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Article: OBITUARY : Jo Van Fleet
- Article from:
- The Independent (London, England)
- Article date:
- June 20, 1996
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 1996 The Independent - London. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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Jo Van Fleet was a powerful actress, described by Elia Kazan as
"full of unconstrained violence", who frequently played roles older
than herself. She won an Oscar for her first film role, as James
Dean's mother in East of Eden (1955). On both stage and screen she
created a gallery of stoic, fiercely dominant women, many of them
proud or manipulative mothers.
Born in 1919 in Oakland, California, she was educated at the
College of the Pacific in Stockton. Encouraged to go to New York to
pursue an acting career, she won a scholarship to study at the
Neighbourhood Playhouse under Sanford Meisner. She made her
Broadway debut as Dorcas in A Winter's Tale (1946) and played Regan
to Louis Calhern's ...