic but lost to Kim Novak. Given a contract by Warner Bros., she was cast as Rock Hudson and Elizabeth Taylor’s daughter in 1956’s Giant and as the young bride in the same year’s Baby Doll, receiving an Oscar nomination for the latter. She is currently the second longest living Best Actress nominee behind Leslie Caron who was nominated for Lili two years earlier.
Baker was bypassed in favor of Joanne Woodward for the lead in 1957’s Three Faces of Eve. She was wanted by MGM for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, but Warner wouldn’t allow it. Elizabeth Taylor got the part instead. She refused to play Diana Barrymore in 1958’s Too Much, Too Soon opposite Errol Flynn as John Barrymore but was, however, loaned out to United Artists for 1958’s The Big Country with Gregory Peck and Jean Simmons and to Paramount for 1959’s But Not for Me opposite Clark Gable. She returned to Warner Bros. to play the lead in 1959’s The Miracle opposite Roger Moore.
Now out of her Warner Bros. contract, Baker made 1961’s Bridge to the Sun opposite James Shigeta for MGM, the same year’s Something Wild opposite Ralph Meeker for United Artists, and two all-star cast westerns, 1963’s How the west Was Won for MGM and 1964’s Cheyenne Autumn which was released by Warner Bros.
Baker then signed a contract with Paramount where her only successful film was 1964’s The Carpetbaggers opposite George Peppard. 1965’s Harlow in which she played Jean Harlow was a huge bomb despite heavy publicity. It was such a failure that it ended her Hollywood career, after which she appeared in European films.
The actress resurfaced in supporting roles in U.S. films beginning in 1980 with Watcher in the Woods. Her subsequent films include 1983’s Star 80, 1986’s Native Son, 1987’s Ironweed, 1990’s Kindergarten Cop, and 1997’s The Game. Her biggest latter-day role in a 1993 episode of Murder, She Wrote opposite Angela Lansbury who played her mother in Harlow.
Divorced from Jack Garfein in 1969 with whom she had two children, actress Blanche Baker and composer Hershel Garfein, she married for a third time in 1982 to British actor Donald Burton who died in 2007 after a long illness.
Carroll Baker retired from acting in 2003 and has been out of the public spotlight ever since. She is now 94 years old.
ESSENTIAL FILMS
GIANT (1956), directed by George Stevens
Baker became an instant star in Elia’s Kazan controversial Baby Doll for which she was nominated for an Oscar but her best film released that same year was Geroge Stevens’ epic film of Edna Ferber’s Giant in which she played the daughter of Rock Hudson and Elizabeth Taylor. She was recommended for the role by James Dean who was a classmate at the Actors Studio. She was only seven years younger than Hudson and several months older than Taylor who, along with Dean, were the stars of the film. She’s in the last section of the film along with Earl Holliman who plays her brother.
THE MIRACLE (1959), directed by Irving Rapper
Still trying to get away from the sexpot image that made her a star in Baby Doll, Baker got as far away from that role as possible when she chose the tole of the postulant nun who leaves the convent to follow a young soldier played by Roger Moore. While she is gone, the Virgin Mary climbs down from her statue in the cathedral and takes her place in the convent. It’s the statue that is missed, not the young nun. Based on a famous play, Warner Bros. had been trying to film it as early as 1942 when the role would have been played by Bette Davis. Jean Simmons was later chosen for the role, but the project was against dropped.
BRIDGE TO THE SUN (1961), directed by Etienne Pérrier
Based on a true story, this compelling drama relates the difficulties of a young woman married to a Japanese diplomat during World War II, victim of suspicion and animosity from her husband’s government. The film takes place from 1935 to the end of the war in 1945. James Shigeta, who played her husband, was also in one of that year’s hit musicals, the film version of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Flower Drum Song. He had already played a memorable role opposite Victoria Shaw as a Japanese American cop in love with a Caucasian woman in Samuel Fuller’s 1959 mirder mystery, The Crimson Kimono.
HOW THE WEST WAS WON (1963), directed by John Ford, Henry Hathaway, George Marshall
This epic film about the taming of the west had three credited directors and at least one uncredited one. It also had a screen full of stars, the principal ones being Gregory Peck, Debbie Reynolds, James Stewart, and Baker. Reynolds and Baker played sisters whose parents Karl Malden and Agnes Moorehead are killed early on. George Peppard with whom Baker starred in 1964’s The Carpetbaggers, played Reynolds’ son in the film. Others in the huge cast included Henry Fonda, Carolyn Jones, Robert Preston, Walter Brennan, Thelma Ritter, Raymond Masey as Lincoln, Harry Morgan as Grant, and John Wayne as Sherman.
HARLOW (1965), directed by Gordon Douglas
One of two films about Jean Harlow that were released in the same year with the same title. Carol Lynley was Harlow in the other version, an even bigger flop than this one. The source material was a novel based on information provided by Harlow’s agent played by Red Buttons. Only he, Harlow, her second husband, Paul Bern (Peter Lawford), Harlow’s mother (Angela Lansbury), and stepfather (Raf Vallone) were called by their real names in the film. Harlow’s first and third husband and her great last love, William Powell, are not seen in the film. Martin Balsam and Leslie Nielsen are fictionalized versions of Louis B. Mayer and Howard Hughes, respectively.
CARROLL BAKER AND OSCAR
Baby Doll (1955) – nominated – Best Actress
