Maggie McNamara(1928-1978)
- Actress
Maggie McNamara -- with her brown hair in a ponytail -- arrives in Rome
in
Three Coins in the Fountain (1954)
expecting great things to happen. Petite and slender, she looks almost
like a schoolgirl in her prim blue suit. She is bright and vivacious
and goes for what she wants -- a proposal from "Prince Dino De Cessi"
played by Louis Jourdan. She was in her
mid-20s, then, and at the height of her career as she made her second
film. One of four children of Irish-American parents, Maggie had come a
long way since attending Textile High in New York to prepare for a
modeling career. Pert as well as petite, she must have reminded people
of the young Debbie Reynolds.
Both had a look that was popular in the late 1940s. Maggie's picture
appeared twice on the cover of Life Magazine and people were saying she
too ought to be in movies. She started taking lessons with a dramatic
coach and, at the age of 23, she was discovered by
Otto Preminger. He signed her to play the
role of a proper young lady who lets herself be lured to a bachelor's
apartment in the Chicago production of a play of
F. Hugh Herbert. She played the ingénue
role in "The Moon Is Blue" in the national company for 18 months. Then,
in 1951, she made it to Broadway in "The King of Friday's Men".
Brooks Atkinson, drama critic for the
New York Times, said of her performance in that play that she was
"remarkably pretty and has a gift for acting". Then Maggie was offered
the female lead in the Otto Preminger's
film version of
The Moon Is Blue (1953) with
William Holden and
David Niven. Theater patrons in New
York and Chicago had found the stage version of the story amusing. The
Catholic Legion of Decency was not amused when it previewed the film.
It was stamped "C" for Condemned. The New York Times noted in 1978:
"The Moon Is Blue aroused a storm of controversy because of what some
observers regarded as 'indecent' discussion of sex, and the ridicule of
the rules of parental protection. By current standards, it was, in
fact, a prim and proper work". Maggie was supporting herself as a
typist when she died in 1978. The New York Times obituary appeared four
weeks after her death. It said she was 48. The relative who confirmed
that she had died did not give the newspaper the date of her birth. The
relative said Maggie had been doing some writing recently and a film
script, "The Mighty Dandelion", had been accepted by a new film
producing company.
