Taina Elg

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Taina Elg at the Finnish Midnight Sun Film Festival in Sodankylä (2012)

Taina Elisabeth Elg (born March 9, 1930 in Impilahti ) is a Finnish - American dancer and actress .

biography

Education and success in Hollywood

Taina Elg was born in Impilahti in 1930 and grew up in Helsinki and Turku . Even in her youth she sporadically took on extras in Finnish films. Elg completed her training at the ballet school of the Finnish National Opera ( Kansallisooppera ) in her hometown in 1946 and worked in Swedish theaters from 1946. A year later she received a scholarship from Sadler's Wells Ballet School in London, where she also performed with the company. From 1949 to 1953 she was a member of the Monte Carlo Ballet . In the course of the success of the Swede Anita Ekberg , Elg came to Hollywood in 1954 through test shots , where she was signed by the American production company MGM . She made her film debut in 1955 with a supporting role in Richard Thorpe's historical film Temple of Temptation at the side of Lana Turner , after which she used the MGM in other film productions. 1956 followed another supporting role in the Lana Turner vehicle Diane - Courtesan of France . In the same year Elg received first praise for the part of sober Elsa in Curtis Bernhardt's Gaby . In the remake of Robert E. Sherwood's popular Broadway hit Waterloo Bridge , Leslie Caron was her film partner and eponymous heroine, who, as a Catholic ballet dancer in London during the war years, refused to accept her lover.

Her breakthrough as a film actress came in 1957 in Elg's fourth film for MGM, in which she was able to exploit her experience as a dancer. In George Cukor's musical Die Girls , with which she was to remain friends for life, she and Kay Kendall and Mitzi Gaynor gave a face to three dancers who were engaged in a defamation process about their past with the head of a revue troupe (played by Gene Kelly ) fight. In the New York Times, film critic Bosley Crowther praised the role of the flighty French Angèle, who escapes into marriage with a good French baron, as "brilliantly funny" and a year later the Finn and her film colleague Kay Kendall received the Golden Globe Award for best leading actress in a comedy or musical . A year earlier, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association had given Elg the prize for the best foreign newcomer .

End of the film career

After Die Girls , Elg was seen as a French farm girl alongside Glenn Ford and Red Buttons in George Marshall's war drama Imitation General (1958). Although the role was again well received by the critics, it could not build on the previous success with this film or the female lead roles in Ralph Thomas ' Hitchcock remake The 39 Steps or Kurt Neumann's adventure film Watusi (both 1959). Kenneth More and George Montgomery were her screen partners in these films . In the late 1950s, Elg's career in Hollywood ended as one of the last contract actresses in the old studio system.

After the Italian-French period film Die Bacchantes (1961) with Pierre Brice , Elg only appeared sporadically as a film actress, for example as a nemesis in the Arnold Schwarzenegger film Hercules in New York in 1970 . She devoted herself increasingly to television work ( love, lies, passion , 1980–1981; murder is her hobby , 1987) and appearances in the theater. One of her greatest successes was the revival of the musical Where's Charley? on New York Broadway (1974/75) in which she was seen alongside Raúl Juliá, among others . The role of Donna Lucia D'Alvadorez earned her a 1975 nomination for the prestigious Tony Award . Elg also appeared at the National Opera in Helsinki in a Finnish version of West Side Story and received the Barrymore Award in 1996 for her role as Miss Schneider in the Philadelphia production of the musical Cabaret . She last toured the American provinces in 1999 with the play Titanic , in which she could be seen as Ida Strauss. She had previously auditioned three times without success for the role in the Broadway production. Her last film appearance so far was in 2006 with a supporting role in the Finnish comedy Kummelin jackpot by Pekka Karjalainen .

Taina Elg has lived in New York since 1961 and is married to the sociologist Rocco Caporale. Their marriage to Carl Björkenheim from 1953 to 1958 resulted in their son Raoul Björkenheim (* 1956), himself a well-known musician. In 1991 she published a biography of her childhood memories in Finland under the title Varpailla maailmalle . In 2003, with her participation, the documentary Starring - Taina Elg by director Jarmo Heikkinen was made, which premiered in Finland in December of the same year and traces the career of the actress. In June 2004, Elg's services as an actress were honored with the Order of the Lion of Finland (1st grade) by the Finnish President Tarja Halonen . Elg, who speaks fluent French, Italian and German in addition to Finnish, Swedish and English, has been enthusiastic about swimming, tennis and skiing in the past and is now an American citizen.

Filmography (selection)

Plays (selection)

  • 1970: Look to the Lilies
  • 1973: Uncle Vanya
  • 1974–1975: Where's Charley?
  • 1979: The Utter Glory of Morrissey Hall
  • 1979-1980: Strider
  • 1982-1984: Nine
  • 1996: Cabaret
  • 1999: Titanic

Awards

literature

Web links

Commons : Taina Elg  - Collection of Images

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Keijo Virtamo (ed.): Otavan musiikkitieto. Otava, Helsinki 1997, ISBN 951-1-14518-5 , p. 92.
  2. ^ Ephraim Katz: The Macmillan international film encyclopedia. Macmillan, New York, NY 1994, ISBN 0-333-61601-4 .
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g Jim Seavor: Titanic star Taina Elg still kicking up her heels. In: Providence Journal bulletin. (Rhode Island) December 2, 1999, Lifebeat, p. 2G.
  4. ↑ a b Actress Taina Elg Decorated. Consulate General, New York, June 16, 2004 (accessed April 7, 2008 from finland.org)
  5. ^ New Film About Treachery And Espionage Mr. S. Reynolds's "Foreign Intrigue". In: The Times . Issue 53.572, July 2, 1956, p. 5.
  6. ↑ Bosley Crowther's review in the New York Times, October 4, 1957.
  7. ↑ Bosley Crowther's review in the New York Times, August 21, 1958.
  8. ^ A Western That Strays From The Trail. In: The Times. Issue 54.238, August 25, 1958, p. 6.
  9. ^ Clifford A. Ridley: 'Cabaret' With the Show's Heart out of Balance. In: The Philadelphia Inquirer. May 3, 1996, p. 35.
  10. ^ List of the 1996 Barry Award winners. Theater Philadelphia, accessed March 5, 2020 .
  11. ↑ Taina Elg. In: Contemporary Theater, Film and Television. Volume 1, Gale Research, 1984. (accessed via Biography Resource Center. Gale, Farmington Hills, Mich. 2009)
personal data
SURNAME Elg, Taina
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Elg, Taina Elisabeth (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Finnish-American dancer and actress
DATE OF BIRTH March 9, 1930
PLACE OF BIRTH Impilahti , Finland