Profile of Gloria Stuart on Famous Like Me

Gloria Stuart, born on July 4, 1910, is an American stage, television and film actress.

Born Gloria Frances Stewart in Santa Monica, California, she changed the spelling of her name when she commenced her acting career.

After acting in college and in other amateur productions, Stuart was signed to a contract by Universal Studios in 1932. She was also selected as one of the thirteen WAMPAS Baby Stars of 1932. As a glamorous blonde, she was quickly cast in a variety of films and became a favourite of director James Whale, appearing in his The Old Dark House (1932), The Invisible Man (1933) and The Kiss Before the Mirror (1933). Her career with Universal Studios failed to gain momentum and she moved to 20th Century Fox. By the end of the decade she had starred in more than forty films, including Roman Scandals (1933) and Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm (1938) but had not become a major star. Some of her co-stars during the decade of the 1930s included Lionel Barrymore, Kay Francis, Claude Rains, Raymond Massey, Paul Lukas, John Boles, John Beal and Shirley Temple.

She made a few films during the 1940s but had become more interested in working with the Screen Actors Guild, and in developing her talents as a painter, although her liberal-left political views may have helped her decide to move out of the public spotlight. As an artist she became well respected with her work being exhibited throughout the USA and Europe. After a thirty year break from acting, she appeared in the 1975 television movie The Legend of Lizzie Borden and over the next few years appeared regularly on television. She made her first cinema appearance in almost forty years when she appeared in My Favourite Year in 1982. She also survived breast cancer around this time.

In old age, she achieved a level of celebrity she had never experienced during her years as a Hollywood contract player, when cast in Titanic (1997). As the 101-year-old Rose DeWitt Bukater she received a Best Supporting Actress Academy Award nomination, becoming the oldest person to receive an acting nomination and was expected to win, if only out of deference, but she was pipped at the post by Kim Basinger, who has been about as in demand for her acting services these days as Stuart was prior to Titanic (1997 film).

Stuart found herself relatively in demand after this and was constantly employed, as much as her age and health permitted, with her most recent roles being in a Murder, She Wrote TV movie in 2001, and Wim Wenders' Land Of Plenty (2004).

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