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Biography: Ruth Gordon

The daughter of a former ship captain, Ruth Gordon knew what she wanted to do with her life after witnessing a performance by stage actress Hazel Dawn. Over the initial objections of her father, Gordon decided upon a stage career, studying at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. After the usual deprivations and barnstorming (and a few extra roles in such films as Camille [1916]), she got her first positive newspaper notice for her Broadway debut in a 1915 production of Peter Pan. "Ruth Gordon was ever so gay as Nibs," wrote influential critic Alexander Woollcott, who became a valued and powerful friend to Gordon, and did what he could to encourage her and promote her career. With such stage hits as Seventeen, Serena Blandish, and Ethan Frome, Gordon was one of Broadway's biggest stars of the 1920s and '30s; privately, however, her life was blotted by the premature death of her first husband, actor Gregory Kelly. She remarried in 1942 to the brilliant playwright Garson Kanin, some 16 years her junior -- a union that lasted more than four decades. Combining stage work with appearances in such films as Abe Lincoln in Illinois (1940) and Action in the North Atlantic (1943), Gordon began to collaborate with Kanin on writing projects, with such delightful results as the Spencer Tracy-Katharine Hepburn comedies Adam's Rib (1949) and Pat and Mike (1952), as well as the Judy Holliday feature The Marrying Kind (1952). Long absent from movies, Gordon returned to the cameras for Inside Daisy Clover in 1966, before taking on the kinky role of an elderly witch in Rosemary's Baby (1968). Upon receiving an Oscar for her performance, the 72-year-old Gordon brought down the house by saying, "You have no idea how encouraging a thing like this can be." Although few of her subsequent film roles were as prestigious, Gordon managed to enter cult-film Valhalla with unforgettable roles in two films: Where's Poppa? (1970), in which she played the obscenely senile mother of George Segal, and Harold and Maude (1972), as the freewheeling soul mate of death-obsessed teen Bud Cort. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide less

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Movies (22)
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The Trouble with Spies (1987)
Cast: Donald Sutherland Ned Beatty
Tags: Comedy Action Parody/Spoof Spy Film
Length: 91min
Appleton Porter (Donald Sutherland) is an inept international secret agent sent by the U.S. to the island of Ibiza in this uneven spy comedy. His mission is to secure the secret recipe for a truth serum to use on enemy agents. Appleton miraculously...
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Mugsy's Girls (1985)
Tags: Comedy
Length: 87min
Six sorority sisters are desperate for rent money, so, encouraged and trained by their den mother, they enter a mud-wrestling tournament in Las Vegas. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide
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Maxie (1985)
Cast: Glenn Close
Tags: Fantasy Comedy Comedy Fantasy
Length: 98min
In this comedy, an ordinary woman finds herself sharing both her home and her body with a ghost who has a pronounced wild streak. Jan (Glenn Close) and Nick (Mandy Patinkin) are a couple moving into an apartment in an old Victorian house in San...
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My Bodyguard (1980)
Cast: John Houseman Tony Bill
Tags: Coming-of-Age Teen Movie Comedy Drama
Length: 96min
This quietly compelling film explores the hardships and anxieties of high school with intelligence, sensitivity, warmth and humor. Chris Makepeace stars as a shy, bookish student who has recently moved to Chicago and begun a new school. There he finds...
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Any Which Way You Can (1980)
Cast: Clint Eastwood William Smith
Tags: Action Comedy Buddy Film Action Biker Film
Length: 116min
This sequel to Every Which Way But Loose finds Philo Beddoe (Clint Eastwood) on the road, orangutan companion Clyde in tow, as he makes his way as a bare-knuckle fighter. The action begins with Philo punching out a new victim while Clyde relieves...
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Every Which Way But Loose (1978)
Cast: Ruth Gordon
Tags: Adventure Comedy Romantic Adventure Action Adventure
Length: 119min
Clint Eastwood's first comedy feature proved to be one of his most profitable vehicles. Eastwood plays Philo Beddoe, a bare-knuckle boxer who travels from fight to fight in a beat-up truck, accompanied by his "pal" Clyde, a orangutan with a mean right...
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Hardhat and Legs (1980)
Tags: Romance Comedy
Length: 96min
Made for television and initially telecast February 9, 1980, Hardhat and Legs is a new-fashioned romance from the old-fashioned writing team of Garson Kanin and Ruth Gordon. The "hardhat" is pugnacious construction worker Kevin Dobson. The "legs" is...
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The Prince of Central Park (1977)
Tags: Drama Childhood Drama
Length: 76min
The Prince of Central Park is 11-year-old Jay Jay (T. J. Hargrave). An orphan from Hell's Kitchen who has been shunted from one foster home to another, Jay Jay is conditioned to despise, or at the very least distrust, all adults and authority figures....
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Boardwalk (1979)
Cast: Janet Leigh
Tags: Drama Crime
Length: 98min
In this drama, David Rosen (Lee Strasberg) and his wife Becky (Ruth Gordon) have lived in the same Coney Island neighborhood for nearly all their married life. But the area is not what it used to be, and a gang leader named Strut (Kim Delgado) has...
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Perfect Gentlemen (1978)
Cast: Jackie Cooper Lauren Bacall
Tags: Caper Comedy Crime
Length: 97min
We're not sure who the gentlemen are in this TV movie adaptation of Nora Ephron's Perfect Gentlemen, but there's no doubt as to the identity of the ladies. The plot revolves around three convict's wives. Sandy Dennis owns a bankrupt deli; Lisa Pelikan...
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