Goldie Jeanne Hawn (born November 21, 1945) is an American actress, producer, dancer, and singer.[1] She achieved stardom and acclaim for playing lighthearted comedic roles in film and television. In a career spanning six decades, she has received several awards, including anAcademy Award and aGolden Globe Award as well as nominations for aBAFTA Award and twoPrimetime Emmy Awards.
Hawn is the mother of actorsOliver Hudson,Kate Hudson, andWyatt Russell. She has been in a relationship withKurt Russell since 1983. In 2003, she founded the Hawn Foundation, which educates underprivileged children.
Hawn was born inWashington, D.C.[1] to Laura (née Steinhoff), a jewelry shop/dance school owner, and Edward Rutledge Hawn, a musician and conductor who was a descendant ofEdward Rutledge, the youngest signatory of theDeclaration of Independence.[2] She was named after her mother's aunt.[3] She has one sister, entertainment publicist Patti Hawn; their brother, Edward Jr., died in infancy before Patti was conceived. Growing up, the girls were unaware of their deceased brother.[4]
In 1964, Hawn ran and taught in a ballet school, having dropped out ofAmerican University where she was majoring in drama. She made her professional dancing debut in a production ofCan-Can at the Texas Pavilion of theNew York World's Fair. She began working as a professional dancer a year later and appeared as ago-go dancer in New York City[3] and at the Peppermint Box inNew Jersey.[13]
Her next role, which brought her to international attention, was also as a dumb blonde, as one of the regular cast members on the 1968–1973sketch comedy showRowan & Martin's Laugh-In. Hawn often broke out into high-pitched giggles in the middle of a joke, then delivered a polished performance a moment later. Noted as much for her chipper attitude as for her bikini-attired and painted body, Hawn was seen as a 1960s"It" girl.[21]
After Hawn's Academy Award win, her film career took off. She starred in a string of successful comedies starting withThere's a Girl in My Soup (1970),$ (1971), andButterflies Are Free (1972). She continued to prove herself in the dramatic league in 1974 with the satirical dramasThe Girl from Petrovka andSteven Spielberg's theatrical debutThe Sugarland Express, and then co-starred inHal Ashby's satireShampoo (1975). She also hosted two television specials:Pure Goldie in 1971 andThe Goldie Hawn Special in 1978. The latter was a sort of comeback for Hawn, who had been out of the spotlight for two years since the 1976 release of the romantic comedy westernThe Duchess and the Dirtwater Fox, while she was focusing on her marriage and the birth of her son.
On the special she performed show tunes and comedy bits alongside comic legendGeorge Burns, teen matinee idolShaun Cassidy, television starJohn Ritter (during his days onThree's Company), and even theHarlem Globetrotters joined her for a montage. The special later went on to be nominated for a primetime Emmy. Four months later the filmFoul Play (withChevy Chase), was released and became a box office smash, reviving Hawn's film career. The plot centered on an innocent woman in San Francisco who becomes mixed up in an assassination plot. Hawn's next film,Mario Monicelli'sLovers and Liars (1979), was abox office bomb.
In 1972, Hawn recorded and released a solo country LP forWarner Brothers, titledGoldie. It was recorded with the help ofDolly Parton andBuck Owens.AllMusic gives the album a favorable review, calling it a "sweetly endearing country-tinged middle of the road pop record".[23]
Hawn's popularity continued into the 1980s, starting with another primetime variety special alongside actress and singerLiza Minnelli,Goldie and Liza Together (1980), which was nominated for fourEmmy Awards. In the same year, Hawn took the lead role inPrivate Benjamin, a comedy she co-produced with her friendNancy Meyers, who co-wrote the script. Meyers recalls Hawn's reaction when she first described the idea for the story with Hawn as its lead:
It was like watching the greatest audience I've ever seen. She laughed and then she got real emotional and her eyes would fill up with tears. She loved the image of herself in an Army uniform and she loved what the movie had to say.[24]
At the age of thirty-nine, Hawn posed for the cover ofPlayboy's January 1985 issue and was the subject of thePlayboy Interview.[26] Her last film of the 1980s was opposite partnerKurt Russell, for the third time, in the comedyOverboard (1987).
In 1990, she starred in the action comedyBird on a Wire, a critically panned but commercially successful film that paired Hawn withMel Gibson. Hawn had mixed success in the early 1990s, with the thrillerDeceived (1991), the dramaCrissCross, and oppositeBruce Willis andMeryl Streep inDeath Becomes Her (both 1992). Earlier that year, she starred inHousesitter, a screwball comedy withSteve Martin, which was a commercial success.
Hawn's pre-fame boyfriends included actorMark Goddard and singer Spiro Venduras.[42] Her first husband was dancer (later director)Gus Trikonis, who appeared as a Shark gang member inWest Side Story. They married on May 16, 1969, and separated on April 9, 1973.[43][44] Hawn then dated stuntman Ted Grossman,[45] Swedish actor Bruno Wintzell[45] and Italian actorFranco Nero,[46] but did not file for divorce from Trikonis until New Year's Eve 1975, after becoming engaged to musicianBill Hudson ofthe Hudson Brothers, whom she'd met the previous summer on a first-class flight from New York to Los Angeles.[47]
Hawn was granted a divorce in June 1976 and married Hudson on July 3 in Takoma Park, Maryland, where she grew up.[48] They had two children, sonOliver (born September 7, 1976) and daughterKate (born April 19, 1979). Hudson filed for divorce on August 15, 1980.[49] Hawn subsequently had romances with French actorYves Rénier[50] and Moroccan businessmanVictor Drai.[51] The divorce from Hudson was finalized in March 1982.[52]
In 2003, Hawn founded the Hawn Foundation, a non-profit organization which provides youth education programs intended to improve academic performance through "life-enhancing strategies for well-being".[68][69] The Hawn Foundation has supported research studies conducted by external researchers to evaluate the effectiveness of its educational program for children, called MindUP.[70]
^abHawn, Goldie (March 6, 2012).Woman's Hour.BBC Radio. Event occurs at 10:17. RetrievedMarch 6, 2012.I'm Jewish....I've studied Buddhism. I've studied Christian faith. I've studied Sufi. I am a great believer in looking at all religions, comparative religions...I am not a JewBu. I am actually born to Jewish mother and I was raised Jewish but my father was Presbyterian so I also went to Presbyterian church.
^E. Lesly Martin, ed. (Spring 2011)."Outreach"(PDF).Emergence.1 (1). Claire Trevor School of the Arts, University of California, Irvine: 6. RetrievedJune 13, 2020.Leo Freedman was born in London and raised in Canada, but his love affair with Southern California led him to invest his time and attention to the Arts scene in Orange County. Freedman, the youngest of 13, lived in Los Angeles but made his career in Orange County as a land developer and real estate investor. In his lifetime, Freedman built two Anaheim hotels and the Melodyland Theatre, where stars such as Goldie Hawn got their start.
^O'Malley, Katie (September 29, 2016)."Goldie Hawn Gives The Perfect Explanation As To Why She Hasn't Married Kurt Russell".Elle. RetrievedDecember 16, 2020.I would have been long divorced if I'd been married ... Marriage is an interesting psychological thing. If you need to feel bound to someone, then it's important to be married ... 'For me, I chose to stay, Kurt chose to stay, and we like the choice,' the 70-year-old added ... The mother-of-three – who has been married twice before – also weighed in on the presumption that marriage cements a relationship: "What is marriage going to do? What does it promise you? Not every relationship works and that is the truth. I don't care if you're a movie star or a person on the street.
