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Ali MacGraw

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Ali MacGraw
MacGraw in The Getaway, 1972
Born
Elizabeth Alice MacGraw

(1939-04-01) April 1, 1939 (age 85)
Pound Ridge, New York, U.S.
Occupations
  • Actress
  • model
  • author
  • animal rights activist
Years active1960–2012
Spouse(s)
Robin Hoen
​
​
(m. 1961; div. 1962)​

​
​
(m. 1969; div. 1972)​

​
​
(m. 1973; div. 1978)​
ChildrenJosh Evans

Elizabeth Alice MacGraw (born April 1, 1939)[1][2] is an American actress. She first gained attention with her role in the film Goodbye, Columbus (1969), for which she won the Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer. She gained an international profile for her role in the film Love Story (1970), for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress and won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama. In 1972, MacGraw was voted the top female box office star in the world[3] and was honored with a hands and footprints ceremony at Grauman's Chinese Theatre after having been in just three films. She went on to star in the popular action films The Getaway (1972) and Convoy (1978) as well as the romantic sports drama Players (1979), the comedy Just Tell Me What You Want (1980), and the historical novel-based television miniseries The Winds of War (1983). In 1991, she published an autobiography, Moving Pictures.

Early life

MacGraw was born in Pound Ridge, New York,[1] the daughter of commercial artists Frances (née Klein; 1901–1980)[4] and Richard MacGraw.[1][2] She has one brother, Dick, an artist.[2] Her mother was Jewish, the daughter of emigrants from Budapest, Hungary. MacGraw's mother chose not to disclose her ancestry to her father, instead professing ignorance about it. "I think Daddy was bigoted," MacGraw has said.[2][5][6][7]

Her mother was considered a "pioneer" as an artist, who had taught school in Paris before settling in Greenwich Village. Her parents married when her mother was 40: "My gorgeous father: a combination of Tyrone Power and a mystery, a brilliant artist and a brain beyond brains."[2] He was born in New Jersey with his childhood spent in an orphanage. He ran away to sea when he was 16 and studied art in Munich. MacGraw adds, "Daddy was frightened and really, really angry. He never forgave his real parents for giving him up."[2] As an adult, he constantly suppressed the rage he built up against his parents.[2] She described her father as "violent".[8]

MacGraw attended Rosemary Hall in Greenwich, Connecticut and Wellesley College in Wellesley, Massachusetts.[2]

Career

Early career

Beginning in 1960, MacGraw spent six years working at Harper's Bazaar magazine as a photographic assistant to fashion maven Diana Vreeland.[2] She worked at Vogue magazine as a fashion model, and as a photographer's stylist. She has also worked as an interior decorator.

Film and television

MacGraw in The Getaway, 1972

MacGraw began her acting career in television commercials,[citation needed] including one for the Polaroid Swinger camera.[9] And in one commercial for International Paper, she was on a beach in a bikini made of Confil and went for a swim underwater to prove its strength and durability. MacGraw gained attention in the film Goodbye, Columbus (1969), but real stardom came when she starred opposite Ryan O'Neal in Love Story (1970), one of the highest-grossing films in U.S. history.[10] MacGraw was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for that performance. Following Love Story, MacGraw was celebrated on the cover of Time magazine.

In 1972, after appearing in just three films, she had her footprints and autograph engraved at Grauman's Chinese Theatre. She then starred opposite Steve McQueen in The Getaway (1972), which was one of the year's top ten films at the box office. Having taken a five-year break from acting, in 1978 MacGraw re-emerged in another box office hit, Convoy (1978), opposite Kris Kristofferson. She then appeared in the films Players (1979) and Just Tell Me What You Want (1980), directed by Sidney Lumet.

In 1983, MacGraw starred in the highly successful television miniseries The Winds of War. In 1985, MacGraw joined hit ABC prime-time soap opera Dynasty as Lady Ashley Mitchell, which, she admitted in a 2011 interview, she did for the money.[11] She appeared in 14 episodes of the show before her character was killed off in the "Moldavian Massacre" cliffhanger episode in 1985.

Stage

MacGraw made her Broadway theatre debut in New York City in 2006 as a dysfunctional matriarch in the drama Festen (The Celebration).

In 2016, MacGraw reunited with Love Story co-star Ryan O'Neal in a staging of A.R. Gurney's play Love Letters.[12]

Magazine recognition

In 1991, People magazine selected MacGraw as one of its "50 Most Beautiful People" in the World.[13]

In 2008 GQ magazine listed her in their "Sexiest 25 Women in Film Ever" edition.[14]

Yoga

Having become a Hatha Yoga devotee in her early 50s, MacGraw produced a yoga video with the American Yoga Master Erich Schiffmann, Ali MacGraw Yoga Mind and Body. The impact of this bestselling video was such that in June 2007 Vanity Fair magazine credited MacGraw with being one of the people responsible for the practice's recent popularity in the United States.

Animal welfare

In July 2006, MacGraw filmed a public service announcement for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), urging residents to take their pets with them in the event of wildfires.[15] In 2008, she wrote the foreword to the book Pawprints of Katrina[16] by author Cathy Scott and photography by Clay Myers about Best Friends Animal Society and the largest pet rescue in U.S. history.[17] MacGraw is also a U.S. Ambassador for animal welfare charity Animals Asia.[18] An animal rights advocate throughout her life, she received the Humane Education Award by Animal Protection of New Mexico for speaking out about animal issues.[19]

Personal life

MacGraw has acknowledged having had an abortion in her early 20s, at a time when the procedure was illegal.[20] In 1979, MacGraw's mother, who was 38 when she had her, revealed that she had an abortion of her own in the early 1920s.[20]

After college, MacGraw married Robin Hoen (d. 13 Sep 2016), a Harvard-educated banker,[21] after dating for five years, but they divorced after a year and a half.[22]

On October 24, 1969, MacGraw married film producer Robert Evans (d. October 26, 2019);[23] their son, Josh Evans, is an actor, director, producer and screenwriter. They divorced in 1972 after she became involved in a public affair with Steve McQueen on the set of The Getaway. She married McQueen on July 13, 1973, in Cheyenne, Wyoming, and divorced him in 1978.

In the 40-plus years since her last divorce, MacGraw has not remarried. She dated Warren Beatty, Rick Danko, Bill Hudson, Ronald Meyer, Rod Stryker, Fran Tarkenton, Peter Weller and Henry Wolf.

MacGraw's autobiography, Moving Pictures, revealed her struggles with alcohol and sex addiction. She was treated for the former at the Betty Ford Center.

When former husband Evans received his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2002, she accompanied him. Their grandson Jackson was born in December 2010 to Josh and his wife, singer Roxy Saint.[24] After Evans' 2019 death, MacGraw told The Hollywood Reporter, "Our son, Joshua, and I will miss Bob tremendously, and we are so very proud of his enormous contribution to the film Industry."[25] During the last four decades of his life, MacGraw had been a good friend to Evans over the previous 40 years, Evans told Vanity Fair in 2010.[26]

Since 1994, MacGraw has lived in Tesuque, New Mexico, after "fleeing Malibu" when a house she was renting was destroyed by a fire.[27] MacGraw was originally intended to make a cameo as herself in the Breaking Bad episode "Grey Matter" as a guest at character Elliott Schwartz's birthday, set in Santa Fe, but her appearance didn't make the final cut of the episode.[28]

Filmography

Films

Year Title Role Notes
1968 A Lovely Way to Die Melody
1969 Goodbye, Columbus Brenda Patimkin Golden Globe Award for Most Promising Newcomer - Female
Nominated—BAFTA Award for Best Newcomer
1970 Love Story Jennifer Cavalleri David di Donatello for Best Foreign Actress
Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama
Nominated—Academy Award for Best Actress
1972 The Getaway Carol McCoy
1978 Convoy Melissa
1979 Players Nicole Boucher
1980 Just Tell Me What You Want Bones Burton
1985 Murder Elite Diane Baker
1994 Natural Causes Fran Jakes
1997 Glam Lynn Travers
1999 Get Bruce Herself

Television

Year Title Role Notes
1983 The Winds of War Natalie Jastrow TV miniseries
1983 China Rose Rose
1985 Dynasty Lady Ashley Mitchell 14 episodes
1988 Joan Rivers and Friends Salute Heidi Abromowitz Herself TV special
1992 Survive the Savage Sea Claire Carpenter TV film
1993 Gunsmoke: The Long Ride Uncle Jane Merkel
2002 The Trail of the Painted Ponies Narrator
2005 Passion & Poetry: The Ballad of Sam Peckinpah Herself
2007 Do You Sleep in the Nude? Herself
2009 Split Estate Narrator
2010 Landscapes of Enchantment Narrator
2012 Valles Caldera: The Science Narrator

References

  1. ^ a b c "Ali MacGraw Biography (1939-)". Film Reference. Advameg. Retrieved June 9, 2009.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Weller, Sheila (March 2010). "Once in Love with Ali". Vanity Fair. p. 5. Archived from the original on March 1, 2011. Retrieved January 23, 2011. In the original version of this article, Ali MacGraw's age last April was originally stated as 71. She turned 70 last April. We regret the error.
  3. ^ "Toledo Blade - Google News Archive Search". google.com. Retrieved February 1, 2017.
  4. ^ familysearch.org, accessed 2015-12-02
  5. ^ Kleiner, Dick (April 12, 1969). "Ingenue Star Ali McGraw Is Selective About Parts". Tuscaloosa News. Retrieved August 20, 2010.
  6. ^ Bykofsky, Stuart D. (February 4, 1983). "ALI MACGRAW: A STAR BY CHANCE". Philadelphia Daily News. Retrieved April 19, 2008.
  7. ^ "Jews in the News: Fred Savage, Herman Wouk and Ali MacGraw | Tampa Jewish Federation". www.jewishtampa.com.
  8. ^ New York magazine, April 3, 2006, pp. 69–70
  9. ^ Lippert, Barbara (June 25, 2018). "Meet the Swinger". Advertising Age: 32.
  10. ^ "DOMESTIC GROSSES". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved June 25, 2012.
  11. ^ https://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2011/01/15/ali-macgraw-reflects-on-her-career-in-front-of-the-camera/ Ali MacGraw Reflects on Her Career in Front of the Camera
  12. ^ "For Ali MacGraw and Ryan O'Neal, 45 years between love stories - The Boston Globe". BostonGlobe.com.
  13. ^ "Beautiful Through the Years", people.com, May 12, 1997.
  14. ^ "GQ magazine names the sexiest 25 women in film ever". Boxwish. Archived from the original on April 6, 2009. Retrieved June 9, 2009.
  15. ^ "PETA Offers Southern California Residents Urgent Information for Safeguarding Animals During Evacuations". People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Archived from the original on April 15, 2009. Retrieved June 9, 2009.
  16. ^ "PAWPRINTS OF KATRINA tells stories of animal rescues in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina". Wileyptnews.com. July 28, 2008. Archived from the original on April 15, 2009. Retrieved June 9, 2009.
  17. ^ "Pawprints of Katrina: Pets Saved and Lessons Learned". Prweb.com. Retrieved June 9, 2009.
  18. ^ "Patrons, Ambassadors and Celebrities". www.animalsasia.org.
  19. ^ "Animal Protection of New Mexico, Inc". Apnm.org. Archived from the original on April 15, 2009. Retrieved June 9, 2009.
  20. ^ a b Ali MacGraw (August 5, 1985). "When Abortion Was Illegal - Personal Tragedy, Coping and Overcoming Illness". People. Retrieved June 9, 2009.
  21. ^ Obituary of Robert "Robin" Martin Hoen, Legacy.com, accessed 10 April 2019.
  22. ^ Flippo, Chet (February 14, 1983). "Ali MacGraw Hopes War Finally Will Bring Her Peace". People. Archived from the original on February 22, 2014.
  23. ^ "The Kid Bows Out: Movie Producer Robert Evans Dies At 89". NPR.org.
  24. ^ "Josh Evans". imdb.com. Retrieved February 1, 2017.
  25. ^ "Robert Evans, Producer Who Brought Paramount Back From the Brink, Dies at 89". The Hollywood Reporter.
  26. ^ Weller, Sheila. "Sheila Weller on Ali MacGraw". Vanity Fair.
  27. ^ "Ali MacGraw, Defining Beauty". CBS News. December 5, 2007.
  28. ^ Lin, Patty. ""Grey Matter" screenplay". Yumpu.

Sources

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