Lee Remick

Lee's paternal grandfather was the son of Irish immigrants. Lee's other ancestry was English (where her maternal grandmother was born, and from where many of her other ancestors had immigrated to Massachusetts in the 1600s).

Lee Remick was born in Quincy, Massachusetts, to Gertrude Margaret (Waldo), an actress, and Francis Edwin Remick, a department store owner. She had Irish and English ancestry. Remick was educated at Barnard College, studied dance and worked on stage and TV, before making her film debut as a sexy Southern majorette in Elia Kazan's A Face in the Crowd (1957).

Her next role was also southern: Eula Varner in The Long, Hot Summer (1958).

She emerged as a real star in the role of an apparent rape victim in Anatomy of a Murder (1959).

Alcoholic Montgomery Clift's career was in decline when he was considered for Wild River (1960). Director Elia Kazan made him promise he wouldn't drink. The actor kept his word with the support of sympathetic co-stars Jo Van Fleet and Lee Remick.

Gave birth to her 2nd child at age 25, a son Matt Colleran on June 7, 1961. Child's father is her 1st [now ex] husband, Bill Colleran.

And she won an Academy Award nomination for her role as the alcoholic wife of Jack Lemmon in Days of Wine and Roses (1962).

Was nominated for Broadway's 1966 Tony Award as Best Actress (Dramatic) for "Wait Until Dark."

Although she liked the European locations for Hard Contract (1969), she thought the film didn't work and was a disaster. However, she met first assistant director and future husband Kip Gowans on the film.

After more work in TV and movies, she moved to England in 1970, making more movies there.

She died only four days before her Jennie: Lady Randolph Churchill (1974) co-star Thorley Walters.

Lee's second husband, British producer Kip Gowans, worked with Lee on a number of TV movies including The Women's Room (1980), and Rearview Mirror (1984).

In 1988 she declared These Thousand Hills (1959) was the least favorite of her films.

Discovered she had tumors on her kidneys and lungs while filming in France in 1989. She had a remission in 1990 before the cancer returned again.

Received the Women's International Center (WIC) Living Legacy Award in 1990.

A very weak, almost unrecognizable Lee made one of her last public appearances on April 29, 1991, to receive her star on the "Hollywood Walk of Fame." In the last stages of her kidney cancer, her face was extremely bloated by the Chemo treatments she was receiving. Jack Lemmon, her Days of Wine and Roses (1962) co-star, was at the ceremony to lend love and support. She died two months later on July 2nd.