Sad news today as it’s been reported that Eva Marie Saint, the Oscar-winning actress best known for On the Waterfront and North by Northwest, has died at the age of 102. She was one of the few remaining actors from the Golden Age of Hollywood.
She Won An Oscar For Her First Movie
Saint was born on July 4, 1924, in Newark, Jew Jersey. She didn’t set out to become an actress; it was her older sister, Adelaide, who was pursuing that path, but on a dare, Saint tried out for a school play and caught the acting bug. “Something started in my mind that got me thinking, ‘This was really exciting,’” she later recalled.
After a few appearances on television, she met with Elia Kazan, who was casting for On the Waterfront. She read scenes with Marlon Brando and won the role of Edie Doyle, a young woman who encourages Brando’s Terry Malloy to stand for something.
“My first scene is on top of the tenement house with the pigeon coops when I give [Brando] my brother’s coat,” she said in a 2010 interview. “Kazan took me aside and said, ‘Now, Eva Marie, you’re a Catholic girl who hasn’t had much experience with the opposite sex, so this is terrifying for you.’ He would give you really specific things to think about, but I never knew what he was saying to the other actors.“
She would win the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.
North by Northwest
On the Waterfront may have made Saint an award-winning actress, but it was Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest that made her a star. She plays Eve Kendall, one of Hitchcock’s classic “cool blondes” who helps Cary Grant’s Roger Thornhill as he’s on the run, but there’s more to her than meets the eye.
While speaking with Vanity Fair in 2014, he recalled how Hitchcock went shopping with her at Bergdorf Goodman to pick out her clothes for the film. “He didn’t talk about acting. He worked with me from the outside in. My hair, my makeup, my shoes, my jewelry, my purse, my gloves, everything,” she said. “And just from creating that exterior for me, he gave me the sense of a spy lady. But we never talked about emotion. He told me not to use my hands, I have a habit of doing that, and to lower my voice. And always, in my scenes with Cary Grant, look directly into his eyes, which was not difficult.“
Her Other Work
Saint’s other movies include Exodus, The Sandpiper, The Russians are Coming the Russians are Coming, Grand Prix, I Dreamed of Africa, Superman Returns, and more. On the small screen, she appeared in episodes of How the West Was Won, The Love Boat, Moonlighting, Frasier, The Legend of Korra, and more.
What a life, and what a career. Our thoughts and condolences are with Saint’s family, friends, and loved ones. She will be deeply missed.
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