Oscar Profile #342: Mildred Dunnock

Born January 25, 1901 in Baltimore, Maryland, Mildred Dunnock was a schoolteacher who did not start acting until she was past 30. Once she began to act, however, her rise was swift and her career meteoric although she never rose above the ranks of character actress, albeit a superb one.

Dunnock’s first Broadway role was as one of the nurses on the maternity ward in 1932’s Life Begins. She was not asked to reprise her role in the film version made later that year. In 1933, she married Keith Urmey, an executive with Chemical Bank in Manhattan with whom she had one child. She remained married to him until her death. Continuing to act on the stage, she was finally allowed to recreate the part of one of her Broadway roles with the 1945 film version of The Corn Is Green. She returned immediately to Broadway where she created the role of Aunt Lavinia in 1946’s Another Part of the Forest, the prequel to The Little Foxes.

Uncredited as the old lady Richard Widmark pushes down the stairs in 1947’s Kiss of Death, she returned to Broadway once again where in 1949 she played her most famous role, that of the wife in Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, directed by Elia Kazan. She repeated the role in the 1951 film version, earning her first Oscar nomination in the process.

Dunnock earned Golden Globe nominations for 1952’s Viva Zapata!, 1956’s Baby Doll and 1957’s Peyton Place and a second Oscar nomination for Baby Doll. On Broadway in 1955, she created the role of Big Mama in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, but lost the part to Judith Anderson in the 1958 film version.

Alternating TV and theatre work with her screen appearances, Dunnock had several high-profile screen roles as the Mistress of Postulants in 1959’s The Nun’s Story, Gig Young’s avaricious mother in 1960’s The Story on Page One and Elizabeth Taylor’s poor mother in the same year’s Butterfield 8. She had one of her most sympathetic roles as Shirley Knight’s aunt in 1962’s Sweet Bird of Youth and played James Francicus’s mother in 1964’s Youngblood Hawke.

In 1966, Dunnock was one of John Ford’s 7 Women in the legendary director’s final film and played the wife once again in an abridged TV version of Death of a Salesman opposite original star Lee J. Cobb.

Dunnock had one more memorable big screen role as the murder victim in 1969’s What Ever Happened to Aunt Alice? in support of Geraldine Page and Ruth Gordon. She continued to act, mainly on TV, most memorably as Donna Reed’s mother in 1979’s The Best Place to Be. Her last role was back on the big screen in 1987’s The Pick-Up Artist in support of Molly Ringwald and Robert Downey, Jr.

Mildred Dunnock died on July 5, 1991 at the age of 90, three days before James Franciscus who played her son in Youngblood Hawke died at the age of 57.

ESSENTIAL FILMS

THE CORN IS GREEN (1945), directed by Irvin Rapper

Dunnock played the part of Miss Ronberry, the traditional Welsh schoolteacher, in support of Ethel Barrymore in the 1940 Broadway production of Emlyn Williams’ play. She recreated the part for the 1945 film starring Bette Davis. Although she received strong notices for her performance, she didn’t make another film for two years when she returned unbilled as the old lady Richard Widmark pushes down the stairs in 1947’s Kiss of Death, returning to Broadway for Lillian Hellman’s Another Part of the Forest, Hellman’s prequel to The Little Foxes.

DEATH OF A SALESMAN (1951), directed by Laslo Benedek

Reportedly, neither Arthur Miller nor Elia Kazan wanted Dunnock for the original Broadway production of Miller’s most famous play, but her portrayal of Linda Loman, the wife of the titled character fit her like a glove and went on to be recognized as her signature role. She received her first Oscar nomination for reprising her role opposite the screen’s Willy Loman, Fredric March. Fifteen years later she joined Broadway’s Willy, Lee J. Cobb, for a truncated TV version. She later worked for Kazan in Viva Zapata! and Baby Doll, and as Big Mama in the original Broadway production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.

PEYTON PLACE (1957), directed by Mark Robson

Having been a schoolteacher before turning to acting in real life, and having made her film debut as a schoolteacher in The Corn Is Green, it was only fitting that Dunnock should be asked to play the beloved schoolteacher who is passed over for a promotion to principal in the film version of the then most salacious American novel of all time, Grace Metalious’ Peyton Place. Her character’s gentility was the purest in the novel and the film, earning her a third Golden Globe nomination following her previous nods for Viva Zapata! and Baby Doll.

SWEET BIRD OF YOUTH (1962), directed by Richard Brooks

Having been passed over in favor of Judith Anderson in Brooks’ film version of Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, the director made the slight up to her by giving her the role of Aunt Nonnie, the character who provides the comeuppance to her brother-in-law, the nasty mayor (Ed Begley) in Williams’ Sweet Bird of Youth starring Geraldine Page and Cat’s Paul Newman. She would work again with Page in her last important big screen role in 1969’s What Ever Happened to Aunt Alice? , which also starred Ruth Gordon.

7 WOMEN (1966), directed by John Ford

Dunnock formed a lifelong friendship with Patricia Neal when the two starred in Broadway’s Another Part of the Forest, and was looking forward to being reunited with her on Ford’s last film, but Neal’s series of strokes forced her to bow out in favor of Anne Bancroft, who gives one of her finest performances as an atheistic doctor who comes to the aid of a group of Protestant missionaries in Communist China. Margaret Leighton, Flora Robson, Dunnock, Betty Field and Anna Lee co-star. This was Dunnock’s third film with Field, following Peyton Place and Butterfield 8.