Barbara Harris

Barbara Densmoor Harris (July 25, 1935 – August 21, 2018) was an American Tony Award-winning Broadway stage star and Academy Award-nominated motion picture actress.

Early life Harris was born in Evanston, Illinois, the daughter of Natalie (née Densmoor), a pianist, and Oscar Graham Harris, an arborist who later became a businessman. She was the youngest of four children. In her youth, Harris attended Senn High School and then Wilbur Wright College. She began her stage career as a teenager at the Playwrights Theatre in Chicago. Her fellow players included Edward Asner, Elaine May and Mike Nichols.

She was also a member of the Compass Players, the first ongoing improvisational theatre troupe in the United States, directed by Paul Sills, to whom she was married at that time. Though the Compass Players closed in disarray, a second theatre directed by Sills called The Second City opened in Chicago in 1959 and attracted national attention.

Broadway career A life member of the Actors Studio, Harris received a Tony nomination in 1962 for Outstanding Featured Actress in a Musical for her Broadway debut in the original musical revue production From the Second City, which ran at the Royale Theatre from September 26, 1961 to December 9, 1961. The revue also featured the young Alan Arkin and Paul Sand. Produced by Max Liebman (among others) and directed by Paul Sills, the production presented Harris in such sketches as Caesar's Wife, First Affair, Museum Piece, and The Bergman Film.

While Rodgers and Lerner were busy working on their original musical for her, she won the Theatre World Award for her role in playwright Arthur Kopit's dark comedic farce, Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mamma's Hung You in the Closet and I'm Feelin' So Sad. She earned a nomination for the 1966 Tony for Best Actress in a Musical for On a Clear Day You Can See Forever (1965), a Broadway musical created for her by Alan Jay Lerner and Burton Lane. She starred as Daisy Gamble, a New Yorker who seeks out the help of a psychiatrist to stop smoking. Under hypnosis, the apparently kooky, brash, and quirky character reveals unexpected hidden depths. During her hypnotic trances, she becomes fascinating to the psychiatrist as she reveals herself as a woman who has lived many past lives, one of them ending tragically. While critics were divided over the merits of the show, they praised Harris's performance. The show opened on October 14, 1965 at the Mark Hellinger Theatre and ran for 280 performances, earning a total of three Tony nominations. Harris performed numbers from the show with John Cullum on The Bell Telephone Hour ("The Lyrics of Alan Jay Lerner", broadcast on February 27, 1966). She had previously appeared on Broadway with Anne Bancroft in a 1963 production of Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage and Her Children, staged by Jerome Robbins, at the Martin Beck Theater; the production received five Tony nominations.

Harris gave another well-received performance in The Apple Tree, another Broadway musical created for her, this time by the team of composer Jerry Bock and lyricist Sheldon Harnick. The show, in which Harris co-starred with Alan Alda and Larry Blyden and was directed by Mike Nichols, opened at the Shubert Theater on October 5, 1966 and closed on November 25, 1967. The show was based on three tales by Mark Twain, Frank R. Stockton, and Jules Feiffer and Harris starred in all three. She played Eve in Twain's The Diary of Adam and Eve, a melodramatically campy temptress in The Lady, or the Tiger?, and two roles in Jules Feiffer's Passionella. She was the forlorn, soot-stained nasal-congested chimney-sweep who wants only to be "a beautiful glamorous movie star, for its own sake", and, by virtue of an instantaneous costume-change, the huge-bosomed, gold-gowned, blonde bombshell of a movie star she always dreamed she'd be. Richard Watts Jr. of the New York Post wrote "here are many high triumphs of the imagination in the vastly original musical comedy ... ut it is Miss Harris who provides it with the extra touch of magic." Walter Kerr called her "the square root of noisy sex" and "sweetness carried well into infinity". Harris captured the 1967 Tony for Best Actress in a Musical as well as Cue Magazine's "Entertainer of the Year" award. Of her friend and colleague Mike Nichols, she said in 2002, "Mike Nichols was a toughie. He could be very kind, but if you weren't first-rate, watch out. He'd let you know." on August 21, 2018, aged 83. She is buried at Markesan Memorial Cemetery in Markesan, Wisconsin, where her mother and grandparents are buried.

Filmography Year Title Role Notes 1965 A Thousand Clowns Dr. Sandra Markowitz Nominated—Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy 1967 Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mamma's Hung You in the Closet and I'm Feelin' So Sad Rosalie 1971 Plaza Suite Muriel Tate Who Is Harry Kellerman and Why Is He Saying Those Terrible Things About Me? Allison Densmore Nominated—Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress 1972 The War Between Men and Women Theresa Alice Kozlenko 1974 Mixed Company Kathy Morrison 1975 The Manchu Eagle Murder Caper Mystery Miss Helen Fredericks Nashville Winifred/Albuquerque Nominated—Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture1976 Family Plot Blanche Tyler Nominated—Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy Freaky Friday Ellen Andrews 1978 Movie Movie Trixie Lane Segment: Baxter's Beauties of 19331979 The North Avenue Irregulars Vickie Simms The Seduction of Joe Tynan Ellie Tynan 1981 Second-Hand Hearts Dinette Dusty 1986 Peggy Sue Got Married Evelyn Kelcher 1987 Nice Girls Don't Explode Mom 1988 Dirty Rotten Scoundrels Fanny Eubanks 1997 Grosse Pointe Blank Mary BlankFinal Film Role

Television Year Title Role Notes 1961 Alfred Hitchcock Presents Beth Season 7 Episode 6: "Beta Delta Gamma" 1962 As Caesar Sees It Self TV comedy featuring insights of Sid Caesar 1962 Naked City Helga Royd Season 4 Episode 3: "Daughter Am I in My Father's House" 1963 Chronicle Episode: "The French, They Are So French" 1963 Channing Sophie Kannakos Season 1 Episode 4: "No Wild Games for Sophie" 1963 What's Going on Here? WNEW-produced TV comedy film 1964 The Defenders Margit Wolsung Season 3 Episode 14: "Claire Cheval Died in Boston" 1964 The Doctors and the Nurses Anna Faye Season 2 Episode 31: "White on White" 1964 The Doctors and the Nurses Elaine Radnitz Season 3 Episode 10: "So Some Girls Play the Cello" 1964 The Garry Moore Show Self 1964 The Jack Paar Show Self 1966 The Bell Telephone Hour Self - singer "The Lyrics of Alan Jay Lerner" w/Florence Henderson, Edward Villella, Patricia McBride, John Cullum and Stanley Holloway 1967 The Merv Griffin Show Self 1971 Stand Up and Cheer Self 1977 A Doonesbury Special Joanie Caucus Voice only (animated) 1989 Days of Our Lives Susan Faraday 5 episodes (Season 1 Episodes 16, 17, 19, 21, 22) 1992 Middle Ages Jean Season 1 Episode 4: "Night Moves"

Theater Year Title Role Notes 1961 From the Second City Broadway debutNominated—Tony Award for Best Supporting or Featured Actress in a Musical 1962 Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mamma's Hung You in the Closet and I'm Feelin' So Sad Rosalie Obie Award for Distinguished Performance by an Actress 1963 Mother Courage and Her Children Yvette Pottier 1965 On a Clear Day You Can See Forever Daisy Gamble Nominated—Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical 1966 The Apple Tree Eve - The Diary of Adam and EvePassionella - PassionellaPrincess Barbara - The Lady, or the Tiger? Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical 1970 Mahagonny Jenny Off-Broadway production