- Born
- Birth nameLyova Haskell Rosenthal
- Height5′ 3¾″ (1.62 m)
- Academy Award-winner Lee Grant was born Lyova Haskell Rosenthal on October 31, 1925 in Manhattan, New York City, to Witia (Haskell), a teacher and model, and Abraham Rosenthal, an educator and realtor. Her father was of Romanian Jewish descent, and her mother was a Russian Jewish immigrant. Lee made her stage debut at age 4 at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City, playing the abducted princess in "L'Orocolo". After graduating from high school, she won a scholarship to the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre, where she studied acting with Sanford Meisner. When she was a teenager Grant established herself as a formidable Broadway talent when she won The Critics' Circle Award for her portrayal of the shoplifter in "Detective Story". She reprised the role in the film version (Detective Story (1951), a performance that garnered her the Cannes Film Festival Citation for Best Actress as well as her first Academy Award Nomination. Immediately following her screen debut, however, Lee became a victim of the McCarthy-era blacklists in which actors, writers, directors, etc., were persecuted for supposedly "Communist" or "progressive" political beliefs, whether they had them or not. Except for an occasional role, she did not work in film or television for 12 years. In 1965 Lee re-started her acting career in the TV series Peyton Place (1964), for which she won an Emmy Award as Stella Chernak, and she later garnered her first Academy Award for Shampoo (1975), also receiving Academy Award nominations for The Landlord (1970) and Voyage of the Damned (1976). Since 1980 Lee has been concentrating on her directorial career, which began as part of the Women's Project at The Americal Film Institute (AFI); her adaptation of August Strindberg's, "Stronger, The" was consequently selected as one of the 10 best films ever produced for AFI. In 1987 she received an Academy Award for the HBO documentary, Down and Out in America (1985) and directed Nobody's Child (1986) for CBS, for which she received the Directors Guild Award. In 1983 she received the Congressional Arts Caucus Award for Outstanding Achievement in Acting and Independent Filmmaking. Subsequently, Women in Film paid tribute to her in 1989, with its first-ever Lifetime Achievement Award. Both the New York City Council and the County of Los Angeles Board of Supervisors have recognized Ms. Grant for the contribution her films have made to the fight against domestic violence.- IMDb Mini Biography By: Gary Collins II <garyrick96@hotmail.com>
- SpousesJoseph Feury(1973 - present)Arnold Manoff(October 1952 - 1960) (divorced, 1 child)
- Children
- ParentsAbraham W. RosenthalWitia Rosenthal
- New York City accent
- Seductive deep voice
- Her youthful appearance
- Red hair
- Was blacklisted in 1951 by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) for refusing to testify against her husband, blacklisted playwright/screenwriter Arnold Manoff. As a result, she got very little work for about 12 years.
- Reportedly declined the lead role that ultimately went to Bea Arthur on The Golden Girls (1985), because she didn't want to play a grandmother. Grant's daughter, Dinah Manoff, went on to co-star as Carol Weston in Empty Nest (1988), a direct spin-off of The Golden Girls (1985). Grant appeared as a guest star on the 4th season of the show in 1992, playing the title character in The Return of Aunt Susan (1992).
- Has three grandsons: Dashiell (b. 1997), Oliver (b. 2002), and Desi (b. 2002) via her daughter, actress Dinah Manoff, with whom Grant herself was three months pregnant when she completed her run of the Broadway play "A Hole in the Head".
- Finally came out with her real age in 2017, after decades of skimming years off her birthdate.
- As of 2022, she is the oldest surviving recipient of a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination, with Ann Blyth and Nancy Olson following close behind. She was nominated in 1952 for Detective Story (1951).
- Many of the things I accomplished in life are because I was dead set on proving somebody wrong.
- The Oscar has endured because of our yearning for excellence. Getting one is like being appointed valedictorian from the bottom of the class. The "outs", like me, get their moment to be "in", for as long as it lasts.
- Documentaries give you the arrogant privilege of opening someone's door and exposing the real person. The people in my films were involved with issues so important to them that they decided (a documentary) was the only way they could reach out and tell the world what was happening to them.
- I've been married to one Marxist and one fascist, and neither one would take the garbage out.
- [Academy Award acceptance speech] Thank you. I really must have wanted it otherwise why would I wear an old wedding dress? [Audience laughs] I think we [referring to the Oscar] had a fight twenty years ago, but he's changed. I know I haven't. But I would like to thank the artistic community for sustaining me in my wins and losses and sitting on the curb, whatever it was. I don't think there's an award for what Warren Beatty had to do to get Shampoo (1975) on, but I respect him and love him, and Robert Towne. And my director Hal Ashby, who encourages an actor to fly without a net because you know that he's there to catch you. Thank you.
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