Born July 18, 1911 in London, Ontario, Canada, Hume Cronyn was one of five children whose father, Hume Sr. was a businessman and member of Parliament for London who had an observatory at the University of Western Ontario and an asteroid named after him.

After graduating from Ridley College, Cronyn switched majors from pre-law to drama while attending McGill University, continuing his studies under Max Reinhardt at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York. He made his Broadway debut playing a janitor in Hipper’s Holiday, the first of many Broadway productions in which he had a minor role for the next decade. He married philanthropist Emily Woodruff that same year, but the two never lived together. They were divorced in 1936.

In 1940, Cronyn met actress Jessica Tandy who had just emigrated to the U.S. from England following her divorce from actor Jack Hawkins. They married in 1942, had two children, and acted together throughout their more than 50-year marriage on stage, in films and on television. Cronyn made his film debut in 1943’s Shadow of a Doubt. Tandy made her U.S. film debut in 1944’s The Seventh Cross, Cronyn’s fifth film for which he received an Oscar nomination in support of Spencer Tracy.

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