Shirley Knight
Encyclopedia
Shirley Enola Knight is an American stage, film and television actress. She has been nominated twice for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress
, in 1960 for The Dark at the Top of the Stairs
and in 1962 for Sweet Bird of Youth
.
(1966), The Dutchman (1966), Petulia
(1968), The Rain People
(1969) and As Good as It Gets
(1997). Recently, she completed Elevator, in which she plays one of several people trapped in a Wall Street elevator with someone who has a bomb. The movie is expected to be released in 2011.
She also was a Warner Brothers Television contract star who made films for Warners, appearing in television series whenever she had a break while filming a movie, including Maverick
("The Ice Man" episode with Jack Kelly
), 77 Sunset Strip
, Sugarfoot
, and Cheyenne
.
Knight's stage credits include Three Sisters
(1964), We Have Always Lived in the Castle
(1966), Kennedy's Children (1975), which earned her the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play
, and A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur
(1979). She was nominated for the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actress in a Play
twice, for Landscape of the Body
and The Young Man from Atlanta, which also garnered her a Tony nomination for Best Leading Actress in a Play
. She also appeared, with Alison Fraser
, in Come Back, Come Back, Wherever You Are, (2009) an original play by legendary playwright, Arthur Laurents
.
Knight's many television credits include Target: The Corruptors!
, The Eleventh Hour
, The Fugitive
, The Virginian
, The Invaders
, The Reporter
, L.A. Law
, Murder, She Wrote
, Law & Order
, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
, Maggie Winters
, House M.D.
, Crossing Jordan
, Cold Case, ER
and Hot in Cleveland
, among others, in addition to television movies such as Indictment: The McMartin Trial
, for which she won both the Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie and the Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television. Her guest performance in thirtysomething
earned her a 1988 Emmy for Best Guest Performer in a Drama Series. She won another Emmy in 1995 for her guest performance in the NYPD Blue
episode Large Mouth Bass.
She appeared in the first segment of If These Walls Could Talk
. She has also had a recurring role on Desperate Housewives
as Bree Hodge's annoying former mother-in-law, Phyllis Van de Kamp, mother of Bree's first husband, Rex Van de Kamp (Steven Culp
). She also appeared in a popular episode from the original The Outer Limits
series, "The Man Who Was Never Born".
, Kansas, the daughter of Virginia (née Webster) and Noel Johnson Knight, an oil company executive. Knight was married twice, to Gene Persson
from 1959 until they divorced in 1969, and to John Hopkins
from 1969 until his death in 1998. She has two daughters, actress Kaitlin Hopkins
and television writer Sophie.
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...
, in 1960 for The Dark at the Top of the Stairs
The Dark at the Top of the Stairs
The Dark at the Top of the Stairs is a 1957 play by William Inge about family conflicts during the early 1920s in a small Oklahoma town. It won the Tony Award for Best Play and was made into a film in 1960.-Plot:...
and in 1962 for Sweet Bird of Youth
Sweet Bird of Youth
Sweet Bird of Youth is a 1959 play by Tennessee Williams which tells the story of a gigolo and drifter, Chance Wayne, who returns to his home town as the accompaniment of a faded movie star, Princess Kosmonopolis , whom he hopes to use to help him break into the movies...
.
Career
Knight's feature films include The GroupThe Group
The Group may refer to:*The Group , by Mary McCarthy*The Group , by Sidney Lumet, based on the book*The Group , a group of British poets of the late 1950s and early 1960s...
(1966), The Dutchman (1966), Petulia
Petulia
Petulia is a British drama film directed by Richard Lester. The screenplay by Lawrence B. Marcus is based on the novel Me and the Arch Kook Petulia by John Haase...
(1968), The Rain People
The Rain People
The Rain People is a 1969 film by Francis Ford Coppola. Alongside Shirley Knight, leading players are James Caan and Robert Duvall, both of whom would later work with Coppola in The Godfather. Future film director and Coppola friend George Lucas worked as an aide on this film, and made a short...
(1969) and As Good as It Gets
As Good as It Gets
As Good as It Gets is a 1997 American romantic comedy film directed by James L. Brooks and produced by Laura Ziskin. It stars Jack Nicholson as a misanthropic, obsessive-compulsive novelist, Helen Hunt as a single mother with an asthmatic son, and Greg Kinnear as a gay artist. The screenplay was...
(1997). Recently, she completed Elevator, in which she plays one of several people trapped in a Wall Street elevator with someone who has a bomb. The movie is expected to be released in 2011.
She also was a Warner Brothers Television contract star who made films for Warners, appearing in television series whenever she had a break while filming a movie, including Maverick
Maverick (TV series)
Maverick is a western television series with comedic overtones created by Roy Huggins. The show ran from September 22, 1957 to July 8, 1962 on ABC and stars James Garner as Bret Maverick, a cagey, articulate cardsharp. Eight episodes into the first season, he was joined by Jack Kelly as his brother...
("The Ice Man" episode with Jack Kelly
Jack Kelly (actor)
Jack Kelly was an American film and television actor most noted for the role of "Bart Maverick" in the TV series Maverick, which ran on ABC from 1957 to 1962...
), 77 Sunset Strip
77 Sunset Strip
77 Sunset Strip is an hour-length American television private detective series created by Roy Huggins and starring Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., Roger Smith, and Edd Byrnes....
, Sugarfoot
Sugarfoot
Sugarfoot is the title of a TV western that aired from 1957 to 1961. The series featured Will Hutchins as fledgling frontier lawyer Tom Brewster and Jack Elam as sidekick Toothy Thompson...
, and Cheyenne
Cheyenne (TV series)
Cheyenne is a western television series of 108 black-and-white episodes broadcast on ABC from 1955 to 1963. The show was the first hour-long western, and in fact the first hour-long dramatic series of any kind, with continuing characters, to last more than one season...
.
Knight's stage credits include Three Sisters
Three Sisters (play)
Three Sisters is a play by Russian author and playwright Anton Chekhov, perhaps partially inspired by the situation of the three Brontë sisters, but most probably by the three Zimmermann sisters in Perm...
(1964), We Have Always Lived in the Castle
We Have Always Lived in the Castle
We Have Always Lived in the Castle is the final novel by Shirley Jackson, published in 1962, three years before her death in 1965. In 1966, the novel was adapted into a play by Hugh Wheeler...
(1966), Kennedy's Children (1975), which earned her the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play
Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play
This is a list of winners and nomination of the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress. The award was first presented in 1947.-1940s:* 1947: Patricia Neal – Another Part of the Forest* 1949: Shirley Booth – Goodbye, My Fancy-1950s:...
, and A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur
A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur
A Lovely Sunday for Creve Coeur is a one-act play with two scenes by Tennessee Williams.-Plot synopsis:Set in St. Louis in the mid-1930s, the play focuses on four women struggling for a sense of identity and independence. Dorothea, a deluded Blanche DuBois-like middle-aged civics teacher at the...
(1979). She was nominated for the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actress in a Play
Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actress in a Play
The Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actress in a Play was first awarded at the 1974–1975 Drama Desk Awards and has been awarded every year since...
twice, for Landscape of the Body
Landscape of the Body
Landscape Of The Body is a two-act play by John Guare, written in 1977.-Synopsis:The play is episodic and non-linear, as it travels back and forth in time. The plot centers around a woman named Betty, whose son, Bert, was recently murdered and decapitated in lower Manhattan. The first and last...
and The Young Man from Atlanta, which also garnered her a Tony nomination for Best Leading Actress in a Play
Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play
This is a list of the winners and nominations of Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play. The award has been presented since 1947, and is for performance in new productions or revivals.-1940s:...
. She also appeared, with Alison Fraser
Alison Fraser
Alison Fraser is an American actress and singer who has appeared in concert at such venues as Carnegie Hall, The White House, Town Hall, The Brooklyn Botanic Garden, The Tisch Center for the Arts, The Folger Shakespeare Library, The Wilma, The Emelin, Joe's Pub and Symphony space.Fraser is a two...
, in Come Back, Come Back, Wherever You Are, (2009) an original play by legendary playwright, Arthur Laurents
Arthur Laurents
Arthur Laurents was an American playwright, stage director and screenwriter.After writing scripts for radio shows after college and then training films for the U.S...
.
Knight's many television credits include Target: The Corruptors!
Target: The Corruptors!
Target: The Corruptors! is a 35-episode crime drama starring Stephen McNally as newspaper reporter Paul Marino, which aired on ABC from September 29, 1961 to June 8, 1962. The character Jack Flood, Marino's undercover agent, was portrayed by Robert Harland...
, 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:...
, The Fugitive
The Fugitive (TV series)
The Fugitive is an American drama series produced by QM Productions and United Artists Television that aired on ABC from 1963 to 1967. David Janssen stars as Richard Kimble, a doctor from the fictional town of Stafford, Indiana, who is falsely convicted of his wife's murder and given the death...
, The Virginian
The Virginian (TV series)
The Virginian is an American Western television series starring James Drury and Doug McClure, which aired on NBC from 1962 to 1971 for a total of 249 episodes. Filmed in color, The Virginian became television's first 90-minute western series...
, The Invaders
The Invaders
The Invaders, a Quinn Martin Production , is an ABC science fiction television program created by Larry Cohen that ran in the United States for two seasons, from January 10, 1967 to March 26, 1968...
, The Reporter
The Reporter (TV series)
The Reporter is an American drama series that aired on CBS from September 25 to December 18, 1964. The series was created by Jerome Weidman and developed by executive producers Keefe Brasselle and John Simon.-Synopsis:...
, L.A. Law
L.A. Law
L.A. Law is a US television legal drama that ran on NBC from September 15, 1986 to May 19, 1994. L.A. Law reflected the social and cultural ideologies of the 1980s and early 1990s and many of the cases featured on the show dealt with hot topic issues such as abortion, racism, gay rights,...
, Murder, She Wrote
Murder, She Wrote
Murder, She Wrote is an American television mystery series starring Angela Lansbury as mystery writer and amateur detective Jessica Fletcher. The series aired for 12 seasons from 1984 to 1996 on the CBS network, with 264 episodes transmitted. It was followed by four TV films and a spin-off series,...
, Law & Order
Law & Order
Law & Order is an American police procedural and legal drama television series, created by Dick Wolf and part of the Law & Order franchise. It aired on NBC, and in syndication on various cable networks. Law & Order premiered on September 13, 1990, and completed its 20th and final season on May 24,...
, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit is an American police procedural television drama series set in New York City, where it is also primarily produced...
, Maggie Winters
Maggie Winters
Maggie Winters was a short-lived CBS sitcom that ran from 1998 to early 1999. The title character was played by Faith Ford.-Plot:Recently divorced from her dentist husband, Maggie Winters moved in with her mother Estelle in her home town of Shelbyville, Indiana and got a job at Hanley's, a local...
, House M.D.
House (TV series)
House is an American television medical drama that debuted on the Fox network on November 16, 2004. The show's central character is Dr. Gregory House , an unconventional and misanthropic medical genius who heads a team of diagnosticians at the fictional Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital in...
, Crossing Jordan
Crossing Jordan
Crossing Jordan is an American television crime/drama series that aired on NBC from September 24, 2001 to May 16, 2007. It stars Jill Hennessy as Jordan Cavanaugh, M.D., a crime-solving forensic pathologist employed in the Suffolk County, Massachusetts, Medical Examiner's Office...
, Cold Case, ER
ER (TV series)
ER is an American medical drama television series created by novelist Michael Crichton that aired on NBC from September 19, 1994 to April 2, 2009. It was produced by Constant c Productions and Amblin Entertainment, in association with Warner Bros. Television...
and Hot in Cleveland
Hot in Cleveland
Hot in Cleveland is an American sitcom on TV Land starring Valerie Bertinelli, Jane Leeves, Wendie Malick and Betty White. The series, which is TV Land's first original scripted series, premiered on June 16, 2010, and was TV Land's highest rated telecast in the cable network's 14-year history. The...
, among others, in addition to television movies such as Indictment: The McMartin Trial
Indictment: The McMartin Trial
Indictment: The McMartin Trial is a made for TV movie that originally aired on HBO on May 20, 1995. Indictment is based on the true story of the McMartin preschool trial.-Summary:...
, for which she won both the Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie and the Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television. Her guest performance in thirtysomething
Thirtysomething
Thirtysomething is an American television drama about a group of baby boomers in their late thirties. It was created by Marshall Herskovitz and Edward Zwick for MGM/UA Television Group and The Bedford Falls Company, and aired on ABC. It premiered in the U.S. on September 29, 1987...
earned her a 1988 Emmy for Best Guest Performer in a Drama Series. She won another Emmy in 1995 for her guest performance in the NYPD Blue
NYPD Blue
NYPD Blue is an American television police drama set in New York City, exploring the internal and external struggles of the fictional 15th precinct of Manhattan...
episode Large Mouth Bass.
She appeared in the first segment of If These Walls Could Talk
If These Walls Could Talk
If These Walls Could Talk is a 1996 made for television movie, broadcast on HBO. It follows the plights of three different women and their experiences with abortion. Each of the three stories takes place in the same house, 22 years each: 1952, 1974, and 1996. All three segments were co-written by...
. She has also had a recurring role on Desperate Housewives
Desperate Housewives
Desperate Housewives is an American television comedy-drama series created by Marc Cherry and produced by ABC Studios and Cherry Productions. Executive producer Cherry serves as Showrunner. Other executive producers since the fourth season include Marc Cherry, Bob Daily, George W...
as Bree Hodge's annoying former mother-in-law, Phyllis Van de Kamp, mother of Bree's first husband, Rex Van de Kamp (Steven Culp
Steven Culp
Steven Bradford Culp is an American film and television actor, best known for his roles as Rex Van de Kamp in the television series Desperate Housewives and CIA Agent Clayton Webb in JAG.-Early life:...
). She also appeared in a popular episode from the original The Outer Limits
The Outer Limits (1963 TV series)
The Outer Limits is an American television series that aired on ABC from 1963 to 1965. The series is similar in style to the earlier The Twilight Zone, but with a greater emphasis on science fiction, rather than fantasy stories...
series, "The Man Who Was Never Born".
Personal life
Knight was born in GoesselGoessel, Kansas
Goessel is a city in Marion County, Kansas, United States. It was named after Captain Kurt von Goessel who went down with his ship, the Elbe, in the English Channel after it was rammed. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 539....
, Kansas, the daughter of Virginia (née Webster) and Noel Johnson Knight, an oil company executive. Knight was married twice, to Gene Persson
Gene Persson
Eugene Persson was an American actor, theatrical and film producer. He was, perhaps, best known for his work as the co-producer and co-creator of the original 1967 production of the Broadway musical comedy, You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown, as well as the show's 1999 Broadway revival, which won...
from 1959 until they divorced in 1969, and to John Hopkins
John Hopkins (writer)
John Richard Hopkins was an English film, stage, and television writer.Born in southwest London, he graduated from St Catharine's College, Cambridge...
from 1969 until his death in 1998. She has two daughters, actress Kaitlin Hopkins
Kaitlin Hopkins
Kaitlin Hopkins is an American stage, screen, and television actress, the daughter of actress Shirley Knight and stage producer/director Gene Persson....
and television writer Sophie.
Selected filmography
- Ice PalaceIce Palace (film)Ice Palace is a 1960 motion picture adapted from Edna Ferber's 1958 novel of the same name. The film, directed by Vincent Sherman and starring Richard Burton, dramatized the debate over Alaska statehood...
(1960) - Sweet Bird of YouthSweet Bird of YouthSweet Bird of Youth is a 1959 play by Tennessee Williams which tells the story of a gigolo and drifter, Chance Wayne, who returns to his home town as the accompaniment of a faded movie star, Princess Kosmonopolis , whom he hopes to use to help him break into the movies...
(1962) - Flight from AshiyaFlight from AshiyaFlight from Ashiya is a 1964 film about the U.S. Air Force's Air Rescue Service, flying out of Ashiya Air Base, Japan. In this fictionalized film set in the early 1960s, a flight crew's mission is to rescue a liferaft of Japanese civilians stranded in rough seas.- Plot :The movie centers on three...
(1964) - DutchmanDutchman (film)Dutchman is a 1967 British drama film directed by Anthony Harvey and starring Shirley Knight and Al Freeman, Jr. It was based on the play Dutchman by Amiri Baraka....
(1967) - The Rain PeopleThe Rain PeopleThe Rain People is a 1969 film by Francis Ford Coppola. Alongside Shirley Knight, leading players are James Caan and Robert Duvall, both of whom would later work with Coppola in The Godfather. Future film director and Coppola friend George Lucas worked as an aide on this film, and made a short...
(1969) - JuggernautJuggernaut (film)Juggernaut is a 1974 British thriller film. It was produced by David V. Picker Productions and released in 1974 by United Artists. The film was directed by Richard Lester, who took over after directors Bryan Forbes and Don Medford each left the project in pre-production.On taking over the film,...
(1974) - Endless LoveEndless Love (film)Endless Love is a 1981 romantic drama film directed by Franco Zeffirelli, starring Brooke Shields and Martin Hewitt. The screenplay by Judith Rascoe was adapted from the novel by Scott Spencer...
(1981) - The Sender (1982)
- Desperate JusticeDesperate JusticeDesperate Justice is a 1993 film starring Lesley Ann Warren, Bruce Davison, and Shirley Knight. It was based on the novel of the same name by Richard Speight, who also co-wrote the screenplay.-Plot:...
(AKA A Mother's Revenge) (1993) - Color of NightColor of NightColor of Night is a 1994 American erotic mystery thriller film produced by Cinergi Pictures and released in the United States by Hollywood Pictures. Directed by Richard Rush, the film stars Bruce Willis, Jane March, Ruben Blades, Lesley Ann Warren, and Scott Bakula...
(1994) - Stuart Saves His FamilyStuart Saves His FamilyStuart Saves His Family is a 1995 comedy film directed by Harold Ramis, and based on a series of Saturday Night Live sketches from the early-to-mid 1990s. The movie tracks the adventures of would-be self-help guru Stuart Smalley, a creation of comedian Al Franken, as he attempts to save both his...
(1995) - A Promise to Carolyn (1996 TV film)
- DiaboliqueDiabolique (1996 film)Diabolique is an American film directed by Jeremiah S. Chechik and written by Henri-Georges Clouzot and Don Roos. The film stars Sharon Stone and Isabelle Adjani...
(1996) - Little Boy BlueLittle Boy Blue"Little Boy Blue" is a popular English language nursery rhyme, often used in popular culture. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 11318.-Lyrics:The most common version of the rhyme is:...
(1997) - As Good as It GetsAs Good as It GetsAs Good as It Gets is a 1997 American romantic comedy film directed by James L. Brooks and produced by Laura Ziskin. It stars Jack Nicholson as a misanthropic, obsessive-compulsive novelist, Helen Hunt as a single mother with an asthmatic son, and Greg Kinnear as a gay artist. The screenplay was...
(1997) - Angel EyesAngel Eyes (film)Angel Eyes is a 2001 romantic drama film directed by Luis Mandoki. The original music score was composed by Marco Beltrami and features Jennifer Lopez, James Caviezel, Jeremy Sisto, and Terrence Howard. Lopez's performance in the film earned her a Razzie Award nomination for Worst Actress.-Plot:The...
(2001) - My Louisiana SkyMy Louisiana SkyMy Louisiana Sky is a 1998 children's novel by Kimberly Willis Holt. It was named an ALA Notable Book and an ALA Top Ten Best Book for Young Adults. It also received a Boston Globe—Horn Book Honor Award.-Plot summary:...
(2001) - Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya SisterhoodDivine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood (film)Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood is a 2002 American comedy-drama film starring Sandra Bullock and Ashley Judd, directed and written by Callie Khouri...
(2002) - Ghost CatGhost CatGhost Cat, also released as Mrs. Ashboro's Cat or The Cat that Came Back, is a 2003 Animal Planet television film starring Ellen Page and Nigel Bennett, it was directed by Don McBrearty and written by Larry Ketron. The film is based on the novel...
(2003) - Desperate HousewivesDesperate HousewivesDesperate Housewives is an American television comedy-drama series created by Marc Cherry and produced by ABC Studios and Cherry Productions. Executive producer Cherry serves as Showrunner. Other executive producers since the fourth season include Marc Cherry, Bob Daily, George W...
as Phyllis Van de Kamp (2004–present) - Locked InLocked InLocked In is the sixth studio album by the rock band Wishbone Ash.-Track listing:All songs composed by Wishbone Ash, except where noted#"Rest in Peace" - 6:41#"No Water in the Well" - 3:47#"Moonshine" - 3:32...
(2005) - Sexual LifeSexual LifeSexual Life is a 2005 comedy-drama film written and directed by Ken Kwapis. Cast members include Azura Skye, Carla Gallo, Anne Heche, Elizabeth Banks, Tom Everett Scott, and Steven Weber.It is adapted from Arthur Schnitzler's play La Ronde.- Cast :...
(2005) - Open WindowOpen WindowOpen Window is an album by the American ambient musician Robert Rich. This is an album of improvised piano solos. Rich’s piano solos have been a part of his live concerts for over 20 years but this is the first time that a recording has been released in a recorded form.The material on this album...
(2006) - Grandma's Boy (2006)
- The Other Side of the TracksThe Other Side of the TracksThe Other Side of the Tracks is a 2008 independent fantasy film written and directed by A. D. Calvo.-Plot:...
(2008) - Paul Blart Mall Cop (2009)
- The Melancholy FantasticThe Melancholy FantasticThe Melancholy Fantastic is a upcoming American independent film written and directed by A.D. Calvo.-Plot:Still suffering from her mother's recent suicide, a delusional young girl falls for an alluring Goth, against the objections of a life-size talking doll...
(2010) - Elevator (2010) (ant. release in 2011)
- Our Idiot Brother (2011)