Barbara Bel Geddes

Bel Geddes came to prominence in the 1946 Broadway production of Deep Are the Roots. The performance garnered her the Clarence Derwent Award, the Theatre World Award and the Donaldson Award (forerunner of the Tony Awards) presented to her by Laurette Taylor, for "Outstanding Achievement in The Theatre". From 1951 to 1953, Bel Geddes played 924 performances of the F. Hugh Herbert hit comedy The Moon Is Blue. In 1955, she created the role of Maggie "The Cat" in Elia Kazan's original Broadway production of Tennessee Williams' Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and in 1961 created the title role in the Jean Kerr comedy Mary, Mary which became Broadway's longest-running show with over 1,500 performances. Both roles earned her Tony Award nominations. Other highlights include John Steinbeck's Burning Bright, Edward Albee's Everything in the Garden, and Silent Night, Lonely Night with Henry Fonda. She starred with Michael Redgrave in the Broadway production of The Sleeping Prince. In the film adaptation, retitled The Prince and the Showgirl, the roles were reprised by Marilyn Monroe and Laurence Olivier.

In 1952, she was presented with the prestigious Hasty Pudding Woman of the Year award from America's oldest theater company, Harvard University's Hasty Pudding Theatricals; in 1993, having appeared in 15 Broadway productions, she was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame (located in the Gershwin Theatre in New York City), a distinction she shared with her father, stage and industrial designer Norman Bel Geddes.

Bel Geddes in Elia Kazan's Panic in the Streets (1950)

Bel Geddes began her film career starring with Henry Fonda in The Long Night (1947), a remake of the 1939 French film Le jour se lève. "I went out to California awfully young", she said. "I remember Lillian Hellman and Elia Kazan telling me, 'Don't go, learn your craft.' But I loved films." The following year, she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in the George Stevens film I Remember Mama.[2]

She played Richard Widmark's wife Nancy in Kazan's 1950 film noir Panic in the Streets.[2] In 1958, Alfred Hitchcock cast her with James Stewart in Vertigo as the long-suffering bohemian, Midge. Bel Geddes also starred with Danny Kaye and Louis Armstrong in the screen musical The Five Pennies.

When an investigation from the House Un-American Activities Committee had Bel Geddes's name put on the Hollywood blacklist during the 1950s, it stalled her film career for a time, and she carried on with her acting on Broadway and an occasional part on television. Bel Geddes found new opportunity in television when she was cast in four episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, including "Lamb to the Slaughter", in which she played a housewife who killed her husband by bludgeoning him to death with a frozen leg of lamb, cooking the murder weapon, and then serving it to the investigating police. She appeared in series such as Playhouse 90, CBS Playhouse, Riverboat, Dr. Kildare, and Death Valley Days. In 1977, she starred in the highly acclaimed production of the Thornton Wilder classic Our Town with Hal Holbrook.

Bel Geddes as Miss Ellie Ewing in the television series Dallas

In 1978, Bel Geddes was the first actor signed to star in Dallas. The role of the family matriarch, Miss Ellie Ewing, brought her renewed international recognition. She appeared in many episodes, in almost every season of the series, for a total of 276 episodes from 1978 to 1990 (she was absent from the 1984–85 and 1990–91 seasons) and remains the only cast member to win the Emmy Award (Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress - Drama Series) and the Golden Globe (List of Golden Globe Awards: Television, Best Actress, Drama).[2] In 1985, she also received Germany's Golden Camera Award.

Larry Hagman (who was only nine years junior to Bel Geddes), who played J. R. Ewing, told the Associated Press: "She was the rock of Dallas. She was just a really nice woman and a wonderful actress. She was kind of the glue that held the whole thing together." In a later interview for the website "Ultimate Dallas", Hagman said, "The reason I took the show, they said Barbara Bel Geddes is going to play your mother, and I said, 'Well, that's a touch of class, you know,' so of course I wanted to work with her."

In 1971, Bel Geddes underwent a radical mastectomy, which was an experience that she relived while playing Miss Ellie in the 1979–1980 season of Dallas. The performance garnered her the Emmy Award. She was also honored by former First Lady Betty Ford for helping to raise breast cancer awareness.

On March 15, 1983, Bel Geddes narrowly avoided a heart attack, but the media falsely reported that she had had a heart attack. Only days after she had completed filming for the 1982–1983 season, her doctor discovered a condition that required emergency quadruple bypass surgery. She subsequently missed the first 11 episodes of the 1983–1984 season[3] and was replaced with actress Donna Reed for the 1984–1985 season. With her health improved, CBS-TV persuaded Lorimar Productions to return Bel Geddes to the role of Miss Ellie for the 1985–1986 season. Bel Geddes remained in the role until the later stages of the penultimate season of Dallas in 1990.