Saturday, April 24, 2010

Jean Hagen


June Hagan's, first film was as a femme fatale in Adam's Rib(1949). The Asphalt Jungle (1950), was Jean Hagen's first starring performance which she received excellent reviews. She is best known for her wonderful performance in Singin' in the Rain. As the talent-less silent movie star Lina Lamont, Hagen received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. (pictured above)



By 1953, she was performing in the television sitcom Make Room for Daddy. As the first wife of Danny Thomas, for three seasons. Hagen received three Emmy Award nominations. Thomas, who also produced the show, was not happy with Jean leaving the show and her character was killed off rather than recast. This was the first TV character to be killed off on a family sitcom.

Hagen performed as Frida Daniels in The Shaggy Dog starring with Fred MacMurray.

In 1960, she performed as "Elizabeth" in the episode "Once Upon a Knight" with June Allyson.

She made guest appearances in many television series and for the remainder of her career played supporting roles, such as Marguerite LeHand, personal secretary to Franklin Delano Roosevelt in Sunrise at Campobello (1960), and the friend of Bette Davis in Dead Ringer (1964).

In the 1960s, Hagen's started having trouble with her health and she spent many years hospitalized.

In 1976, she performed in episodes of the television series Starsky and Hutch and The Streets of San Francisco, and made her final film performance in the 1977 television movie Alexander. The Other Side of Dawn.


3 comments:

  1. panavia999, Thank you for catching that...I think I need new glasses.. :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Dawn she was also in the 60's cult classic Panic In The Year Zero .

    ReplyDelete

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