Joan Plowright

Born: 28 October 1929
Where: North Lincolnshire, England

Acknowledged as one of the finest stage actresses of her generation, Joan Plowright found feature success later in life.

At age 15, she won an amateur theatre prize that included a week's run in a production with the Harry Hanson Players. After this Joan won a scholarship to study at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School.

Plowright first garnered attention as a member of the Royal Court Theatre in such productions as The Crucible and The Constant Wife. (It was in the title role of the latter that she first caught Lawrence Olivier's attention.)

In 1957, she landed the role of Archie Rice's daughter opposite Olivier in John Osborne's The Entertainer and went on to repeat the role on Broadway and later on film.

That same year she also landed her first significant film role in Joseph Losey's taut thriller Time Without Pity.

For her performance as an unwed mother in A Taste of Honey, the actress received a 1961 Tony Award. Plowright spent the better part of the next two decades dividing her time between her family and the London stage.

By the 70s, she and the ageing Olivier worked together in several plays, TV specials and the rare film. After his death in 1989, Plowright came into her own as a character actress, generally cast as kindly matriarchs or starchy aristocrats. By the end of the 80s, as her film work increased, she made fewer stage appearances.

After missing out on a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her portrayal of a snooty widow in Mike Newell's Enchanted April, Plowright went on to win a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress.

Another confirmation came in 2003, when the actress was paired with Steve Martin and Oscar nominee Queen Latifah in the comedy Bringing Down The House, a feature about a lawyer (Martin) who discovers that the woman he's been corresponding with (Latifah) is not who she said she was. Plowright played Martin's billionaire client adding both class and humour to the role.