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Joan Hackett

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Not to be confused with Jo Ann Hackett.

Joan Hackett
Hackett in the 1969 production
Support Your Local Sheriff!
Born
Joan Ann Hackett

(1934-03-01)March 1, 1934
New York City, U.S.
DiedOctober 8, 1983(1983-10-08) (aged 49)
Encino, California, U.S.
Resting placeHollywood Forever Cemetery
OccupationActress
Years active1959–1983
Spouse
​
​
(m. 1966; div. 1973)​
RelativesAnnette McCarthy (niece)

Joan Ann Hackett (March 1, 1934 – October 8, 1983) was an American actress of film, stage, and television.[1] She starred in the 1968 western Will Penny. She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress for the 1981 film Only When I Laugh[2]. She also starred as Christine Mannon in the 1978 PBS miniseries version of Mourning Becomes Electra.[2]

Early life[edit]

Hackett was born in the East Harlem neighborhood of New York City, the daughter of John and Mary (née Esposito) Hackett, and grew up in Elmhurst, Queens, where she became a model and dropped out during her final year of high school.[3] She had a sister, Theresa, and a brother, John. Hackett's mother was from Naples, Italy, and her father had Irish ancestry, and they raised her Catholic and sent her to Catholic schools.[4][5][6]

Acting career[edit]

Hackett debuted in 1959 with the role of Gail Prentiss in the television series, Young Doctor Malone[2]. In 1961, she won a Theatre World Award, an Obie Award for Best Actress, and a Drama Desk Award for her Off-Broadway portrayal of Chris in Michael Shurtleff's play Call Me By My Rightful Name[2].

She had a recurring role in the CBS legal drama The Defenders (1961–1965) as the fiancée of Kenneth Preston (played by Robert Reed), partner in the father-and-son law firm led by patriarch Lawrence Preston (E.G. Marshall). She appeared regularly in scenes with both lead actors. She had a leading role in The Twilight Zone episode "A Piano in the House". In the 1963–1964 season, she guest-starred on Channing, an ABC drama about college life starring Jason Evers and Henry Jones.

Hackett had one of the starring roles in the 1966 Sidney Lumet film The Group, along with Candice Bergen, Larry Hagman, Richard Mulligan, Joanna Pettet, and others. She was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Foreign Actress for this role.[2]

One of her notable film performances was the role of Catherine Allen, a young mother struggling to survive on the frontier, in the 1968 Western Will Penny, with Charlton Heston in the title role. Hackett also had notable parts in the classic Western comedy Support Your Local Sheriff!, with James Garner, and the 1973 murder mystery The Last of Sheila. After this, she primarily had parts in TV movies and on episodes of TV series.

She received top billing in the 1974 adaption of Michael Crichton's novel The Terminal Man, where she played the brilliant Dr. Janet Ross, a psychiatrist who accurately predicts her patient's destructive behavior, opposite actors George Segal, Donald Moffat, and Richard Dysart.

In 1976, she played the female lead in the Disney adventure film Treasure of Matecumbe. In 1978, she appeared in a PBS adaptation of Mourning Becomes Electra as Christine Mannon. Her performance in that production earned her some of the best reviews of her career. Clive James said that it entitled her to be called a great actress. The same year, she was a regular in the cast of the short-lived CBS situation comedy Another Day, portraying Ginny Gardner.

She appeared in the September 22, 1979, episode "Grass Is Always Greener" of The Love Boat as Julie McCoy's former classmate from the line's cruise director course.

Hackett won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in the 1981 film Only When I Laugh, the last film she made before her death. She could also be seen in Paul Simon's 1980 film One Trick Pony.

Personal life and death[edit]

From 1966 to 1973 she was married to actor Richard Mulligan, who was also cast in The Group.

Crypt of Joan Hackett at Hollywood Forever

Hackett was diagnosed with cancer in 1981. She died of ovarian cancer on October 8, 1983, at Encino Hospital in Encino, California. A funeral mass was held on Wednesday, October 12, 1983, at St. Victor Catholic Church in Los Angeles, California. Her remains are entombed in The Abbey of The Psalms Mausoleum at Hollywood Forever Cemetery, where her epitaph reads: "Go Away — I'm Asleep".

Partial filmography[edit]

Selected television guest appearances[edit]

  • 1960 Diagnosis: Unknown (Season 1 Episode 7: "Gina, Gina") (aired September 6)
  • 1961 Alfred Hitchcock Presents (Season 6 Episode 34: "Servant Problem") playing "Sylvia" (aired June 6)
  • 1962 The New Breed (Season 1 Episode: "Cross the Little Line") playing "Angie" (aired January 9)
  • 1962 The Twilight Zone (Season 3 Episode 22: "A Piano in the House") playing "Esther Fortune" (aired February 16)
  • 1962 Gunsmoke (Season 7 Episode 25: "The Widow") playing "Mady Arthur" (aired March 24)
  • 1962 Theatre '62 (Season 1 Episode 7: "Rebecca") playing the "Second Mrs. de Winter" (aired April 8)
  • 1963 Combat! (Season 1 Episode 19: "The Chateau") playing "Gabrielle" (aired February 12)
  • 1963 Empire (Season 1 Episode 31: "Between Friday and Monday") playing "Dolores Lanza" (aired May 7)
  • 1964 Channing (Season 1 Episode 15: "A Rich, Famous, Glamorous Folk Singer Like Me") playing "Djuna Phrayne" (aired January 8)
  • 1964 The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (Season 2 Episode 21: "Beast in View") playing "Helen Clarvoe" (aired March 20)
  • 1964 Chrysler Theatre (Season 1 Episode 27: "Echo of Evil") playing "Florence" (aired June 5)
  • 1965 Bonanza (Season 6 Episode 17: "Woman of Fire") playing "Margarita Miguel" (aired January 17)
  • 1965 Chrysler Theatre (Season 3 Episode 8: "The Highest Fall of All") playing "Lili Strode" (aired December 1)
  • 1966 Run for Your Life (Season 2 Episode 6: "The Sex Object") playing "Diana Murrow" (aired October 17)
  • 1967 Judd, for the Defense (Season 1 Episode 14: "The Living Victim") playing "Ruth Massey" (aired December 15)
  • 1969 Daniel Boone (Season 5 Episode 26: "A Pinch of Salt") playing "Theodora Liggett" (aired May 1)
  • 1971 Dan August (Season 1 Episode 26: "The Assassins") playing "Nancy Williams" (aired April 8)
  • 1971 Alias Smith and Jones (Season 1 Episode 15: "The Legacy of Charlie O'Rourke") playing "Alice Banion" (aired April 22)
  • 1972 Bonanza (Season 13 Episode 16: "Second Sight") playing "Judith Corman" (aired January 9)
  • 1978 Another Day (Season 1 Episodes 1, 2, 3, 4) playing "Ginny Gardner" (aired April 8 - April 29)
  • 1979 $weepstake$ (Season 1 Episode 3: "Vince, Pete and Patsy, Jessica and Rodney") (aired February 9)
  • 1979 Trapper John, M.D. (Season 1 Episode 10: "The Surrogate") playing "Wilma" (aired December 23)
  • 1979 Taxi (Season 2 Episode 2: "Honor Thy Father") playing "Charlotte Reiger", the sister of "Alex Reiger" (aired on 18 September 1979)
  • 1981 Mourning Becomes Electra (TV mini-series) as "Christine Mannion"
    • (Season 1 Episode 1: "The Secret") (aired August 20)
    • (Season 1 Episode 2: "The Homecoming") (aired August 27)
    • (Season 1 Episode 3: "The Hunted") (aired September 3)
    • (Season 1 Episode 4: "An Act of Justice") (aired September 10)
  • 1982 Paper Dolls (TV movie) playing "Julia Blake", mother of teen model Taryn Blake (aired May 24)
  • 1985 Tales of the Unexpected (Season 8 Episode 4: "Scrimshaw") playing "Brenda" (aired on 28 July 1985)

References[edit]

  1. ^ Obituary, Variety, October 12, 1983.
  2. ^ a b c d e Magazine, Harlem World (March 13, 2022). "The Award Winning Actress, East Harlem's Joan Hackett, 1934 – 1983 (Video)". Harlem World Magazine. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  3. ^ Purnick, Joyce (October 10, 1983). "Joan Hackett, 49, The Actress; Won 1982 Oscar Nomination". The New York Times. Retrieved September 20, 2018. Joan Hackett, daughter of an Italian mother and an Irish-American father, was born March 1, 1934, in East Harlem. The Hacketts soon moved to Elmhurst, Queens, and that was home when the future actress with the high cheekbones and aristocratic nose dropped out of her senior year in high school to work as a model
  4. ^ "Unknown". The Palm Beach Post. December 9, 1978. Retrieved February 25, 2016 – via Google News.[permanent dead link]
  5. ^ Mackay, Kathy (May 24, 1982). "One Oscar Bid Plus Two New Movies May Finally Equal Fame for Joan Hackett". People. Vol. 17, no. 20. Archived from the original on June 4, 2009. Retrieved February 25, 2016.
  6. ^ "Person Details for Joan Hackett, "California Death Index, 1940-1997"". Familysearch.org. Retrieved February 25, 2016.

External links[edit]

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