Shirley Knight, the US-born actress who was nominated for two Oscars early in her career and went on to play an astonishing variety of roles in movies, TV and the stage, has died. She was 83.
Ms Knight passed away today at her daughter's home in Texas, according to her daughter Kaitlin Hopkins.
Shirley Knight’s career carried her from Kansas to Hollywood and then to the New York theater and London, then back to Hollywood.
She was nominated for two Tonys, winning one and in recent years, she had a recurring role as Phyllis Van de Kamp on Desperate Housewives, gaining one of her many Emmy nominations.
Her first Academy Award nomination for best supporting actress came in just her second screen role, as an woman in love with a Jewish man in the 1960 film version of William Inges’ play The Dark at the Top of the Stairs.
She was nominated for best supporting actress two years later for her role as the woman seduced and abandoned by Paul Newman in the 1962 film Sweet Bird of Youth, based on the Tennessee Williams play.
She thrived on stage and television winning a Tony award in 1976 as best featured actress in a play for Kennedy’s Children.
Shirley Knight was nominated for another Tony in 1997 for best actress in Horton Foote’s The Young Man From Atlanta.
As the Times put it, “the splendid Ms. Knight, who doesn’t waste a single fluttery gesture, brings an Ibsenesque weight to a woman frozen in the role of petulant, spoiled child bride”.
She aimed to become an opera singer, then switched to acting when she saw Julie Harris in a touring company of The Lark. She traveled west to study acting at the Pasadena Playhouse. Warner Bros. signed her to a contract.
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