Lynn Fontanne

Lynn Fontanne
Photograph by Carl Van Vechten, 1932
Born	Lillie Louise Fontanne (1887-12-06)6 December 1887 Woodford, London, England, UK
Died	30 July 1983(1983-07-30) (aged 95) Genesee Depot, Wisconsin, U.S.
Other names	Lynn Lunt
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1921–83
Spouse(s)	Alfred Lunt (1922-1977; his death)

Lynn Fontanne (/fɒnˈtæn/; 6 December 1887 – 30 July 1983) was a British-born American-based actress for over 40 years. She teamed with her husband, Alfred Lunt. Lunt and Fontanne were given special Tony Awards in 1970. They both won Emmy Awards in 1965, and Broadway's Lunt-Fontanne Theatre was named for them. Fontanne is regarded as one of the American theater's great leading ladies of the 20th century.

Born Lillie Louise Fontanne in Woodford, London, of French and Irish descent, her parents were Jules Fontanne and Frances Ellen Thornley. She had two sisters, one of whom later lived in England; the other lived in New Zealand.

She drew acclaim in 1921 playing the title role in the George S. Kaufman-Marc Connelly farce, Dulcy. Dorothy Parker memorialized her performance in verse:

She soon became celebrated for her skill as an actress in high comedy, excelling in witty roles written for her by Noël Coward, S.N. Behrman, and Robert Sherwood. However, she enjoyed one of the greatest critical successes of her career as Nina Leeds, the desperate heroine of Eugene O'Neill's controversial nine-act drama Strange Interlude. From the late 1920s on, Fontanne acted exclusively in vehicles also starring her husband. Among their greatest theater triumphs were Design for Living (1933), The Taming of the Shrew (1935–36), Idiot's Delight (1936), There Shall Be No Night (1940), and Quadrille (1952). Design for Living, which Coward wrote expressly for himself and the Lunts, was so risqué, with its theme of bisexuality and a ménage à trois, that Coward premiered it in New York, knowing it would not survive the censor in London. The duo remained active onstage until retiring from stage performances in 1958. Fontanne was nominated for a Tony Award for one of her last stage roles, in The Visit (1959).