Date of Birth

31 January 1929, Crouch Hill, London, England, UK

Date of Death

22 January 2010, Santa Monica, California, USA

Demure British beauty Jean Simmons was born January 31, 1929, in Crouch End, London. As a 14-year-old dance student she was plucked from her school to play Margaret Lockwood's precocious sister in Give Us the Moon (1944), and she went on to make a name for herself in such major British productions as Caesar and Cleopatra (1945), Great Expectations (1946) (as the spoiled, selfish Estella), Black Narcissus (1947) (as a sultry native beauty), Hamlet (1948) (playing Ophelia to Laurence Olivier's great Dane and earning a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination), The Blue Lagoon (1949) and So Long at the Fair (1950), among others.

In 1950 she married actor Stewart Granger and that same year starred in the Frank Sinatra/Marlon Brando musical Guys and Dolls (1955/I); she used her own singing voice and earned her first Golden Globe Award. Simmons divorced Granger in 1960 and almost immediately married writer-director Richard Brooks, who cast her as Sister Sharon opposite Burt Lancaster in Elmer Gantry (1960), a memorable adaptation of the Sinclair Lewis novel. That same year she costarred with Kirk Douglas in Stanley Kubrick's Spartacus (1960) and played a would-be homewrecker opposite Cary Grant in The Grass Is Greener (1960).

Off the screen for a few years, she captivated moviegoers with a brilliant performance as the mother in All the Way Home (1963), a literate, tasteful adaptation of James Agee's "A Death in the Family." After that, however, she found quality projects somewhat harder to come by, and took work in Life at the Top (1965), Mister Buddwing (1966), Divorce American Style (1967), Rough Night in Jericho (1967), The Happy Ending (1969) (a Richard Brooks film for which she was again Oscar-nominated, this time as Best Actress).

Jean continued making films well into the 1970s. In the 1980s she mainly appeared in TV mini-series, such as "North and South" (1985) and "The Thorn Birds" (1983). Jean made a comeback to films in 1995 in How to Make an American Quilt (1995) co-starring Winona Ryder and Anne Bancroft, and most recently played the elderly Sophie in the English version of Hayao Miyazaki's Howl's Moving Castle (2004). She now resides in Santa Monica, California, with her dog Mr. Gates and her two cats, Adisson and Megan.

Daughter, with Richard Brooks, Kate Brooks. Daughter, with Stewart Granger, Tracy Granger.

Turned down the role of Jean Pargetter in the British TV series "As Time Goes By" (1992).

Naturalized U.S. citizen.

Becoming depressed at the lack of quality parts being offered her, Jean became addicted to alcohol. In 1986, she sought professional treatment.

Jean was made an OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire) for services to acting in the 2003 New Year Honours List.

In America from the early 1950s, Jean found out that RKO head Howard Hughes had purchased the remaining six months of her Rank Studio contract. When Hughes claimed that an oral agreement with Rank precluded her from being loaned out to any other studio, she sued RKO. The legal battle raged for over a year. When the suit was finally settled, RKO had a three-year contract for Jean's services but was obligated to pay her $250,000 in addition to her legal fees. Furthermore, she won the right to work on loan to other studios at a substantial salary.

In 1958, she accepted the Oscar for "Best Actor in a Leading Role" on behalf of Alec Guinness, who wasn't present at the awards ceremony

Even before her American debut, she was revered and beloved by both the British critics and filmgoers. By the end of 1950, she was the #4 box office attraction, American or British, in British cinema.

In the early 1980s, she and daughter Kate Brooks lived in the Litchfield County town of New Milford, Connecticut. They later returned to their long-time California home in Santa Monica.

As of 2007, she is one of six women, who have received Best Actress nominations for performances directed by their spouses. The other five are Frances McDormand for Fargo (1996), Gena Rowlands for A Woman Under the Influence (1974) & Gloria (1980), Julie Andrews for Victor Victoria (1982), Elisabeth Bergner for Escape Me Never (1935) and Joanne Woodward for Rachel, Rachel (1968). Jules Dassin also directed his future wife Melina Mercouri in an Oscar-nominated performance (Pote tin Kyriaki (1960)), but they weren't married yet at the time of the nomination.

In Italy, most of her films were dubbed by Fiorella Betti. She was occasionally dubbed by Dhia Cristiani during the mid-fifties, most notably in The Robe (1953). Other actresses like Miranda Bonansea, Rosetta Calavetta and Rina Morelli also lent their voice to Simmons at some point. From the sixties onwards, Maria Pia Di Meo became her official Italian voice.

She was made a Fellow of the British Film Institute in recognition of her outstanding contribution to film culture.

Was William Wyler's first choice for the role of Princess Ann in Roman Holiday (1953), but Howard Hughes, who owned her contract, wouldn't loan her out to Paramount to do the film.

Her mother was Winifred Aida Loveland. Her father, Charles Simmons, won a bronze medal in the Olympics for Great Britain in artistic gymnastics and died, when Jean was 13, from an ulcer.

Became a U.S. citizen in 1956.

Director Richard Brooks claimed that he wrote The Happy Ending (1969), the filmed story of an alcoholic wife (played by Simmons) as a way to tell his wife that she herself had a problem. The marriage eventually broke up due to Simmons' drinking and Brooks' workaholic tendencies.

She and Marlon Brando were originally supposed to lip-sync their songs in the musical film Guys and Dolls (1955/I). Samuel Goldwyn heard them during rehearsal and decided the untrained stars should do their own singing for authenticity.

Her Hamlet (1948) co-star Laurence Olivier urged the young actress to perfect her craft on the stage; instead she decided to follow her future husband Stewart Granger to Hollywood.

She is survived by her daughters; Tracy Granger and Kate Brooks; and one grandson, Ty Saville.

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