Martha Hyer

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Martha Hyer (born August 10, 1924 in Fort Worth , Texas , † May 31, 2014 in Santa Fe , New Mexico ) was an American film actress .

Life

At the age of eleven, Martha Hyer had her first appearance in the 1935 film Thunder Mountain with George O'Brien . After graduating from high school, the daughter of Julien C. Hyer (1894–1974), a Texas Senator and Judge Advocate , moved with her family from her native Fort Worth to San Antonio . After graduating from Fairfax Hall Junior College in Waynesboro in the early 1940s, she studied language and acting at Northwestern University in Evanston and began training as a theater actress at the Pasadena Playhouse in California . Her classmates included Cloris Leachman , Paul Lynde , Charlton Heston, and Patricia Neal . In 1946 she was signed by the production company RKO Pictures and in the same year she had a small role as the bridesmaid in The Locket . Until the early 1950s, she shot numerous B- Westerns with Tim Holt and Allan 'Rocky' Lane , including a remake of Thunder Mountain from 1947.

After the contract with RKO expired in 1951, Hyer moved to New York and married the producer and director C. Ray Stahl , whom she met while filming the film Oriental Evil . The divorce followed just two years later. She initially worked as a freelancer at several film studios ( Monogram , Paramount , Warner Bros. ) before contracting with Universal in the late 1950s . She celebrated her greatest successes as the rich daughter Elizabeth Tyson in Sabrina and as the demure teacher Gwen French at the side of Frank Sinatra in Damn They All , for which she received an Oscar nomination a year later. She also became known for films such as Houseboat and The Four Sons of Katie Elder . Sometimes because of their blond hair and their cultivated appearance as "Universal's answer to Grace Kelly called," she was also one of the candidates for the role of Marion Crane in the movie Psycho by Alfred Hitchcock . Her male film partners were well-known stars such as Cary Grant , John Wayne , Roger Moore , Danny Kaye and Dean Martin .

In 1966 Hyer married the film producer Hal B. Wallis , with whom she lived at Rancho Mirage until his death in 1986 . At the end of the 1960s, she withdrew into private life. In 1971 she made her last film The Day of the Wolves and had another appearance on television in January 1974 in the episode A Cowboy in Paradise of the American series McCloud . She co-wrote the script for the feature film Mit Dynamit und Religious Sayings , produced by her husband in 1975 .

Hyer sometimes appeared under the pseudonym Martha Lou Spring during her short career as a model . She published her autobiography Finding My Way under the name Martha Hyer Wallis in 1990 and last lived in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where she died on May 31, 2014 at the age of 89.

Filmography (selection)

Awards

  • 1959 Academy Awards : nomination for Best Supporting Actress in Damn They All
  • 1959 Laurel Awards : Winner of the Golden Laurel for Best Supporting Actress in Damn They All
  • Western Heritage Awards 1966: Winner of the Bronze Wrangler (along with producer, director and other actors) in the Theatrical Motion Picture category for The Four Sons of Katie Elder

literature

Web links

Commons : Martha Hyer  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Steve Vaught: Hyer Up in the Hills - The Martha Hyer Residence. In: Paradise Leased. May 11, 2011, accessed July 19, 2012 .
  2. ↑ Man About Town on Gay Broadway ... Earl Wilson In: Beaver Valley Times (archive), October 26, 1953
  3. ↑ Landt Dennis: Behind Adobe Walls. The Hidden Homes and Gardens of Santa Fe and Taos . Chronicle Books, San Francisco 1997, ISBN 0-8118-1164-6 , pp. 132-139 .
  4. ^ William Yardley: Martha Hyer, Oscar-Nominated Actress, Dies at 89. In: The New York Times, June 10, 2014 (accessed June 11, 2014).
personal data
SURNAME Hyer, Martha
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hyer Wallis, Martha; Spring, Martha Lou (stage name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American film actress
DATE OF BIRTH August 10, 1924
PLACE OF BIRTH Fort Worth , Texas , USA
DATE OF DEATH May 31, 2014
Place of death Santa Fe , New Mexico , USA