Kim Hunter was an American film, theatre, and television actress. She won both an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award

Golden Globe Award

The Golden Globe Award is an accolade bestowed by the 93 members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association recognizing excellence in film and television, both domestic and foreign...

, each as Best Supporting Actress, for her performance as Stella Kowalski

Stella Kowalski

Stella Kowalski is one of the main characters in Tennessee Williams' play A Streetcar Named Desire. She is the younger sister of central character Blanche DuBois.-In the play:...

 in the 1951

1951 in film

The year 1951 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* Sweden - May Britt is scouted by Italian film-makers Carlo Ponti and Mario Soldati-Top grossing films : After theatrical re-issue- Awards :Academy Awards:...

 film A Streetcar Named Desire. Decades later she received a Daytime Emmy Award

Daytime Emmy Award

The Daytime Emmy Awards are awards presented by the New York-based National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences and the Los Angeles-based Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in recognition of excellence in American daytime television programming...

 for her work on the long running soap

Soap opera

A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...

 The Edge of Night

The Edge of Night

The Edge of Night is an American television mystery series/soap opera produced by Procter & Gamble. It debuted on CBS on April 2, 1956, and ran as a live broadcast on that network until November 28, 1975; the series then moved to ABC, where it aired from December 1, 1975, until December 28, 1984...

.

Early life

Hunter was born Janet Cole in Detroit

Detroit, Michigan

Detroit is the major city among the primary cultural, financial, and transportation centers in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 5.2 million people. As the seat of Wayne County, the city of Detroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and serves as a major port on the Detroit River...

, Michigan

Michigan

Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....

, the daughter of Grace Lind, who was trained as a concert pianist, and Donald
Cole, a refrigeration engineer. She attended Miami Beach High School

Miami Beach High School

Miami Beach Senior High School, commonly referred to as "Beach High" or "MBSH", is a secondary school located at 2231 Prairie Avenue in the Miami Beach, Florida, right around the corner from the Miami Beach Convention Center and Botanical Gardens on Prairie Avenue and Dade Boulevard...

.

Career

Hunter's first film role was in the film noir

Film noir

Film noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as extending from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...

 The Seventh Victim

The Seventh Victim

The Seventh Victim is a 1943 horror and film noir starring Tom Conway, Jean Brooks, Isabel Jewell, Kim Hunter , and Hugh Beaumont, directed by Mark Robson, and produced by Val Lewton for RKO Radio Pictures...

in 1943. She performed in the original Broadway

Broadway theatre

Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...

 production of A Streetcar Named Desire

A Streetcar Named Desire (play)

A Streetcar Named Desire is a 1947 play written by American playwright Tennessee Williams for which he received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1948. The play opened on Broadway on December 3, 1947, and closed on December 17, 1949, in the Ethel Barrymore Theatre. The Broadway production was...

(1947), playing the role of Stella Kowalski. She appeared in the 1951 film version, for which she won both the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress

Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress

Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actress who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry. Since its inception, however, the...

 and the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture

Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture

The Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture was first awarded by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association in 1944 for a performance in a motion picture released in the previous year....

. In 1952 she was Humphrey Bogart's

Humphrey Bogart

Humphrey DeForest Bogart was an American actor. He is widely regarded as a cultural icon.The American Film Institute ranked Bogart as the greatest male star in the history of American cinema....

 leading lady in Deadline USA

Deadline - U.S.A.

Deadline – U.S.A. is a 1952 crime film starring Humphrey Bogart, Ethel Barrymore and Kim Hunter. A crusading newspaper editor fights a gangster. The newspaper used as background on the film, called The Day is loosely based upon the old New York City newspaper The Sun, which closed in 1950. The...

.

Hunter was blacklist

Blacklist

A blacklist is a list or register of entities who, for one reason or another, are being denied a particular privilege, service, mobility, access or recognition. As a verb, to blacklist can mean to deny someone work in a particular field, or to ostracize a person from a certain social circle...

ed from film and television in the 1950s, amid suspicions of communism

Communism

Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...

 in Hollywood, during the McCarthy Era

McCarthyism

McCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting roughly from the late 1940s to the late 1950s and characterized by...

. Streetcar director Elia Kazan

Elia Kazan

Elia Kazan was an American director and actor, described by the New York Times as "one of the most honored and influential directors in Broadway and Hollywood history". Born in Istanbul, the capital of the Ottoman Empire, to Greek parents originally from Kayseri in Anatolia, the family emigrated...

 gave her name to the House Un-American Activities Committee. She still appeared in an episode of CBS

CBS

CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...

's anthology series Appointment with Adventure

Appointment with Adventure

Appointment with Adventure is a half-hour adventure/dramatic anthology television series broadcast live on CBS from 1955-1956. The program has no host. It aired at 10 p.m...

and NBC

NBC

The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...

's Justice

Justice (1954 TV series)

Justice is an NBC half-hour drama television series about attorneys of the Legal Aid Society of New York, which aired from April 8, 1954 to March 25, 1956. In the 1954-1955 season, Justice starred Dane Clark as Richard Adams and Gary Merrill as Jason Tyler. In the 1955-1956 season, William Prince...

, based on case files of the New York Legal Aid Society.

She appeared opposite Mickey Rooney

Mickey Rooney

Mickey Rooney is an American film actor and entertainer whose film, television, and stage appearances span nearly his entire lifetime. He has won multiple awards, including an Honorary Academy Award, a Golden Globe and an Emmy Award...

 in the 1957 live CBS-TV broadcast of The Comedian

The Comedian (1957 TV drama)

The Comedian is a 1957 live television drama written by Rod Serling from a novella by Ernest Lehman, directed by John Frankenheimer, and starring Mickey Rooney....

, a harrowing drama written by Rod Serling

Rod Serling

Rodman Edward "Rod" Serling was an American screenwriter, novelist, television producer, and narrator best known for his live television dramas of the 1950s and his science fiction anthology TV series, The Twilight Zone. Serling was active in politics, both on and off the screen and helped form...

 and directed by John Frankenheimer

John Frankenheimer

John Michael Frankenheimer was an American film and television director known for social dramas and action/suspense films...

. In 1959 she appeared in Rawhide

Rawhide (TV series)

Rawhide is an American Western series that aired for eight seasons on the CBS network on Friday nights, from January 9, 1959 to September 3, 1965, before moving to Tuesday nights from September 14, 1965 until January 4, 1966, with a total of 217 black-and-white episodes...

season 1/16 episode Incident of the Misplaced Indians as Amelia Spaulding. In 1962, she appeared in the NBC

NBC

The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...

 medical drama

Medical drama

A medical drama is a television program, in which events center upon a hospital, an ambulance staff, or any medical environment.In the United States, most medical episodes are one hour long and, more often than not, are set in a hospital. Most current medical Dramatic programming go beyond the...

 The Eleventh Hour

The Eleventh Hour (1962 TV series)

The Eleventh Hour is an American medical drama about psychiatry starring Wendell Corey, Jack Ging, and Ralph Bellamy, which aired sixty-two new episodes plus selected rebroadcasts on NBC from October 3, 1962, to September 9, 1964.-Series premise:...

in the role of Virginia Hunter in the episode Of Roses and Nightingales and Other Lovely Things. In 1963, Hunter appeared as Anita Anson on the ABC

American Broadcasting Company

The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...

 medical drama Breaking Point in the episode Crack in an Image. In 1965, she appeared twice as Emily Field in the NBC TV medical series Dr. Kildare

Dr. Kildare

Dr. James Kildare is a fictional character, the primary character in a series of American theatrical films in the late 1930s and early 1940s, an early 1950s radio series, a 1960s television series of the same name and a comic book based on the TV show, and a short-lived 1970s television series...

.

Her other major film roles include David Niven

David Niven

James David Graham Niven , known as David Niven, was a British actor and novelist, best known for his roles as Phileas Fogg in Around the World in 80 Days and Sir Charles Lytton, a.k.a. "the Phantom", in The Pink Panther...

's character's love interest in the film A Matter of Life and Death (1946), and Zira, the sympathetic chimpanzee

Chimpanzee

Chimpanzee, sometimes colloquially chimp, is the common name for the two extant species of ape in the genus Pan. The Congo River forms the boundary between the native habitat of the two species:...

 scientist in the 1968 film Planet of the Apes

Planet of the Apes (1968 film)

Planet of the Apes is a 1968 American science fiction film directed by Franklin J. Schaffner, based on the 1963 French novel La Planète des singes by Pierre Boulle. The film stars Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowall, Kim Hunter, Maurice Evans, James Whitmore, James Daly and Linda Harrison...

and two sequels. She also appeared in several radio and TV soap opera

Soap opera

A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...

s, most notably as Nola Madison on TV's The Edge of Night

The Edge of Night

The Edge of Night is an American television mystery series/soap opera produced by Procter & Gamble. It debuted on CBS on April 2, 1956, and ran as a live broadcast on that network until November 28, 1975; the series then moved to ABC, where it aired from December 1, 1975, until December 28, 1984...

, for which she received a Daytime Emmy Award

Daytime Emmy Award

The Daytime Emmy Awards are awards presented by the New York-based National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences and the Los Angeles-based Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in recognition of excellence in American daytime television programming...

 nomination in 1980 as Best Actress. In 1979 she appeared as First Lady Ellen Axson Wilson in the serial drama Backstairs at the White House.

Hunter starred in the controversial TV movie

Television movie

A television film is a feature film that is a television program produced for and originally distributed by a television network, in contrast to...

 Born Innocent (1974) playing the mother of Linda Blair

Linda Blair

Linda Denise Blair is an American actress. Blair is best known for her role as the possessed child, Regan, in the 1973 film The Exorcist, for which she was nominated for an Academy Award and two Golden Globes, winning one. She reprised her role in 1977's Exorcist II: The Heretic.-Biography:Blair...

's character. She also starred in several episodes of the CBS Radio Mystery Theater

CBS Radio Mystery Theater

CBS Radio Mystery Theater was a radio drama series created by Himan Brown that was broadcast on CBS affiliates from 1974 to 1982....

during the mid-1970s. In 1973, she appeared twice on Lorne Greene

Lorne Greene

Lorne Greene , was the stage name of Lyon Himan Green, OC, a Canadian actor.His television roles include Ben Cartwright on the western Bonanza, and Commander Adama in the science fiction movie and subsequent TV Series Battlestar Galactica...

's short-lived ABC

American Broadcasting Company

The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...

 crime drama Griff

Griff (TV series)

Griff is a 13-episode ABC crime drama starring Lorne Greene and Ben Murphy, which aired from September 29, 1973, to January 4, 1974. Nine months after the expiration of his nearly 14-year role as Ponderosa Ranch patriarch Ben Cartwright on NBC's Bonanza western series, the Canadian native Greene...

, including the episode The Last Ballad, in which she portrayed Dr. Martha Reed, an abortion

Abortion

Abortion is defined as the termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo prior to viability. An abortion can occur spontaneously, in which case it is usually called a miscarriage, or it can be purposely induced...

ist held by police in the death of a patient. In 1977, she appeared on the NBC western

Western (genre)

The Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...

 series The Oregon Trail

The Oregon Trail (TV series)

The Oregon Trail is a 14-episode NBC western television series starring Rod Taylor as the widower Evan Thorpe, who leaves his Illinois farm in 1842 to take the Oregon Trail to the Pacific Northwest. The show also starred Andrew Stevens, Tony Becker, and Gina Marie Smika as Thorpe's children...

starring Rod Taylor, in the episode The Waterhole, which also featured Lonny Chapman

Lonny Chapman

Lonny Chapman was an American television actor best known for his numerous guest star appearances on detective dramas, including Quincy, M.E., The A-Team, Murder, She Wrote, Matlock, and NYPD Blue...

.

Death and legacy

Hunter died of heart attack in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 at the age of 79. She received two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame

Hollywood Walk of Fame

The Hollywood Walk of Fame consists of more than 2,400 five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along fifteen blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California...

, one for motion pictures at 1615 Vine Street

Vine Street

Vine is a street in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California that runs north-south from Melrose Avenue up past Hollywood Boulevard. The intersection of Hollywood and Vine was once a symbol of Hollywood itself...

 and a second for television at 1715 Vine Street.

Filmography

Year	Film	Role	Notes
1943	The Seventh Victim The Seventh Victim The Seventh Victim is a 1943 horror and film noir starring Tom Conway, Jean Brooks, Isabel Jewell, Kim Hunter , and Hugh Beaumont, directed by Mark Robson, and produced by Val Lewton for RKO Radio Pictures...	Mary Gibson
	Tender Comrade	Doris Dumbrowski
1944	When Strangers Marry When Strangers Marry When Strangers Marry is a 1944 suspense film directed by William Castle and featuring Dean Jagger and Kim Hunter. The film, re-released under the title Betrayed, was called "the finest B-picture ever made" by film historian Don Miller.-Plot:...	Millie Baxter
	A Canterbury Tale A Canterbury Tale A Canterbury Tale is a 1944 British film by the film-making team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. It stars Eric Portman, Sheila Sim, Dennis Price and Sgt. John Sweet; Esmond Knight provided narration and played several small roles. For the postwar American release, Raymond Massey narrated...	Johnson's Girl	US release
1945	You Came Along You Came Along You Came Along is a 1945 romance film set in World War II with a screenplay by Ayn Rand. It starred Robert Cummings and, in her film debut, Lizabeth Scott. Robert Cummings' character has the same name of his character on his 1950's television show Love That Bob.-Cast:*Robert Cummings as Major Bob...	Frances Hotchkiss
1946	A Matter of Life and Death	June
1951	A Streetcar Named Desire	Stella Kowalski Stella Kowalski Stella Kowalski is one of the main characters in Tennessee Williams' play A Streetcar Named Desire. She is the younger sister of central character Blanche DuBois.-In the play:...	Academy Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture The Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture was first awarded by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association in 1944 for a performance in a motion picture released in the previous year....
1952	Deadline - U.S.A. Deadline - U.S.A. Deadline – U.S.A. is a 1952 crime film starring Humphrey Bogart, Ethel Barrymore and Kim Hunter. A crusading newspaper editor fights a gangster. The newspaper used as background on the film, called The Day is loosely based upon the old New York City newspaper The Sun, which closed in 1950. The...	Nora Hutcheson
	Anything Can Happen	Helen Watson
1956	Storm Center Storm Center Storm Center is an American drama film directed by Daniel Taradash. The screenplay by Taradash and Elick Moll focuses on what were at the time two very controversial subjects, Communism and book banning, and took a strong stance against censorship....	Martha Lockridge
	Bermuda Affair	Fran West
1957	The Young Stranger The Young Stranger The Young Stranger is a drama film which is also the first film directed by John Frankenheimer.- Plot :Teenage Hal Ditmar, the son of a wealthy movie producer, gets into an argument in a theater, which ends with Hal hitting the theater manager. Neither the police nor Hal's father believe his claim...	Helen Ditmar
1959	Money, Women and Guns	Mary Johnston Kingman
1964	Lilith Lilith (film) Lilith is a film written and directed by Robert Rossen. It is based on a novel by J. R. Salamanca and stars Warren Beatty, Jean Seberg, Peter Fonda, Kim Hunter and Gene Hackman...	Dr. Bea Brice
1968	Planet of the Apes Planet of the Apes (1968 film) Planet of the Apes is a 1968 American science fiction film directed by Franklin J. Schaffner, based on the 1963 French novel La Planète des singes by Pierre Boulle. The film stars Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowall, Kim Hunter, Maurice Evans, James Whitmore, James Daly and Linda Harrison...	Dr. Zira
	The Swimmer The Swimmer (film) The Swimmer is a 1968 American film directed by Frank Perry and starring Burt Lancaster. The surreal, allegorical tale is based on the 1964 short story by John Cheever, adapted by Eleanor Perry, the director's wife...	Betty Graham
1970	Beneath the Planet of the Apes Beneath the Planet of the Apes Beneath the Planet of the Apes is a 1970 American science fiction film directed by Ted Post and written by Paul Dehn. It is the second of five films in the original Planet of the Apes series produced by Arthur P. Jacobs...	Dr. Zira
1971	Escape from the Planet of the Apes Escape from the Planet of the Apes Escape from the Planet of the Apes, directed by Don Taylor, is a 1971 science fiction film starring Roddy McDowall, Kim Hunter, Bradford Dillman and Ricardo Montalbán. It is the third of five films in the original Planet of the Apes series produced by Arthur P. Jacobs, the second being Beneath the...	Dr. Zira
1976	Dark August	Adrianna Putnam
1987	The Kindred	Amanda Hollins
1990	Due occhi diabolici	Mrs. Pym	segment "The Black Cat"
1993	The Black Cat	Mrs. Pym	Short release of segment in Due occhi diabolici
1997	Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil	Betty Harty
1998	A Price Above Rubies A Price Above Rubies A Price Above Rubies is a 1998 film directed by Boaz Yakin, starring Renée Zellweger as a young woman who finds it difficult to conform to the restrictions imposed on her by her community. Reviews of the movie were mixed, though generally positive to Zellweger's performance. The title is a biblical...	Rebbitzn
1999	Abilene	Emmeline Brown
	Out of the Cold	Elsa Lindepu
2000	Here's to Life!	Nelly Ormond
	The Hiding Place	Muriel

External links