Deborah Kerr

Born: September 1921
Where: Helensburgh, Scotland

The Scottish-born star landed her breakthrough screen role in 1940 as a frightened Salvation Army worker in the all-star adaptation of the satire Major Barbara.

Originally trained for the ballet, she moved into stage acting and gained some experience in British repertory theater before segueing to films.

Kerr moved into leads in an adaptation of the controversial novel which was England's equivalent of The Grapes of Wrath, the touching study of Depression-era poverty Love on the Dole.

However, it was her work in three roles in the splendid Michael Powell-Emeric Pressburger time-spanning saga "The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp" (1943), as the various women in the hero's life, that really set her on top.

She followed up with several excellent performances as the mousy wife whose marriage is revitalized when she enters wartime service in Perfect Strangers and the Irish spy in the gripping I See a Dark Stranger.

She also gave a marvellous performance as the determined yet fallible Sister Superior who attempts to establish a school and hospital in a remote Himalayan castle in Powell and Pressburger's Black Narcissus.

Kerr was soon co-starring opposite Clark Gable in the enjoyable satire of advertising The Hucksters.

Gracious, ladylike and smart, Kerr would in fact recreate two Irene Dunne roles: the proper Englishwoman who becomes governess to a potentate's brood in the music version of Anna and the King of Siam, The King and I and the heroine prevented from making a crucial rendezvous with her lover in An Affair to Remember.

The actress' regal quality suited her for period adventures including Quo Vadis and The Prisoner of Zenda and she also ventured into comedy in Dream Wife and The Grass Is Greener.

One of the most famous images of Kerr's career was that of her straying wife in From Here to Eternity, making love on the beach with military officer Burt Lancaster.

Since her appeal did not really depend upon youthful beauty, she continued impressively, if less prolifically, into 60s films.

Her work as governesses who encounter ghost-possessed charges in The Innocents and free-spirited ones in The Chalk Garden was well crafted, and she had fine moments as a gentle tourist caring for her aging grandfather in The Night of the Iguana.

Kerr subsequently returned primarily to stage work, keeping very busy in plays until health problems interfered with her work.

She made a successful one-shot return to films as a repressed widow in The Assam Garden and was given an honorary Oscar at the 1993 ceremonies.

Seven years later, it was confirmed that she was suffering with Parkinson's disease and had been confined to a wheelchair.