| Ellen Burstyn | |
|---|---|
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| Birth name | Edna Rae Gillooly |
| Born | December 7 1932 Detroit, Michigan, U.S. |
| Official site | http://www.ellenburstyn.net/ |
Ellen Burstyn (born December 7, 1932) is an Academy Award-winning American actress.
Contents |
Biography
Early life
Burstyn was born Edna Rae Gillooly in Detroit, Michigan, the daughter of Correine Marie (née Hamel) and John Austin Gillooly, a building contractor.[1] She was raised Catholic.[2] Because her parents divorced when she was young, Burstyn says she only remembers seeing her father one time when she was away at boarding school. At 19 years old, Burstyn says she sought out her father, hoping to establish a relationship with him. "I arrived on his doorstep and … he didn't consider me a daughter, he considered me a hot babe. So that ended that relationship," she said. "What happens is that you go on trying to look for a father all of your life until the day comes when you realize I have to father myself." She referred to her mother as tough, violent and controlling. In 1960, after two failed marriages, Ellen fell in love with actor Neil Burstyn. Ellen said he was charming, funny, bright, talented and eccentric. Then he degenerated into mental illness and became schizophrenic and violent. Neil left Ellen just before she became one the most celebrated actresses of the 1970s and '80s, with five Oscar nominations and one win in 10 years. "Then he wanted to come back," she says. "By then I had discovered how pleasant life was without a crazy husband and I didn't want him to come back. In her biography "Lessons in Becoming Myself", Burstyn revealed that she was stalked over a period of 10 years by her third husband whom she divorced. This included a violent incident of rape that went unpunished, as the police said that because the perpetrator was her husband "no crime was committed." Ultimately he committed suicide, upon which his parents sent Burstyn a telegram stating "Congratulations, you've won another Oscar; Neil killed himself".
Career
Burstyn debuted on Broadway in 1957 and, in 1975, won a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play for her performance in Same Time, Next Year (a role she would reprise in the film version, three years later). In 1990 she won the Sarah Siddons Award for her work in Chicago theatre. Until 1970, she was credited as "Ellen McRae" in nearly all her film and TV appearances. Burstyn won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1974 for her performance in the movie Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore. She received her first Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress in 1971 for the film The Last Picture Show, and was subsequently nominated for Best Actress in 1973 for the horror movie The Exorcist, in 1978 for Same Time, Next Year, in 1980 for Resurrection, and for Requiem for a Dream in 2000. She worked on several television shows of the 1960s, including guest appearances on Perry Mason, Maverick, Wagon Train, 77 Sunset Strip, The Big Valley and Gunsmoke. She hosted Saturday Night Live in 1980. In 1986, she had her own ABC sitcom, The Ellen Burstyn Show costarring Megan Mullally as her daughter and Elaine Stritch as her mother. It was cancelled after one season. From 2000 to 2002, Burstyn appeared in the CBS television drama That's Life. In 2006, she starred as a bishop in the controversial NBC comedy-drama The Book of Daniel. Burstyn's most recent film appearance was in The Fountain, directed by Darren Aronofsky, with whom she worked in Requiem for a Dream. She also appeared on a 2007 episode of the HBO series Big Love, playing the mother of Polygamist wife Barbara Henrickson.
Emmy Awards and controversy
Burstyn was nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Actress in a Miniseries or Special, for the TV movie The People vs. Jean Harris (1981) and again for another TV movie, Pack of Lies (1987). In 2006, she was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or Special for HBO's Mrs Harris as Dr. Tarnower's "Ex-Lover #3." (She had played the title character in The People vs Mrs Jean Harris). She was nominated for a performance that consisted of 14 seconds of screen time, two lines of dialogue and a total of 38 words. This is the shortest nominated performance in the history of the Emmy Awards. Soon after the nominations were announced, an outcry ensued from the press and the public regarding the worthiness of the nomination. One explanation for the nomination was that people were honoring Burstyn for her nominated but non-winning performance from the first Harris telefilm. A more popular accusation was that the nominating committee was either confused in their recollection, or merely "threw in" her name from sheer recognition, assuming a worthy performance without actually seeing it. The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences initially insisted that "based on the popular vote, this is a legitimate nomination." Meanwhile, HBO deflected the blame for submitting the nomination to the movie production company. Burstyn's own reaction ranged from initial silence to:
| “ | I thought it was fabulous. My next ambition is to get nominated for seven seconds, and ultimately I want to be nominated for a picture in which I don't even appear. | ” |
to this final quote:
| “ | This doesn't have anything to do with me. I don't even want to know about this. You people work it out yourself. | ” |
Ultimately, Kelly Macdonald, who starred in The Girl in the Cafe, won the award. In March 2007, the Academy officially announced that eligibility for a Primetime Emmy Award in any long-form supporting-actor category required nominees to appear on-screen in at least 10 percent of the project (9 minutes in a typical 90-minute telefilm). Many critics still cite this incident to illustrate the lack of integrity in the increasingly expansive process of Emmy nominations, where name and role misrecognition have played an increasingly visible role.[3]
Other activities
During the 1970s, Burstyn, was active in the movement to free falsely convicted boxer Rubin "Hurricane" Carter from jail. In 1981, Burstyn recorded "The Ballad of the Nazi Soldier's Wife" (Kurt Weill's musical setting of Bertolt Brecht's text "Und was bekam des Soldaten Weib?") for Ben Bagley's album Kurt Weill Revisited, Vol. 2. Burstyn served as president of the Actors' Equity Association from 1982 to 1985. In 1997, Burstyn was inducted into the Michigan Women's Hall of Fame. In 2000, she was named co-president of The Actor's Studio, alongside Al Pacino and Harvey Keitel. Burstyn practices Sufism. She is affiliated with the Maezumi Institute (Zen Peacemakers) and says her spiritual journey was inspired by the book The Last Barrier: A Journey Through the World of Sufi Teaching.[4]
Filmography
| Year | Film | Role | Other notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1964 | Goodbye Charlie | Franzie Salzman | |
| For Those Who Think Young | Dr. Pauline Thayer | ||
| 1969 | The Winner | Ellen McLeod | |
| 1970 | Alex in Wonderland | Beth Morrison | |
| Tropic of Cancer | Mona Miller | ||
| 1971 | The Last Picture Show | Lois Farrow | Nominated - Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress; Nominated - Golden Globe Award |
| 1972 | The King of Marvin Gardens | Sally | |
| 1973 | The Exorcist | Chris MacNeil | Nominated - Academy Award for Best Actress Nominated - Golden Globe Award |
| 1974 | Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore | Alice Hyatt | Academy Award for Best Actress BAFTA Award Nominated - Golden Globe Award |
| Harry and Tonto | Shirley Mallard | ||
| Thursday's Game | Lynne Evers | TV | |
| 1977 | Providence | Sonia Lngham | |
| 1978 | A Dream of Passion | Brenda | |
| Same Time, Next Year | Doris | Golden Globe Award Nominated - Academy Award for Best Actress | |
| 1980 | Resurrection | Edna Mae McCauley | Nominated - Academy Award for Best Actress Nominated - Golden Globe Award |
| 1981 | Silence of the North | Olive Frederickson | |
| The People vs. Jean Harris | Jean Harris | TV; Nominated - Golden Globe Award | |
| 1984 | The Ambassador | Alex Hacker | |
| 1985 | Into Thin Air | Joan Walker | TV |
| Twice in a Lifetime | Kate MacKenzie | ||
| 1986 | The Ellen Burstyn Show | Ellen Brewer | TV |
| Act of Vengeance | Margaret Yablonski | TV | |
| Something in Common | Lynn Hollander | TV | |
| 1987 | Look away | Mary Todd Lincoln | TV |
| Pack of Lies | Barbara Jackson | TV | |
| 1988 | Hannah's War | Katalin | |
| 1990 | When You Remember Me | Nurse Cooder | TV |
| 1991 | Grand Isle | Mademoiselle Reisz | |
| Dying Young | Mrs. O'Neil | ||
| Mrs. Lambert Remembers Love | Lillian "Lil" Lambert | TV | |
| 1992 | Wilma | TV | |
| 1993 | Joan Delvecchio | TV | |
| The Cemetery Club | Esther Moskowitz | ||
| 1994 | Trick of the Eye | Frances Griffin | TV |
| Getting Gotti | Jo Giaclone | TV | |
| When a Man Loves a Woman | Emily | ||
| Getting Out | Arlie's Mother | TV | |
| The Color of Evening | Kate O'Reilly | ||
| 1995 | How to Make an American Quilt | Hy Dodd | |
| The Baby-Sitters Club | Emily Haberman | ||
| Follow the River | Gretel | TV | |
| My Brother's Keeper | Helen | TV | |
| Roommates | Judith | ||
| 1996 | Timepiece | Maud Gannon | TV |
| Our Son, the Matchmaker | TV | ||
| The Spitfire Grill | Hannah Ferguson | ||
| 1997 | Flash | Laura Strong | TV |
| Deceiver | Mook | ||
| A Deadly Vision | Yvette Watson | TV | |
| 1998 | Playing by Heart | Mildred | |
| The Patron Saint of Liars | June Clatterbuck | TV | |
| You Can Thank Me Later | Shirley Cooperberg | ||
| 1999 | Walking Across Egypt | Mattie Rigsbee | |
| Night Ride Home | Maggie | TV | |
| 2000 | Mermaid | Trish Gill | TV |
| Requiem for a Dream | Sara Goldfarb | Nominated - Academy Award for Best Actress Nominated - Golden Globe Award |
|
| The Yards | Val Handler | ||
| 2001 | Within These Walls | Joan Thomas | TV |
| Dodson's Journey | Mother | ||
| 2002 | Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood | Viviane Joan 'Vivi' Abbott Walker | |
| 2003 | Brush with Fate | Rika | TV |
| 2004 | The Five People You Meet in Heaven | Ruby | TV |
| Tommie | TV | ||
| 2005 | Mrs. Harris | Ex-lover #3 | |
| Down in the Valley | Ma | ||
| Our Fathers | Mary Ryan | TV | |
| 2006 | The Fountain | Dr. Lilian Guzetti | |
| The Wicker Man | Sister Summersisle | ||
| The Elephant King | Diana Hunt | ||
| 30 Days | Maura | ||
| 2007 | The Stone Angel | Hagar | |
| Mitch Albom's For One More Day | Pauline Benetto | TV | |
| 2008 | Our Lady of Victory | Mother St. John | Post-Production |
| The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond | Miss Adie | Post-Production | |
| Greta | Katherine | Post-Production | |
| 2009 | Lovely, Still | Mary | Post-Production |
See also
- BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role
- Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture Musical or Comedy
References
External links
- Official website
- Ellen Burstyn at the Internet Movie Database
- Ellen Burstyn at TV.com
- Ellen Burstyn at Yahoo! Movies
- Ellen Burstyn at the Internet Broadway Database
- Interview
| Awards | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Glenda Jackson for A Touch of Class |
Academy Award for Best Actress 1974 for Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore |
Succeeded by Louise Fletcher for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest |
| Preceded by Goldie Hawn, Gene Kelly, Walter Matthau, George Segal, and Robert Shaw 48th Academy Awards |
"Oscars" host (with Warren Beatty, Jane Fonda, and Richard Pryor) 49th Academy Awards |
Succeeded by Bob Hope 50th Academy Awards |
