Shirley MacLaine
From her early days in Broadway choruses to her Academy Award for best actress in 1983, Shirley MacLaine's career has always been driven by her determination and talent. Born in 1934 in Richmond, Virginia, MacLaine studied dance from an early age. After high school she went to New York, working in the chorus of Broadway shows such as Me and Juliet. In 1954 she took over for the injured Carol Haney in The Pajama Game. Her first major film was Hitchcock's 1955 comedy The Trouble With Harry. MacLaine garnered her first Oscar nomination in 1959 for Some Came Running with Frank Sinatra. She continued her affiliation with the Rat Pack, appearing in an uncredited cameo in Ocean's Eleven (1960). She was nominated again for her performance in The Apartment (1960) with Jack Lemmon. Throughout the 1960s MacLaine's film career accelerated and developed, with a string of movies including Irma la Douce, Two Mules for Sister Sara and Bob Fosse's Sweet Charity. MacLaine is an avid world traveler and during the 1970s she spent time traveling through Asia and Africa. In 1975 she was nominated for an Oscar for The Other Half of the Sky, a documentary about her travels through China. Her Broadway hiatus ended in 1976 with the acclaimed one-woman show A Gypsy in My Soul. MacLaine began making movies again and in 1983 won a best actress Oscar for Terms of Endearment. At the same time she published the book Out on a Limb about her spiritual journeys, including her beliefs in channeling past lives and reincarnation. She has been politically active since her early days, supporting the campaigns of Robert Kennedy and George McGovern. Shirley MacLaine has also appeared in the acclaimed Steel Magnolias (1989), Postcards from the Edge (1990), and Sir Richard Attenborough's Closing the Ring (2007).
