Nydia Eileen Westman was an American actress and singer of stage, screen and television.

Career

Westman's career ranged from episodic appearances on TV sitcoms and uncredited bit roles in movies to appearances in groundbreaking films (such as Craig's Wife

Craig's Wife

Craig's Wife is a 1925 play written by American playwright George Kelly, uncle of actress and later Princess of Monaco Grace Kelly. It won the 1926 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Harriet Craig was played by Chrystal Herne....

, which starred Rosalind Russell

Rosalind Russell

Rosalind Russell was an American actress of stage and screen, perhaps best known for her role as a fast-talking newspaper reporter in the Howard Hawks screwball comedy His Girl Friday, as well as the role of Mame Dennis in the film Auntie Mame...

, and the first film version of Little Women

Little Women

Little Women is a novel by American author Louisa May Alcott . The book was written and set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House, in Concord, Massachusetts. It was published in two volumes in 1868 and 1869...

which starred Katharine Hepburn

Katharine Hepburn

Katharine Houghton Hepburn was an American actress of film, stage, and television. In a career that spanned 62 years as a leading lady, she was best known for playing strong-willed, sophisticated women in both dramas and comedies...

 in her first great movie success).

She appeared as the housekeeper

Housekeeper (servant)

A housekeeper is an individual responsible for the cleaning and maintenance of the interior of a residence, including direction of subordinate maids...

 Mrs. Featherstone in the 1962–1963 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...

 series, Going My Way

Going My Way (TV series)

Going My Way is an American comedy-drama series starring dancer and actor Gene Kelly. Based on the 1944 film of the same name starring Bing Crosby, the series aired on ABC with new episodes from October 3, 1962 to April 24, 1963. The program was Kelly's first and only attempt at a weekly television...

, which starred Gene Kelly

Gene Kelly

Eugene Curran "Gene" Kelly was an American dancer, actor, singer, film director and producer, and choreographer...

, Leo G. Carroll

Leo G. Carroll

Leo Gratten Carroll was an English-born actor. He was best known for his roles in several Hitchcock films and The Man from U.N.C.L.E. and Topper.-Early life:...

, and Dick York

Dick York

Richard Allen "Dick" York was an American actor. He is best remembered for his role as the first Darrin Stephens on the ABC television fantasy sitcom Bewitched...

.

She also broke ground on stage, debuting the role of "Nell" off-Broadway in Samuel Beckett

Samuel Beckett

Samuel Barclay Beckett was an Irish avant-garde novelist, playwright, theatre director, and poet. He wrote both in English and French. His work offers a bleak, tragicomic outlook on human nature, often coupled with black comedy and gallows humour.Beckett is widely regarded as among the most...

's
Endgame

Endgame (play)

Endgame, by Samuel Beckett, is a one-act play with four characters, written in a style associated with the Theatre of the Absurd. It was originally written in French ; as was his custom, Beckett himself translated it into English. The play was first performed in a French-language production at the...

, for which she won one of the first Obie

Obie Award

The Obie Awards or Off-Broadway Theater Awards are annual awards given by The Village Voice newspaper to theatre artists and groups in New York City...

 awards.

Personal life

She was born 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...

. Her parents, Theodore and Lily (Wren) Westman were actors in vaudeville

Vaudeville

Vaudeville was a theatrical genre of variety entertainment in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. Each performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill...

. Her sisters, Lolita and Neville were actresses, and her brother, Theodore (d. November 20, 1927), was an actor and playwright

Playwright

A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...

.

She was married to Robert Sparkes, a producer, from 1930 until 1937; they had a daughter.

Westman died of cancer

Cancer

Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...

, aged 68, in Burbank, California

Burbank, California

Burbank is a city in Los Angeles County in Southern California, United States, north of downtown Los Angeles. The estimated population in 2010 was 103,340....

.

Filmography

• Rabbit, Run
  Rabbit, Run
  Rabbit, Run is a 1960 novel by John Updike.The novel depicts five months in the life of a 26-year-old former high school basketball player named Harry 'Rabbit' Angstrom, and his attempts to escape the constraints of his life...
  
  (1970)
• Silent Night, Lonely Night (1969)
• The Horse in the Gray Flannel Suit
  The Horse in the Gray Flannel Suit
  The Horse in the Gray Flannel Suit is a 1968 film directed by Norman Tokar....
  
  (1968)
• The Reluctant Astronaut
  The Reluctant Astronaut
  The Reluctant Astronaut is a Universal Pictures feature film starring Don Knotts in a story about a kiddie-ride operator who is hired as a janitor at the Manned Spacecraft Center in Houston and is eventually sent into space. The film was produced and directed by Edward J...
  
  (1967)
• The Swinger
  The Swinger
  The Swinger is a 1966 film directed by George Sidney. It stars Ann-Margret and Anthony Franciosa.-Cast:*Ann-Margret as Kelly Olsson*Anthony Franciosa as Ric Colby*Robert Coote as Sir Hubert Charles*Yvonne Romain as Karen Charles...
  
  (1966)
• The Chase
  The Chase (1966 film)
  The Chase is a 1966 American drama film directed by Arthur Penn, about a series of events set into motion by a prison break. Since one of the two escapees is Charlie "Bubber" Reeves , the escape causes a stir in a nearby town where Bubber is a well-known figure.The film deals with themes of racism...
  
  (1966)
• The Ghost and Mr. Chicken
  The Ghost and Mr. Chicken
  The Ghost and Mr. Chicken is a 1966 American Universal Pictures feature film starring Don Knotts as Luther Heggs, a newspaper typesetter who spends a night in a haunted house, which is located in the fictitious community of Rachel, Kansas...
  
  (1966)
• For Love or Money
  For Love or Money (1963 film)
  For Love or Money is a 1963 romantic comedy film starring Kirk Douglas, Mitzi Gaynor and Thelma Ritter.-Plot summary:Lawyer Donald Kenneth "Deke" Gentry is given the task of playing matchmaker for the three daughters of his wealthy client Chloe Brasher .-Cast:* Kirk Douglas as Donald Kenneth...
  
  (1963)
• Don't Knock the Twist
  Don't Knock the Twist
  Don't Knock the Twist is a 1962 film starring Lang Jeffries. It is the sequel to the 1961 film Twist Around the Clock-Plot summary:Many twist dancers' meet in preparation for the TV variety show called "The Twist." While the special is still in the production stages, jealousies lead to problems -...
  
  (1962)
• The Velvet Touch
  The Velvet Touch
  The Velvet Touch is an American drama film released by RKO Radio Pictures.-Production background:The dialogue in Leo Rosten's screenplay, adapted from a story by William Mercer and Annabel Ross, anticipates the witty repartee in All About Eve and Auntie Mame .The cast, directed by Jack Gage,...
  
  (1948)
• The Late George Apley
  The Late George Apley
  The Late George Apley is a 1937 novel by John Phillips Marquand. It is a satire of Boston's upper class. The title character is a Harvard-educated WASP living on Beacon Hill in downtown Boston....
  
  (1947)
• Her Primitive Man (1944)
• Princess O'Rourke
  Princess O'Rourke
  Princess O'Rourke is a 1943 romantic comedy film. It was directed and written by Norman Krasna and starring Olivia de Havilland, Robert Cummings and Charles Coburn...
  
  (1943)
• Hers to Hold (1943)
• They All Kissed the Bride
  They All Kissed the Bride
  They All Kissed the Bride is a Columbia Pictures feature film starring Joan Crawford, Melvyn Douglas, Roland Young, and Billie Burke in a story about a trucking firm executive who falls in love. The screenplay by P. J. Wolfson was based on a story by Gina Kaus and Andrew P. Solt. The film was...
  
  (1942)
• The Remarkable Andrew (1942)
• The Chocolate Soldier
  The Chocolate Soldier (film)
  -Cast:* Nelson Eddy as Karl Lang, aka Vassily Vassilievitch* Risë Stevens as Maria Lanyi, Karl's Wife* Nigel Bruce as Bernard Fischer, Critic* Florence Bates as Madame 'Pugsie' Helene* Dorothy Raye as Magda...
  
  (1941)
• The Bad Man
  The Bad Man
  The Bad Man is a 1941 Western film starring Wallace Beery, Lionel Barrymore, Laraine Day, and Ronald Reagan. The movie was written by Wells Root from the Porter Emerson Browne play, and directed by Richard Thorpe...
  
  (1941)
• Hullabaloo
  Hullabaloo (film)
  Hullabaloo is a 1940 musical comedy film directed by Edwin L. Marin and written by Nat Perrin. It stars Frank Morgan, Virginia Grey, Dan Dailey, Billie Burke, Donald Meek, Reginald Owen and Connie Gilchrist...
  
  (1940)
• Forty Little Mothers (1940)
• The Cat and the Canary
  The Cat and the Canary (1939 film)
  The Cat and the Canary starring Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard is a 1939 comedy horror film remake of the 1927 film The Cat and the Canary, which was based on the 1922 play of the same name by John Willard...
  
  (1939)
• When Tomorrow Comes
  When Tomorrow Comes (film)
  When Tomorrow Comes is a 1939 romantic drama film starring Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer. A waitress falls in love with a man who later turns out to be a married concert pianist. Bernard B...
  
  (1939)
• Bulldog Drummond's Peril
  Bulldog Drummond's Peril
  Bulldog Drummond's Peril is a 1938 American film directed by James P. Hogan. The film is based on Herman C. McNeile's novel The Third Round.-Plot:...
  
  (1938)
• The First Hundred Years
  The First Hundred Years
  The First Hundred Years is the first ongoing TV soap opera in the United States that began as a daytime serial, airing on CBS from December 4, 1950 until June 27, 1952...
  
  (1938)
• The Goldwyn Follies
  The Goldwyn Follies
  The Goldwyn Follies is a 1938 Technicolor film written by Ben Hecht, Sid Kuller, Sam Perrin and Arthur Phillips, with music by George Gershwin, Vernon Duke, and Ray Golden, and lyrics by Ira Gershwin. Some sources credit Kurt Weill as one of the composers, but this is apparently incorrect...
  
  (1938)
• Bulldog Drummond's Revenge
  Bulldog Drummond's Revenge
  Bulldog Drummond's Revenge is a 1937 black-and-white detective film directed by Louis King, produced by Stuart Walker‎, and written by Edward T. Lowe Jr. and Herman C...
  
  (1937)
• Bulldog Drummond Comes Back
  Bulldog Drummond Comes Back
  Bulldog Drummond Comes Back is a 1937 American film starring John Barrymore and directed by Louis King.-Plot:The girlfriend of Captain Drummond is kidnapped by an enemy of Drummond seeking revenge, but Drummond and his friend Colonel Nielsen are hot on his his trail.-Cas :*John Barrymore as Colonel...
  
  (1937)
• When Love Is Young (1937)
• Pennies from Heaven
  Pennies from Heaven (1936 film)
  Pennies from Heaven is a 1936 musical comedy film starring Bing Crosby and featuring Louis Armstrong in a supporting role. The movie was directed by Norman Z. McLeod and the screenplay was written by Jo Swerling from a story by William Rankin based on the novel The Peacock Feather by Katherine...
  
  (1936)
• Rose Bowl (1936)
• Craig's Wife
  Craig's Wife (film)
  Craig's Wife is a 1936 drama film starring Rosalind Russell as a domineering wife. It was based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning Broadway play of the same name by George Kelly , and directed by Dorothy Arzner...
  
  (1936)
• The Gorgeous Hussy
  The Gorgeous Hussy
  The Gorgeous Hussy is a 1936 film directed by Clarence Brown, and starring Joan Crawford and Robert Taylor. The film's plot tells a fictionalized account of President of the United States Andrew Jackson and an innkeeper's daughter...
  
  (1936)
• The Invisible Ray (1936)
• Three Live Ghosts (1936)
• A Feather in Her Hat
  A Feather in Her Hat
  A Feather in Her Hat is a 1935 melodrama film starring Pauline Lord as a working-class woman with ambitions for her son. It is based on the novel of the same name by I. A. R. Wylie.-Plot:...
  
  (1935)
• Dressed to Thrill (1935)
• Sweet Adeline (1934)
• One Night of Love
  One Night of Love
  One Night of Love is a 1934 romantic musical film set in the opera world, starring Grace Moore and Tullio Carminati. It was written by James Gow, S.K. Lauren and Edmund H. North, from the story, Don't Fall in Love, by Charles Beahan and Dorothy Speare...
  
  (1934)
• Ladies Should Listen
  Ladies Should Listen
  Ladies Should Listen is a 1934 American comedy film directed by Frank Tuttle.-Cast:*Cary Grant as Julian De Lussac*Frances Drake as Anna Mirelle*Edward Everett Horton as Paul Vernet*Rosita Moreno as Marguerite Cintos*George Barbier as Joseph Flamberg...
  
  (1934)
• Success at Any Price (1934)
• Manhattan Love Song (1934)
• The Trumpet Blows
  The Trumpet Blows
  The Trumpet Blows is a film directed by Stephen Roberts, featuring George Raft as a Mexican matador, Adolphe Menjou as a retired bandito clearly based on Pancho Villa, and Frances Drake as Chulita, the woman they both want to marry....
  
  (1934)
• Two Alone (1934)
• Cradle Song
  Cradle Song
  Cradle Song is a 1981 dramatic short film written, produced, and directed by Sharron Miller. Its cast includes Richard Gates and Cheryl Waters. It tells the story of a young farm couple who are struggling with the wife's pregnancy as they relive their grief over the death of their first child....
  
  (1933)
• Little Women
  Little Women
  Little Women is a novel by American author Louisa May Alcott . The book was written and set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House, in Concord, Massachusetts. It was published in two volumes in 1868 and 1869...
  
  (1933)
• The Way to Love (1933)
• Bondage (1933)
• King of the Jungle (1933)
• From Hell to Heaven (1933)
• Should Crooners Marry (1933)
• Manhattan Tower
  Manhattan Tower (film)
  Manhattan Tower is a 1932 film directed by Frank R. Strayer starring Mary Brian and James Hall. Manhattan Tower is currently available via the Internet Archive.- Plot summary :...
  
  (1932)
• Strange Justice (1932)

Television work

• The Murdocks and the McClays (1970)
• Bewitched
  Bewitched
  Bewitched is an American situation comedy originally broadcast for eight seasons on ABC from 1964 to 1972, starring Elizabeth Montgomery, Dick York and Dick Sargent , Agnes Moorehead, and David White. The show is about a witch who marries a mortal and tries to lead the life of a typical suburban...
  
  (1 episode, 1970)
• Dragnet 1967
  Dragnet (series)
  Dragnet is a radio and television crime drama about the cases of a dedicated Los Angeles police detective, Sergeant Joe Friday, and his partners...
  
  (6 episodes, 1967–1970)
• Adam-12
  Adam-12
  Adam-12 was a television police drama which followed two police officers of the Los Angeles Police Department, Pete Malloy and Jim Reed, as they patrolled the streets of Los Angeles in their patrol unit, 1-Adam-12. Created by Jack Webb who is known for creating Dragnet, the series captured a...
  
  (1 episode, 1969)
• Lancer
  Lancer (TV series)
  Lancer is a 1968-1970 Western television series on CBS, which starred Andrew Duggan, James Stacy, and Wayne Maunder as a father with two half-brother sons, an arrangement similar to the more successful Bonanza on NBC....
  
  (1 episode, 1969)
• Out of the Blue (1968)
• Family Affair
  Family Affair
  Family Affair is an American sitcom that aired on CBS from September 12, 1966 to September 9, 1971. The series explored the trials of well-to-do civil engineer and bachelor Bill Davis as he attempted to raise his brother's orphaned children in his luxury New York City apartment. Davis' traditional...
  
  (1 episode, 1967)
• My Favorite Martian
  My Favorite Martian
  My Favorite Martian is an American television sitcom that aired on CBS from September 29, 1963 to May 1, 1966 for 107 episodes...
  
  (1 episode, 1965)
• F Troop
  F Troop
  F Troop is a satirical American television sitcom that originally aired for two seasons on ABC-TV. It debuted in the United States on September 14, 1965 and concluded its run on April 6, 1967 with a total of 65 episodes. The first season of 34 episodes was filmed in black-and-white, but the show...
  
  - (1 episode, 1965)
• Please Don't Eat The Daisies
  Please Don't Eat The Daisies
  Please Don't Eat the Daisies is a best-selling collection of humorous essays by American humorist and playwright Jean Kerr about suburban living and raising four boys. The essays do not have a plot or through-storyline, but the book sold so well it was later adapted into a film starring Doris Day...
  
  (1 episode, 1965)
• The Munsters
  The Munsters
  The Munsters is a 1960s American family television sitcom depicting the home life of a family of monsters. It starred Fred Gwynne as Herman Munster and Yvonne De Carlo as his wife, Lily Munster. The series was a satire of both traditional monster movies and popular family entertainment of the era,...
  
  (1 episode, 1965)
• The Donna Reed Show
  The Donna Reed Show
  The Donna Reed Show is an American sitcom starring Donna Reed as the upper middle class housewife Donna Stone. Carl Betz appears as her pediatrician husband Alex, and Shelley Fabares and Paul Petersen as their teenage children Mary and Jeff. The show originally aired on ABC at 10 pm from September...
  
  (1 episode, 1965)
• Ben Casey
  Ben Casey
  Ben Casey is an American medical drama series which ran on ABC from 1961 to 1966. The show was known for its opening titles, which consisted of a hand drawing the symbols "♂, ♀, *, †, ∞" on a chalkboard, as cast member Sam Jaffe intoned, "Man, woman, birth, death, infinity." Neurosurgeon Joseph...
  
  (1 episode, 1964)
• Bonanza
  Bonanza
  Bonanza is an American western television series that both ran on and was a production of NBC from September 12, 1959 to January 16, 1973. Lasting 14 seasons and 430 episodes, it ranks as the second longest running western series and still continues to air in syndication. It centers on the...
  
  (1 episode, 1964)
• Perry Mason
  Perry Mason (TV series)
  Perry Mason is an American legal drama produced by Paisano Productions that ran from September 1957 to May 1966 on CBS. The title character, portrayed by Raymond Burr, is a fictional Los Angeles defense attorney who originally appeared in detective fiction by Erle Stanley Gardner...
  
  (1 episode, 1964)
• The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (1 episode, 1964)
• The Addams Family
  The Addams Family (TV series)
  The Addams Family is an American television series based on the characters in Charles Addams' New Yorker cartoons. The 30-minute series was shot in black-and-white and aired for two seasons in 64 installments on ABC from September 18, 1964, to April 8, 1966...
  
  (1 episode, 1964)
• Route 66
  Route 66 (TV series)
  Route 66 is an American TV series in which two young men traveled across America. The show ran weekly on CBS from 1960 to 1964. It starred Martin Milner as Tod Stiles and, for two and a half seasons, George Maharis as Buz Murdock. Maharis was ill for much of the third season, during which time Tod...
  
  (1 episode, 1963)
• Going My Way
  Going My Way
  Going My Way is a 1944 film directed by Leo McCarey. It is a light-hearted musical comedy-drama about a new young priest taking over a parish from an established old veteran . Crosby sings five songs in the film. It was followed the next year by a sequel, The Bells of St. Mary's. This picture was...
  
  (1962) TV Series
• Play of the Week
  Play of the Week
  Play of the Week is an American anthology series of televised stage plays which aired in NTA Film Network syndication from October 12, 1959 to May 1, 1961...
  
  (1 episode, 1960)
• The United States Steel Hour
  The United States Steel Hour
  The United States Steel Hour is an anthology series which brought hour-long dramas to television from 1953 to 1963. The television series and the radio program that preceded it were both sponsored by the United States Steel Corporation....
  
  (1 episode, 1957)
• Kaiser Aluminum Hour (1 episode, 1957)
• Producers' Showcase
  Producers' Showcase
  Producers' Showcase is an American anthology television series that was telecast live during the 1950s in compatible color by NBC. With top talent, the 90-minute episodes, covering a wide variety of genres, aired under the title every fourth Monday at 8 p.m. ET for three seasons, beginning October...
  
  (1 episode, 1956)
• Ford Television Theatre (1 episode, 1955)
• Studio One
  Studio One (TV series)
  Studio One is a long-running American radio–television anthology series, created in 1947 by the 26-year-old Canadian director Fletcher Markle, who came to CBS from the CBC.-Radio:...
  
  (1 episode, 1955)
• Kraft Television Theatre
  Kraft Television Theatre
  Kraft Television Theatre is an American drama/anthology television series that began May 7, 1947 on NBC, airing at 7:30pm on Wednesday evenings until December of that year. In January 1948, it moved to 9pm on Wednesdays, continuing in that timeslot until 1958. Initially produced by the J...
  
  (5 episodes, 1954–1955)
• Philip Morris Playhouse (1 episode, 1954)
• Broadway Television Theatre (1 episode, 1953)
• Robert Montgomery Presents
  Robert Montgomery Presents
  Robert Montgomery Presents is an American dramatic television series which was produced by NBC from January 30, 1950 until June 24, 1957. The live show had several sponsors during its seven-year run, and the title was altered to feature the sponsor, usually Lucky Strike cigarettes, for example,...
  
  (1 episode, 1952)
• Young Mr. Bobbin
  Young Mr. Bobbin
  Young Mr. Bobbin is an American television situation comedy that aired live on the NBC network during the 1951-1952 season.-Synopsis:The series stars Jackie Kelk as Alexander Hawthorne Bobbin, a young high school graduate that lived with his maiden aunts and was in love with the girl next door,...
  
  (1951) TV Series
• Philco Television Playhouse (2 episodes, 1949–1951)
• Chevrolet Tele-Theatre (1 episode, 1950)
• Actor's Studio (1 episode, 1948)
• Mary Kay and Johnny
  Mary Kay and Johnny
  Mary Kay and Johnny is the first situation comedy broadcast on network television in the United States. Starring real-life married couple Mary Kay Stearns and Johnny Stearns, the series is the first program to show a couple sharing a bed, and the first television series to show a woman's pregnancy...
  
  (unknown episodes, 1947–1950)

External links

• filmsandtv.com bio