Julie Haydon
| Julie Haydon | |
|---|---|
publicity photo c.1937
|
|
| Born |
Donella Donaldson June 10, 1910 Oak Park, Illinois, U.S. |
| Died | December 24, 1994 (aged 84) La Crosse, Wisconsin, U.S. |
| Occupation | actress |
| Years active | 1931-1963 |
| Spouse(s) |
George Jean Nathan (1955-1958) |
Julie Haydon (June 10, 1910 – December 24, 1994) was an American Broadway, film and television actress who received second billing as the female lead in the Ben Hecht–Charles MacArthur 1935 film vehicle for Noel Coward, The Scoundrel. After her Hollywood career ended in 1937, she turned to the theatre, originating the roles of Kitty Duval in The Time of Your Life (1939) and Laura Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie (1945).
Born Donella Donaldson in the Chicago suburb of Oak Park, to Orin Donaldson, a newspaper publisher, and Ella Horton. Haydon began her acting career when she was 19, touring with Minnie Maddern Fiske in Mrs. Bumstead Leigh. Within two years, she played Ophelia in a production of Hamlet at the Hollywood Playhouse.
Shortly after, she began appearing in films, in 1931. Her first film, in which she was billed under her birth name, was The Great Meadow, a Johnny Mack Brown Western drama made by MGM. In 1932, she signed with RKO, and her first major role came that year in The Conquerors, directed by William Wellman Her most notable performance came in 1935's The Scoundrel playing opposite Noël Coward, but, despite a new contract with MGM, only a few more films were to come in her short career, including A Family Affair (1937), the initial movie in the Andy Hardy series.
Haydon retired from films in 1937.
Haydon debuted on Broadway in 1935 in Bright Star by Philip Barry, which ran for only seven performances before closing. Her next Broadway production, Shadow and Substance by Paul Vincent Carroll, in which she played a saintly maid, was more successful, running for 9 months in 1938. Next, in 1939, she created the role of the prostitute, Kitty Duval, in William Saroyan's Pulitzer Prize-winning The Time of Your Life. She also starred in the 1942 Broadway production of Saroyan's play Hello Out There. Haydon was the original Laura Wingfield in the first production of Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie in 1945. Her final appearance on Broadway came in 1947's Our Lan'.
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