Eva Marie Saint

Eva Marie Saint (born July 4, 1924) is an American actress who has starred in films, on Broadway, and on television in a career spanning seven decades. She won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in the drama film On the Waterfront (1954), and later starred in the thriller film North by Northwest (1959), directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Saint received Golden Globe and BAFTA award nominations for the drama film A Hatful of Rain (1957) and won an Emmy Award for the television miniseries People Like Us (1990). Her film career also includes roles in Raintree County (1957), Exodus (1960), Grand Prix (1966), Nothing in Common (1986), Because of Winn-Dixie (2005), Superman Returns (2006) and Winter's Tale (2013). --- Saint was born in the City of Newark to Eva Marie (née Rice) and John Merle Saint. She attended Bethlehem Central High School in Delmar, New York, graduating in 1942, and was inducted into the high school's hall of fame in 2006. She studied acting at Bowling Green State University while a member of Delta Gamma Sorority, and there is now a theater on Bowling Green's campus named for her. She was an active member in the theater honorary fraternity, Theta Alpha Phi and served as Secretary of the Bowling Green Student Government in 1944. Saint's introduction to television began as an NBC page. She appeared in the very early live NBC TV show Campus Hoopla in 1946–47. Her performances on this program are recorded on rare kinescope, and audio recordings of these telecasts are preserved in the Library of Congress. She also appeared in the 1949 Bonnie Maid Versa-Tile Varieties NBC program as one of the singing Bonnie Maids used in the live commercials. She appeared in a 1947 Life Magazine special about television, and also in a 1949 feature Life article about her as a struggling actress earning minimum amounts from early TV while trying to make ends meet in New York City. In the late 1940s, she continued doing extensive work in radio and television before winning the Drama Critics Award for her Broadway stage role in the Horton Foote play The Trip to Bountiful (1953), in which she co-starred with such formidable actors as Lillian Gish and Jo Van Fleet. In 1955, she was nominated for her first Emmy for "Best Actress In A Single Performance" on The Philco Television Playhouse for playing the young mistress of middle-aged E. G. Marshall in Middle of the Night by Paddy Chayefsky. She won another Emmy nomination for the 1955 television musical version of the Thornton Wilder classic play Our Town with co-stars Paul Newman and Frank Sinatra. Her success and acclaim were of such a high level that the young Saint earned the nickname "the Helen Hayes of television." Saint's first feature-film role, at age 30, was in On the Waterfront (1954), directed by Elia Kazan and starring Marlon Brando - a performance for which she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. Her role as Edie Doyle (whose brother's death sets the film's drama in motion), which she won over such leading contenders as Claire Trevor, Nina Foch, Katy Jurado, and Jan Sterling also earned her a British Academy of Film and Television Award nomination for "Most Promising Newcomer." --- Saint has been married to producer/director Jeffrey Hayden since October 28, 1951. They have two children, Darrell (born April 1, 1955) and Laurette (born July 19, 1958), and three grandchildren.