Lee Grant | WatchedThis
Lee Grant
Acting
Biography
Lee Grant (born Lyova Haskell Rosenthal; October 31, 1925) is an American actress and director. She made her film debut in 1951 as a young shoplifter in William Wyler's Detective Story, co-starring Kirk Douglas and Eleanor Parker. This role earned her an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress as well as the Best Actress Award at the 1952 Cannes Film Festival. In 1952 she was blacklisted from most acting jobs for the next 12 years. She was able to find only occasional work onstage or as a teacher during this period. It also contributed to her divorce. She was removed from the blacklist in 1962 and rebuilt her acting career. She starred in 71 TV episodes of Peyton Place (1965–1966), followed by lead roles in films such as Valley of the Dolls, In the Heat of the Night (both 1967), and Shampoo (1975), for the last of which she won an Oscar. In 1964, she won the Obie Award for Distinguished Performance by an Actress for her performance in The Maids. During her career she was nominated for the Emmy Award seven times between 1966 and 1993, winning twice. In 1986 she directed Down and Out in America which tied for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature, and in the same year she also won a Directors Guild of America Award for Nobody's Child.
Filmography Movies
Acting
Mulholland Drive
Blonde Betty Elms has only just arrived in Hollywood to become a movie star when she meets an enigmatic brunette with amnesia. Meanwhile, as the two set off to solve the second woman's identity, filmmaker Adam Kesher runs into ominous trouble while casting his latest project.
Valley of the Dolls
Lured by their dreams of fame and fortune, three ambitious young women enter the world of show business and discover how easy it is to sink into a celebrity nightmare of ego, alcohol and pills — the beloved "dolls."
In the Heat of the Night
African-American Philadelphia police detective Virgil Tibbs is arrested on suspicion of murder by Bill Gillespie, the racist police chief of tiny Sparta, Mississippi. After Tibbs proves not only his own innocence but that of another man, he joins forces with Gillespie to track down the real killer. Their investigation takes them through every social level of the town, with Tibbs making enemies as well as unlikely friends as he hunts for the truth.
Sidney Poitier - The Man Who Changed Hollywood
Exceptionally talented actor and bridge-builder between black and white, a political icon and artist at the same time: that was Sidney Poitier. He made Hollywood history in 1964 when he became the first black man to win an Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role − and thus became the first international black superstar. He grew up in poor circumstances in the Bahamas − with only a few years of schooling. Despite this humble start, Sidney Poitier became a film legend committed artistically and politically against all odds. What compromises did he have to make? What shaped him? This documentary gives an intimate insight into the eventful life of the actor and director, who died in January 2022 at the age of 94.
Rod Serling: Submitted for Your Approval
The life and career of the renowned television writer and creator of the classic science fiction series, "The Twilight Zone."
Dr. T & the Women
A successful Texas gynecologist finds himself amid a bevy of women and their problems – his wife’s breakdown, his daughter's fake marriage, his other daughter’s conspiracy theories, and his secretary’s crush. Craving time for himself, he finds solace in a kind outsider.
Damien - Omen II
Since the sudden and suspicious deaths of his parents, young Damien has been in the charge of his wealthy aunt and uncle and enrolled in a military school. Widely feared to be the Antichrist, he relentlessly plots to seize control of his uncle's business empire — and the world.
Detective Story
Tells the story of one day in the lives of the various people who populate a police detective squad. An embittered cop, Det. Jim McLeod, leads a precinct of characters in their grim daily battle with the city's lowlife. The characters who pass through the precinct over the course of the day include a young petty embezzler, a pair of burglars, and a naive shoplifter.
Shampoo
On Election Day, 1968, irresponsible hairdresser and ladies' man George Roundy is too busy cutting hair and dealing with his girlfriends and mistress Felicia Karpf, whose husband Lester is having an affair with his ex-girlfriend Jackie.
Teachers
A teacher reconnects with an old student who is now an attorney representing a family who is suing the school for graduating their son who still cannot read or write. Amid the daily chaos of teaching in an inner city school, Alex Jurel tries to decide if he will lie at his deposition to protect the school or tell the truth and risk throwing away his career.
Production
Battered
Lee Grant's acclaimed 1989 investigation of domestic violence in American Homes. Battered is the powerful, if harrowing portrait of a life lived in constant fear of the people closest to you. Intimate interviews with the victims and children of the cycle are combined with the eye opening and heart breaking stories of the abusers themselves to take you deeper into every facet of these American lives.
Battered
Lee Grant's acclaimed 1989 investigation of domestic violence in American Homes. Battered is the powerful, if harrowing portrait of a life lived in constant fear of the people closest to you. Intimate interviews with the victims and children of the cycle are combined with the eye opening and heart breaking stories of the abusers themselves to take you deeper into every facet of these American lives.
Staying Together
After their father abruptly sells the beloved family-owned restaurant that has employed them for years, the charismatic McDermott boys - hot-tempered Brian (Quill), lovelorn Kit (Mulroney) and jokester Duncan (Astin) - find themselves at odds with their parents and each other.
A Father… A Son… Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Kirk Douglas achieved the kind of cinematic stardom that dreams are made of. As the torch was passed to his talented son Michael, it became obvious to everyone that the Douglas dynasty would continue to thrive…
Tell Me a Riddle
A long-married couple embark on one last cross-country journey when it is discovered that the wife is dying. Together they try to reconnect with their estranged daughter before it is too late.
No Place Like Home
A Pittsburgh apartment superintendent loses his job and home when the apartment building where he lives and works at is suddenly destroyed by fire. Daniel and his family moves in with his brother but that doesn't last for long due to the two families not getting along with each other. The family moves from rundown hotels to homeless shelters as Daniel searches work as a electrician while his wife takes waitress jobs to try to make ends meet.
Nobody's Child
Fact-based drama about the life of Marie Balter, who spent most of her young life in mental institutions. At age 16, she first attempted suicide and the next 20 years she spent in and out of the institutions. At last, a caring doctor started treating her for extreme depression and panic disorder. Weened from strong medications she had taken all her life, at age 36, she emerged for the last time and started a rehabilitation program in the home of a volunteer married couple. There she met a fellow patient with whom she developed a romantic relationship. She also started a college degree. This followed with a long-term professional success in the field of mental health.
Baghdad ER
Produced and directed by 11-time Emmy Award-winner Jon Alpert, this 64-minute verite documentary takes an unforgettable look inside the 86th Combat Support Hospital (CSH), the U.S. Army's premier medical facility in Iraq and former site of one of Saddam Hussein?s elite medical facilities. Shot over two months in the summer of 2005, the film puts a human face on the war's cold casualty statistics, as doctors and nurses fight to save the lives of wounded soldiers who are Medevaced (helicoptered) in a numbingly routine basis.
The Willmar 8
Risking jobs, friends, family and the opposition of church and community, eight unassuming women begin the longest bank strike in American history.
Confronting the Crisis: Childcare in America
Documentary that examines whether America is failing children by not making child care an issue of national priority.
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