Lynn Fontanne

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Lynn Fontanne (1932)

Lynn Fontanne (born as: Lillie Louise Fontanne ; born December 6, 1887 in the London Borough of Redbridge , England , † July 30, 1983 in Genesee Depot , Wisconsin , USA ) was a British film and theater actress .

Life

Lynn Fontanne was the daughter of Jules printer font Anne, a native French and the Irish born Frances Ellen Thornley. Called Lynn from childhood , she became enthusiastic about acting at a young age. Through a family friend, she was introduced to the actress Ellen Terry , from whom she received acting lessons. She made her London theater debut in 1905 with a small role as a mime in the Theater Royal in Drury Lane , which was followed by other supporting roles in theaters or on tours in England. In 1910 she first visited the United States, where she made her Broadway debut in the play Mr. Preedy and the Countess . Although she then lived in the United States for over six decades, she never applied for citizenship. Lynn Fontanne was best known as a stage actress. She appeared in around 35 plays. In 1959 she was nominated for the Tony Award , but only received this award in 1970.

In 1919 Fontanne met the actor Alfred Lunt , who was five years his junior . Her first major success was the title role in George S. Kaufman's and Marc Connelly's Dulcy (1921). Fontanne and Lunt married in May 1922. The couple were members of the American theater company Theater Guild from 1924 to 1929 , where they appeared in plays such as Ferenc Molnár's Divorce from Margit Veszi ( The Guardsmen , 1924/25), George Bernard Shaw's Heroes (1925/26) and Pygmalion (1926/27) or Franz Werfels Bocksgesang ( The Goat Song , 1926). Even today, they are considered to be one of the first married couples in history, who mostly appeared together. They also shared common film projects.

Fontanne, who first appeared in front of the camera in Second Youth in 1924 , only appeared in a few films like her husband. Her most successful feature film was the theatrical adaptation of Werfels Bocksgesang , The Guardsman (1931), for which Fontanne was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress in 1932 .

Fontanne and Lunt founded the Lunt-Fontanne Theater in New York City , which opened on May 5, 1958 with Friedrich Dürrenmatt's The Visit of the Old Lady .

After Alfred Lunt's death on August 3, 1977, Fontanne retired to her estate in Waukesha County . Here she died six years later, at the age of 95, of severe pneumonia .

Others

  • After Fontanne's death, a theater museum was set up on the estate.
  • In 1999, a 33-cent stamp with the likeness of the couple was distributed exclusively in New York City.
  • The couple's changeable relationship is said to have served as a model for the main characters in the musical Kiss Me, Kate .

Awards

Web links

Commons : Lynn Fontanne  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ cf. Brown, Jared: Lunt, Alfred, and Lynn Fontanne . In: American National Biography Online ( Memento of the original from September 7, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. February 2000. (accessed on November 13, 2007) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.anb.org
  2. ↑ a b cf. Hartnoll, Phyllis (Ed.): The Oxford Companion to the Theater . London [et al.]: Oxford University Press, 1951
personal data
SURNAME Fontanne, Lynn
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Fontanne, Lillie Louise
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British film and stage actress
DATE OF BIRTH December 6, 1887
PLACE OF BIRTH London Borough of Redbridge , England
DATE OF DEATH July 30, 1983
Place of death Genesee Depot , Wisconsin , USA