| Actress
Ellen Burstyn enjoyed her greatest prominence during the '70s,
a decade during which she was a virtual fixture of Academy
Award voters' ballots. Born Edna Rae Gillooly in Detroit,
MI, on December 7, 1932, as a teen she studied dancing and
performed in an acrobatic troupe. She later became a model
for paperback book covers, subsequently dancing in a Montréal
nightclub under the name "Keri Flynn." In 1954,
she was tapped to appear as a Gleason Girl on television's
Jackie Gleason Show, and in 1957, she made her Broadway debut
in Fair Game, again with a new stage name, "Ellen McRae."
While in New York, Burstyn studied acting under Stella Adler,
and later married theatrical director Paul Roberts. She briefly
relocated to Los Angeles for television work but soon returned
east to work at the Actors' Studio. She made her film debut
in 1964's For Those Who Think Young, quickly followed by Goodbye
Charlie. The cinema did not yet suit her, however, and she
spent the remainder of the decade appearing on the daytime
soap opera The Doctors. |
