Karen Blanche Black (néeZiegler; July 1, 1939 – August 8, 2013) was an American actress, screenwriter, singer, and songwriter. She rose to prominence for her work in studio and independent films in the 1970s, frequently portraying eccentric and offbeat characters, and established herself as a figure ofNew Hollywood. Her career spanned 50 years and includes nearly 200 credits in both independent and mainstream films. Black received numerous accolades throughout her career, including twoGolden Globe Awards, as well as anAcademy Award nomination forBest Supporting Actress.
A native of suburban Chicago, Black studied theater atNorthwestern University before dropping out and relocating to New York City. She performed on Broadway in 1965 before making her major film debut inFrancis Ford Coppola'sYou're a Big Boy Now (1966). Black relocated to California and was cast as anLSD-tripping prostitute inDennis Hopper's road filmEasy Rider (1969). That led to a co-starring role in the dramaFive Easy Pieces (1970), in which she played a hopeless waitress, for which she was nominated for an Academy Award and won a Golden Globe forBest Supporting Actress. Black made her first major commercial picture with the disaster filmAirport 1975 (1974), and her subsequent appearance as Myrtle Wilson inThe Great Gatsby (1974) won her a second Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress.
Black played a glamorous country singer inRobert Altman's ensemble musical dramaNashville (1975), also writing and performing two songs for the soundtrack, for which she received a nomination for aGrammy Award. Her portrayal of an aspiring actress inJohn Schlesinger's dramaThe Day of the Locust (also 1975) earned her a third Golden Globe nomination, this time forBest Actress. Black subsequently took on four roles inDan Curtis' anthology horror filmTrilogy of Terror (1975), followed by Curtis' supernatural horror feature,Burnt Offerings (1976). The same year, she played a kidnapping accomplice inAlfred Hitchcock's final film,Family Plot.
In 1982, Black played a transsexual in the Robert Altman-directed Broadway debut ofCome Back to the 5 & Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean, a role she reprised in Altman's subsequentfilm adaptation. She next starred in the comedyCan She Bake a Cherry Pie? (1983), followed byTobe Hooper's remake ofInvaders from Mars (1986). For much of the 1990s and 2000s, Black starred in a variety ofarthouse, independent, and horror films, as well as writing her own screenplays. She had a leading role as a villainous mother inRob Zombie'sHouse of 1000 Corpses (2003), which cemented her status as acult horror icon. Black continued to star in low-profile films throughout the early 2010s, as well as working as a playwright before her death fromampullary cancer in 2013.
Early life
Black with sister Gail Brown
Black was born Karen Blanche Ziegler on July 1, 1939, inPark Ridge, Illinois,[5] the third child of Elsie Mary (née Reif), a writer of several prize-winning children's novels, and Norman Arthur Ziegler, an engineer and businessman.[5][6][7] Her paternal grandfather was Arthur Charles Ziegler, a classical musician and first violinist for theChicago Symphony Orchestra.[8] She had a brother and a sister,Gail Brown. Black was of German, Czech, and Norwegian descent.[9][10] The Zieglers came to the United States fromNeukirch,Württemberg, Germany.
Black and her siblings were raised at 224 N. Greenwood Ave. in Park Ridge, and often spent time on her uncle's farm nearGreen Bay, Wisconsin.[11] As a young teenager, she aspired to have a career as a stage actress, seeking outsummer stock theater job opportunities.[5] "From the age of 13 I'd rush out during vacations to find work in summer stock," Black recalled. "I started by cleaning toilets and by the time I was 16 I was a prop-girl and in the chorus line singing, and at 17 I got my first real acting, paid job."[5]
I would say that the college training was very lousy, and I don't think that people learn by being invalidated... Acting teachers, not all of them but many, seem to think that beating up their students and invalidating them will make them better, which I think is completely wrong. And at that age, you don't realize that this sick person is really projecting all their neurosis onto you, you think that you're the one who's damaged... Alvina Krause would not validate and would not allow. I think she had favorites, and you could never figure out why you weren't a favorite, and it never made any sense. The thing you have to remember is that if a person is making you feel bad about yourself, that person is going to be in his or her own world. They are lost in their own universe.[14]
Career
1960–1970: Stage and film beginnings
Posing by a mirror, circa 1966
In 1960, Black moved to New York City to pursue an acting career, residing in acold water flat in Manhattan.[5] She took odd jobs working as a secretary, a front desk person at a hotel, and at an insurance office, and lived on "thirty dollars a week."[15] Black initially began performing with the Rockefeller Players, a theater troupe inWestwood, New Jersey.[16] She briefly joined at theActors Studio, but left shortly after enrolling, later commenting: "How can a man who isn't an actor teach you how to act?"[5]
Black made her screen debut with a minor role in the independent filmThe Prime Time (1960), which she would later deem "the worst film ever made."[5] Disillusioned by this foray into film, Black returned to work in theater.[5] She worked as anunderstudy in theBroadway production ofTake Her, She's Mine in December 1961 under directorGeorge Abbott.[17] She made her formal Broadway debut in 1965'sThe Playroom,[17] which received favorable reviews and for which she was nominated for aNew York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best Actress.[18]
Black's first major commercial film[21] was the disaster featureAirport 1975 (1974), in which she played Nancy Pryor, a stewardess forced to fly a plane after a midair collision.[13] She subsequently portrayed an unfaithful wife, Myrtle Wilson, in the 1974 version ofThe Great Gatsby, a performance that earned her a secondGolden Globe Award in the same category. In 1975, she played multiple roles inDan Curtis' televised anthology filmTrilogy of Terror: The segments, all written byRichard Matheson, were named after the women involved in the plot — a plain college professor seemingly seduced by a handsome cad of a student ("Julie"), a pair of sisters who squabble over their father's inheritance ("Millicent and Therese"), and the unknowing purchaser of a cursedZuni fetish that comes to life and pursues her relentlessly ("Amelia").[28][29]
Black received her third Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress for her role as an aspiring starlet in 1930s Hollywood inJohn Schlesinger's tragic dramaThe Day of the Locust (1975). Though the film earned her critical notice, Black recalled the production being profoundly troubled and possibly hindering her career:
That was not a fun experience, making that film. It was just horrible. I wish quite heartily I'd never made it, because I'd have had a much longer career in Hollywood... It was a very troubled production, and I became the scapegoat that everyone blamed. People kept getting sick, getting fired, and it was just a horror, an absolute horror. Seven months. There were all these rumors that people made up…and I wound up being the center of it. Poor[William] Atherton walked off and didn't do the final scene, because he couldn't take it anymore.[14]
The same year, she starred as a glamorous country singer inRobert Altman's ensemble filmNashville.[27] In addition to acting in the film, Black also wrote and performed two songs for the soundtrack, which was nominated for aGrammy Award forBest Score Soundtrack.[23]
In 1976, Black appeared as afemme fatale jewel thiefAlfred Hitchcock's final film,Family Plot.[27] The film received mixed reviews, thoughRoger Ebert commented that Black "does a good job in a role that doesn't give her much to do."[30] She also reunited with directorDan Curtis to star oppositeOliver Reed andBette Davis in the supernatural horror filmBurnt Offerings, playing the wife of a family living in a haunted house.[31] Released in the fall of 1976,Burnt Offerings was deemed inThe New York Times as an "outstanding terror movie" with "solid actors."[32] Additionally, she had a lead role in the independent crime comedyCrime and Passion (1976), co-starring withOmar Sharif.[27] Due to scheduling conflicts withFamily Plot, Black turned downValerie Perrine's role inW.C. Fields and Me (1976).[33]
In September 1976, Black traveled to Toronto to be a guest star on the variety programThe Bobby Vinton Show, which aired across the United States and Canada. Black sang "Lonely Now", and joined Bobby in a medley of country oldies. She played a dual role in the 1977 made-for-television thriller,The Strange Possession of Mrs. Oliver, followed by a minor role inCapricorn One (1978) oppositeElliott Gould.[27] In 1979, Black appeared in the erotic dramaIn Praise of Older Women, which she regretted because she thought its title aged her.[34]
1980–1985: Career comedown
With husband Stephen Eckelberry during their courtship
In 1982, Black starred oppositeCher andSandy Dennis[23] in a Robert Altman-directed Broadway production ofCome Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean.[17] She subsequently co-starred with Cher and Dennis in Altman'sfilm adaptation, also released in 1982.[23] In both renditions, she portrayed the role of Joanne, atrans woman in a small Texas town.[23] Black spent months preparing for the role, and "did research into pretty depressing statistics about people who've become transsexuals and how they still don't feel complete. I had to become a man, and I am not a man... And that transition was so painful to me, to become a man, that I could use the pain of my actual transition for Joanne."[37] While the Broadway production garnered Black some unfavorable reviews,[38] Gary Arnold ofThe Washington Post praised Black's performance in the film, writing that "watching her in the movie, you can understand that what she's doing as Joanna[sic] might depend on the intimacy of the camera to be both witty and credible."[38]
Black next starred in theHenry Jaglom-directed comedyCan She Bake a Cherry Pie? (1983) playing a divorcee who becomes involved with a bachelor,[39] followed by a lead in the teen-themedblack comedyBad Manners (1984).[40] She also appeared in television during this period, with a guest-starring role as Sheila Sheinfeld onE/R between 1984 and 1985. She starred in several feature films in 1985, including the Italian exploitation horror filmCut and Run, directed byRuggero Deodato;[41] the Canadian supernatural horror filmThe Blue Man;[42] and the action filmSavage Dawn, co-starring withLance Henriksen as a kidnappee.[43]
In 1996, Black appeared as a paranoid mother in small-town Nebraska inChildren of the Corn IV: The Gathering, oppositeNaomi Watts.[51] She had supporting roles in a number of other independent films that year, including as a public defender inUlli Lommel's dramaEvery Minute is Goodbye,[52] and the exploitation comedyDinosaur Valley Girls.[53] The following year, she co-starred withTilda Swinton as Lady Byron in the feminist science fiction featureConceiving Ada (1997), about a contemporary scientist who uses software to make contact with the Victorian pioneer of computer programmingAda Lovelace, daughter of the poetLord Byron.[54] She also had supporting roles in the independent dramaMen, and as a singer in rural Missouri inGeorge Hickenlooper'sDogtown.[55]
She continued to star in independent films in 1998, including thecamp comedyI Woke Up Early the Day I Died,[56] the dramaCharades, as well as the short filmWaiting for Dr. MacGuffin.[57] In 2000, Black began filmingRob Zombie's directorial debutHouse of 1000 Corpses, in which she portrayedMother Firefly, the matron of a family of psychotic murderers. Upon its release in 2003, the film received largely unfavorable reviews,[58] though it helped cement Black's status as acult icon in the horror genre.[59]
2003–2013: Establishment as cult figure; playwriting and later works
With daughter Celine Eckelberry in the late 2000s
As her later career progressed, Black gained a cult following, as alluded to byFamily Guy television anchorTom Tucker in his remark, "Karen Black: what an obscure reference." in the episodeDeath Is a Bitch (season 2, episode 6). She co-starred withNatasha Lyonne inAmerica Brown (2004), which won the Golden Zenith Award for Best Picture at theMontreal World Film Festival. In 2005, Black received the Best Actress Award at the Fantasporto International Film Festival inPorto, Portugal, for her work in the critically acclaimedSteve Balderson filmFirecracker (2005), in which she played two roles, Sandra and Eleanor. She and actorJohn Hurt were also presented with Career Achievement Awards.
Black launched a career as a playwright in May 2007 with the opening ofMissouri Waltz at the Blank Theater in Los Angeles; Black starred in the play as well. She also performed live narrations ofGuy Maddin's experimental filmBrand Upon the Brain! in 2007, touring the show around the United States.[60]
Theexperimental hip-hop groupDeath Grips released a video onYouTube called "Bottomless Pit" in October 2015. The video shows footage of Black reciting lines from a film script written by the group's drummer/co-producerZach Hill. The footage was shot in early 2013.[64]
Image and acting style
"I remember a friend of mine who said once, when you're raised in a congested space, you can get kind of intellectual. A little paper-loving, a little essayist. That's not very good for actors. Actors don't think. Thinking isn't good for acting; it's not what you do at all."
Due to her work in various independent and mainstream films in the 1970s, Black is considered by film historians as a prominent figure ofNew Hollywood,[65][66] and was described in 2004 by Howard Feinstein in theLGBT magazineThe Advocate as "Hollywood's off-center icon."[67] She was prolific throughout her career, sometimes appearing in as many as seven films a year,[60] and favored working in independent films: "That's my world—independent features," she stated in 2007. "That's how I started. That's what I like. It's playful and comfortable and not stressful, and it's an individual's way of creating. You're not in the studio system imitating other people and yourself. I'm having a good life."[60]
Black in 2010
In her later life, Black spoke unfavorably of the formalstudy of acting, and commented that she found her training both in the university (underAlvina Krause) and at theActors Studio unhelpful and oppressive.[5][14] Also a writer, Black likened her acting process to that of writing screenplays or other literature: "Everything that occurs in this zone is imagination-based. In that sense you mock up a life, and then you become the effect of what you've mocked up, so it'scause and effect. So the more you can mock it up so that it seems real to you, the more you can react to the effect. That's what acting is, and that's what writing involves for me, too. That's the simplicity of it. It sounds simple, because it is."[14] Black considered herself acharacter actress.[68]
Throughout her career, Black was noted for her distinctive eyes, which gave her a slightly "cross-eyed" appearance,[69] although she stated in a 1982 interview that she had not been clinically diagnosed as such.[70] One reviewer once described her as a "lopsided caricature of a pretty face."[5] For much of her career, Black wastypecast as an unglamorous or lowly woman of limited intelligence.[5] Beginning in the 1990s, Black began garnering a cult following for her appearances in horror films, though she clarified in 2008 that she had acted only in "about 14" out of her wide-ranging filmography.[11] "When I didTrilogy of Terror, with that [demon] doll, I filled the role very well," she recalled. "It was very real to people, and they just fell in love with it. And that got to be incredibly popular. With my last name being Black ... so it got to be kind of an unconscious thing, [my association with horror movies]. But I'm not interested in blood."[11]
Beliefs
In 1964, Black became aScientologist,[71] and practiced it for the remainder of her life.[72][73] She was a vocal proponent ofgay rights, commenting in 2007: "I'm for gay rights. Who you are is very sacred, and should be honored—no matter what gender you were born. You shouldn't feel like you have to dodge some sort of conformity."[60] Black also advocatedanimal rights and was critical of thefur industry, once posing in a Halloween-themed anti-fur advertisement forPeople for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA).[74]
Personal life
Black was married four times and called off two engagements. Three of her marriages ended in divorce, while the fourth lasted nearly 30 years and ended only at death.
She claimed that she became pregnant the first time she had sex, with her boyfriend Charles Black.[75] He was 18; she was 15.[75] They were driven to Alabama where they could marry with parental consent, then moved toMuncie, Indiana, where Charles attended college.[76] Black had amiscarriage, to her relief, but when she returned home, her father barred her from returning, so she drove back to Muncie.[76] The marriage was short-lived, although she retained Charles' surname, under which she would come to be credited throughout her career.[77]
While a student at Northwestern University, Black began dating classmate Robert Benedetti.[13][78] She got pregnant again and gave birth to a daughter on March 4, 1959.[79] She did not tell her parents about the pregnancy, and put her daughter up foradoption at birth;[76] she reconnected with her in 2012.[80][81]
With Skip Burton, 1973
Boyfriends during the 1960s included writerHenry Jaglom and actorsPeter Kastner andPaul Sorvino.[73][82] From 1971 to 1972, Black was engaged to music manager Peter Rachtman.[82] Rachtman's daughterKaryn would remain a lifelong friend, delivering a eulogy at Black's memorial service.[83]
On April 17, 1973, Black married actor Robert "Skip" Burton.[71] They appeared together in the first segment ofTrilogy of Terror (1975), but had separated by the time it premiered.[65][84]
In January 1975, Black met screenwriterL. M. Kit Carson in Beverly Hills during an interview forOui magazine.[85] They married on July 4 of that year when she was pregnant with their sonHunter.[65] Black and Carson separated in 1980 and divorced in 1983.[65][84] In 1989, when Hunter was 13, he decided to live with his father and stepmother in Dallas; he did not see Black for a decade.[73][86]
In 1981, Black announced her engagement toMichael Raeburn, who wrote the screenplay for her low-budget star vehicleKilling Heat.[87] The two did not marry. Black's next significant relationship was withPaul Williams, who directed her in 1982'sMiss Right.[70][88]
With Stephen Eckelberry, circa 2005
In August 1983, Black met her fourth husband, film editor Stephen Eckelberry, at a Scientology retreat inClearwater, Florida.[73] The couple married on September 27, 1987, and adopted a daughter, who acted with her parents in the filmMovies Money Murder.[89][90] Black and Eckelberry remained married until her death in 2013.
In November 2010, Black was diagnosed withampullary cancer. She had a portion of herpancreas removed and underwent two further operations.[51] She was invited to attend the premiere of the salvaged feature filmDark Blood, in which she had played a small part in the original early 1990s shoot. Black was unable to attend the event, held in the Netherlands in September 2012, due to her illness.[65]
On August 8, 2013, Black died atWest Hills Hospital in Los Angeles,[13] from the ampullary cancer, aged 74.[93] Black's funeral was held on August 19 inOceanside, California, followed by a Hollywood memorial on September 17.[83][94]
ActressJuliette Lewis paid tribute, saying "Karen Black was my mentor and a second mother to me. She inspired everyone she came in contact with."[95] Peter Fonda, her co-star inEasy Rider, commented upon her death: "[Karen] managed to play kooky, she managed to play sexy, she managed to play crazed. She managed to play all the different ways of human nature."[23] Black is interred at Eternal Hills Memorial Park in Oceanside.[96]
^The timeline is hazy as Black neglected to acknowledge this marriage in press interviews. She is pictured as a high school sophomore in the 1955 yearbooks of two different institutions, Maine East High School in Park Ridge, Illinois, and Jefferson High School in Lafayette, Indiana. In the Main East yearbook she is listed as Karen Ziegler,[1] while in the Jefferson yearbook she is listed as K. Black,[2] indicating the marriage occurred sometime during the 1954-1955 school year, during which she transferred schools. Multiple sources relay that Black married at age 15, but do not provide an exact date.[3][4]
References
^ab1955 Lens. Maine Township High School. Park Ridge - Des Plaines Illinois. p.93.
^ab1955 Nautilus. Jefferson High School. Lafayette, Indiana. p.151.
^Sedam, Lauren (August 9, 2013)."Former Jeff student, 'Five Easy Pieces' actress Karen Black dies at 74".Journal & Courier. Archived fromthe original on August 10, 2013.Obituaries that appeared in major publications on Friday painted a different picture of her past, deleting any reference to high school years or attendance at Purdue. Instead, the Associated Press reported that 'at age 15, she enrolled in Northwestern University to study drama.' It was almost as if her time in Lafayette was erased from her memory, Lux said.Alt URL
Klossner, Michael (2006).Prehistoric Humans in Film and Television: 581 Dramas, Comedies and Documentaries, 1905-2004. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland.ISBN978-0-786-42215-9.
