Laurie Kennedy

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Laurie Kennedy
Born (1945-02-14) February 14, 1945 (age 80)
Manhattan, New York, U.S.
Education Solebury School
Sarah Lawrence College
Occupation Actress
Spouse D. Keith Mano
Children2
Parent Arthur Kennedy

Laurie Ewing Kennedy [1] (born February 14, 1945) is an American stage, screen and television actress. [2] She is the daughter of actor Arthur Kennedy. [1]

Contents

Early years and career

Kennedy was born in Hollywood, California, [3] in February 1945, [a] the daughter of actor Arthur Kennedy and stage actress Mary Cheffey. [13] In 1953, her parents purchased a home in Westport, Connecticut. [14] and thus Kennedy spent the bulk of her formative years in the Northeastern United States. It was while attending Solebury School in Pennsylvania that Kennedy first realized that she was meant to be an actor. [15] After her freshman year at Sarah Lawrence College, Kennedy apprenticed under Nikos Psacharopoulos at the Williamstown Theatre Festival, where she gave what would prove but the first of several performances as Irina, the youngest of Chekhov's Three Sisters (a role Kennedy would reprise twice at Williamstown and once at Los Angeles Music Center's Mark Taper Forum. [16]

In 1979, for her performance as Violet Robinson in Shaw's Man and Superman , Kennedy received the Derwent Award, the Theatre World Award, [17] and a Best Featured Actress Tony nomination. [18]

On screen, Kennedy portrayed Pat Lawford in the 1983 miniseries, Kennedy . [19]

Personal life

From 1980 until his death in 2016, Kennedy was married to writer D. Keith Mano. [13] [20] [21]

Filmography

Notes

  1. ↑ Whereas Internet Broadway Database lists 1948 as her birth year (and February 14 as the specific day), [4] and the 1990 work, The World Who's Who of Women, has "14 Feb 1949", [5] a 1945 piece by entertainment writer Marjory Adams, published in response to a reader's Arthur Kennedy query, offers both the actor's date of birth—February 17, 1914—and those of both his son, Terence (February 14, 1943), and daughter, Laurie, here listed as February 13, 1945. [6] Moreover, at least four different articles published between the years of 1949 and 1962 include the name and current age of each of Arthur Kennedy's two children, each and every one of then consistent with the respective birth years—1943 and 1945—cited by Adams. [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] Indeed, the last of these—a profile/interview conducted in August 1962 during a brief Ireland getaway with wife and daughter—not only specifically cites his then "17-year-old daughter Laurie [and] 19-year-old Terry" but contains a photograph of the former, clearly depicting someone then better able to pass for 20-something than 14. [12]

References

  1. 1 2 Macksoud, Meredith C. (2003). Arthur Kennedy, Man of Characters . Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company. p. 12. ISBN   0786413840. "On March 28, 1938, John Arthur Kennedy took time out to marry Mary Cheffey, [...] a fellow drama student at the Carnegie Institute [...] She appeared in several Broadway plays, including the award winning The Time of Your Life. On tour she starred in Room Service and Brother Rat. Her career ended in the mid-forties when she gave birth to their first child, Terence Gordon; two years later she bore Laurie Ewing, who has kindly provided a Forward and Remembrances for this volume."
  2. ↑ Robertson, Nan (February 2, 1979). "New Face: Laurie Kennedy Broadway Bow in Shaw". The New York Times. p. C17. ProQuest   121015109. [Shaw's elaborate stage direction] springs to instant, vivid life as Laurie Kennedy sweeps on stage in her Broadway debut as Violet in the Circle in the Square production and exits moments later to the first applause of the evening. Miss Kennedy is so good, whether one has read Shaw's insrructions or not, that Richard Eder of the New York Times thought that she should have been picked as the play's leading lady.
  3. ↑ Hill, Holly (1987). Playing Joan: Actresses on the Challenge of Shaw's Saint Joan : Twenty-six Interviews by Holly Hill . New York: Theatre Communications Group. p. 171. ISBN   0-930452-64-X. "Laurie Kennedy was born in Hollywood. She played Joan at the Williamstown Theatre Festival in 1973, and at Arena Stage in 1976."
  4. ↑ "Laurie Kennedy Credits". IBDB.
  5. ↑ International Biographical Centre (1990). The World Who's Who of Women. Melrose Press. p. 462. ISBN   9780948875106. "... Laurie Ewing , b . 14 Feb. 1949 , Hollywood , California , USA . Actress ."
  6. ↑ Adams, Marjory (July 16, 1957). "Movie Question Box". The Boston Globe. p. 19. "Arthur Kennedy was born in Worcester, Feb. 17, 1914, the son of Dr. and Mrs. J. T. Kennedy. [...] His wife is the former Mary Cheffey and their Terence, was born Feb. 14, 1943. His daughter, Laurie, was born Feb. 13, 1945."
  7. ↑ Cohen, Harold V. (December 2, 1949). "The Drama Desk: Local Scrappings". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. p. 22. ProQuest   1854422260. Arthur Kennedy's wife has arrived in Hollywood to stay with him until he finishes his role in the screen version of 'The Glass Menagerie.' She's the Pittsburgh girl, Mary Cheffey, who retired from the stage and screen after marrying Kennedy. Their two children, Terence, 6, and Laurie, 4, are remaining in charge of a nurse at the Kennedys' Westport, Conn. home.
  8. ↑ Scheuer, Philip K. (October 8, 1950). "Art Kennedy Haunted by Family Roles (Continued from First Page)". The Los Angeles Times. pt. IV, p. 4. "Born John Arthur Kennedy in Worcester on Feb. 17, 1914, [...] he is the father of Terence, 7, and Laurie, 5. When we talked he expressed his eagerness to get back to them and the rented farmhouse, built in 1804, they occupy in Westport, Ct."
  9. ↑ Burroughs, Betty (January 14, 1953). "'Crucible' Star Nervous as New Play Nears Opening". The Wilmington News . p. 12. "They have a son, Terence, 10, and a daughter, Laurie, 8. The girl, Kennedy says, shows an inclination toward acting and even at such an early age 'has a voice like Bankhead.' Asked if he would approve of a theatrical career for his daughter, he solemnly replied, 'If she likes it.'"
  10. ↑ MacArthur, Harry (September 21, 1955). "The Passing Show: He's Just Too Normal to Be a Movie Star". The Evening Star . p. B-26. "He has been called, several years ago, by George M. Cohan, 'The most brilliant young actor on Broadway.' In the face of all this, he [...] lives not by a pool in Beverly Hills, but with his wife and their two children, Terence, 12, and Laurie, 10, in Westport, Conn."
  11. ↑ Russell, Fred H. (October 2, 1955). "Gossip of the Rialto". Connecticut Post. p. 44. "With more than 30 motion pictures to his credit it is understandable why Kennedy would like to get back on Broadway for a change. [...] Arthur, a native of Worcester, Mass., met a girl named Mary Cheffey while he was a student at Carnegie Tech. Today they have two children, Terence, 12, and Laurie, 10."
  12. ↑ Hennigan, Tom; Gilligan, Eamonn (August 28, 1962). "Going Places: Came Here to Cool Off". Evening Herald. p. 9.
  13. 1 2 Bass, Milton R. (July 12, 1979). "The Lively World". The Berkshire Eagle. p. 21.
  14. ↑ Peck, Seymour (February 15, 1953). "Growth -- and Growing Pains -- of an Actor: Arthur Kennedy, like all of us, 'suffers' from being human -- and his ability to convey it has made him a star". The New York Times Sunday Magazine. p. 20. ProQuest   112617778. During rehearsals he isolates himself in a midtown hotel room, preferring not to inflict himself upon his wife, Mary; his son, Terence, 10, and his daughter, Laurie, 8, who stay at home in the salt-box house the Kennedys recently bought in Westport, Conn.
  15. ↑ Kennedy, Laurie (December 19, 1986). "Deciding to Be an Actress". Back Stage. p. 29A. ProQuest   964115050. After that performance, I knew that I was going to go into the profession on some level. I still wasn't competent enough to go to a school like Juilliard or Yale or Carnegie-Mellon. So I decided to go to Sarah Lawrence, and have the near-by New York, and a good theatre department, and still get a B.A. with all that that entailed.
  16. ↑ Hackett, Jean (1993). The Actor's Chekhov : Nikos Psacharopoulos and the Company of the Williamstown Theatre Festival, on the plays of Anton Chekhov . Newbury, VT: Smith and Kraus. pp. 152, 153. ISBN   1-880399-05-9. "Ms. Kennedy played Irina in three productions of The Three Sisters at Williamstown – the first when she was an apprentice at age 17, and again in 1970 and 1976. [...] 'Actually, I played Irina four times. I did it at the Mark Taper Forum in 1976, before coming east to do it again for Nikos the same year."
  17. ↑ "Theater World Cites 12 New Performers". The New York Times. May 22, 1979. p. C7. ProQuest   120821599. Twelve performers from Broadway and Off-Broadqway for the 1978-1979 season will receive the 35th Annual Theatre World Awards Thursday at the Gotham Hotel, Fifth Avenue and 55th Street. Judges for the awards, presented to 'the most outstanding new performers,' were Clive Barnes, drama critic of the New York Post, Douglas Watt, critic of the Daily News, and John Willis, editor of Theater World. The actors cited are: Philip Anglim ('The Elephan Man'), Lucie Arnaz ('They're Playing Our Song'), Gregory Hines ('Eubie'), Ken Jennings ('Sweeney Todd'), Michael Jeter ('G.R. Point') and Laurie Kennedy ('Man and Superman')
  18. ↑ "Parks, Cohen Back for 13th Tony Awards Sunday; Some Nominees". The Register-Guard TV & Radio Week. June 2, 1979. p. 9. "BEST FEATURED ACTRESS (PLAY): Joan Hickson, 'Bedroom Farce': Laurie Kennedy, 'Man and Superman'; Susan Littler, 'Bedroom Farce': Mary-Joan Negro, 'Wings.'"
  19. ↑ "TV Presidency". Newsday. November 20, 1983. pt. II, p. 5. "Middle, Alan Conti and Joanne Camp (Sargent and Eunice Shriver), Sheen (JFK), Laurie Kennedy (Pat Lawford), John Shea (RFK), Kevin Conroy (Edward);"
  20. ↑ Bass, Milton R. (July 29, 1982)."The Lively World". The Berkshire Eagle. p. 21. "WRITER-ACTOR D. Keith Mano merged with actress Laurie Kennedy two years ago. Ms. Kennedy is now appearing in 'Room Service' at the Williamstown Theater Festival."
  21. ↑ Grimes, William (September 20, 2016). "D. Keith Mano, Novelist Who Tackled Christianity, Sex and More, Dies at 74". The New York Times. p. B9. ProQuest   1934692630. D. Keith Mano, whose teeming, rollicking novels explored the problems and passions of Christianity in the modern world, to remarkable effect in the capacious, Rabelaisian black comedy "Take Five," died on Wednesday in Manhattan. He was 74. The cause was complications of Parkinson's disease, his wife, the actress Laurie Kennedy, said.

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