#Fact1She Was Awarded the 1980 Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award for Distinguished Performance in a Play for "On Golden Pond" at the Ahmanson Theatre in...
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Fact
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She was awarded the 1980 Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award for Distinguished Performance in a Play for "On Golden Pond" at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles, California.
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Had never retired from acting.
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She was known to be a very private person.
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Studied for a year at the New York Drama School before becoming one of the first members of Lee Strasberg's Actor's Studio.
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The daughter of investment broker William Pickett Harris.
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Her parents sent her to a finishing school in Providence, Rhode Island, before she persuaded them to let her transfer to a girl's prep school in Manhattan then known as Miss Hewitt's Classes, which offered drama. Harris also attended a summer acting camp in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, where she was mentored by Charlotte Perry, who encouraged her to attend the Yale School of Drama, which she did for a year.
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As a young girl, Harris says she saw Gone with the Wind (1939) 13 times and also read biographies of great actresses.
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In 1950, she made her mark on the stage at age 24 playing 12-year-old Frankie Addams in Carson McCullers's adaptation of her own novel 'The Member of the Wedding'. She then reprised the role in the 1952 screen version with the same title.
9
'Acting is my life', she announced early on to her high school drama teacher, and later in her career, director and critic Harold Clurman seemed to confirm this when he described Harris as 'totally designed to be a good instrument on the stage'.
Her future Knots Landing (1979), co-star, Joan Van Ark, had interviewed as a student reporter, when she was fifteen years old. Harris later recommended Van Ark to attend the Yale School of Drama. Harris is the youngest student ever to attend the college on a scholarship.
12
Won a 2002 Special Tony Award (New York City) lifetime achievement award.
Julie Harris is the most honored performer in Tony history with ten nominations and five victories. She won the award as Best Actress (Dramatic) for "I Am A Camera" (1952), "The Lark" (1956), "Forty Carats" (1969), and "The Last of Mrs. Lincoln" (1973); and as Best Actress (Play) for "The Belle of Amherst" (1977). Her five additional nominations were: for Best Actress (dramatic), "Marathon '33" (1964) and "The Au Pair Man" (1974); for Best Actress (musical), "Skyscraper" (1966); and for Best Actress (play), "Lucifer's Child" (1991), and "The Gin Game" (1997).
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Elia Kazan, in his autobiography "A Life," said that he was grateful to have Harris on the set of East of Eden (1955) because she had a calming influence on James Dean. Kazan praised Harris as both an actress and as a human being.
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In May 2002, she and producer Robert Whitehead were both named recipients of Special Tony awards for Lifetime Achievement in the Theater. It was Harris's sixth Tony award.
21
Suffered a stroke. [May 2001]
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Fell backstage in Stamford, Connecticut, USA, requiring surgery to drain fluid from her head. [April 1999]
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