Named after child actressShirley Temple, who was six years old at the time, Shirley MacLean Beaty was born on April 24, 1934, inRichmond, Virginia. Her father, Ira Owens Beaty,[3] was a professor of psychology, a public school administrator, and a real estate agent. Her Canadian mother, Kathlyn Corinne (née MacLean), was a drama teacher fromWolfville, Nova Scotia. MacLaine's younger brother is filmmakerWarren Beatty, who changed the spelling of his surname for his career.[4] Both were raised by their parents asBaptists.[5] Her mother's brother-in-law wasA. A. MacLeod, a member of theOntario provincial legislature for theCommunist Party in the 1940s.[6][7]
While MacLaine was still a child, Ira Beaty moved the family from Richmond toNorfolk, Virginia, and then toArlington, then toWaverly, and finally back to Arlington—where he worked at Thomas Jefferson Junior High School in Arlington—in 1945. MacLaine played baseball on a boys' team and held the record for the most home runs, earning her the nickname "Powerhouse." During the 1950s, the family resided in theDominion Hills section of Arlington.[8]
As a toddler, she had weak ankles and fell over with the slightest misstep, so her mother enrolled her in ballet class at the Washington School of Ballet at the age of three.[9] This was the beginning of her interest in performing. Strongly motivated by ballet, she never missed a class. In classical romantic pieces such asRomeo and Juliet andThe Sleeping Beauty, she always played the boys' roles because she was the tallest in the groups of girls. MacLaine eventually was cast in a substantial female role as the fairy godmother inCinderella and, while warming up backstage, broke her ankle. She tightened the ribbons on her toe shoes and completed the entire performance before calling for an ambulance. Ultimately, MacLaine decided against making a career of professional ballet because she had grown too tall and felt unable to perfect her technique. She explained that hers was unlike the ideal body type, lacking the requisite "beautifully constructed feet" of high arches, high insteps, and a flexible ankle.[10] She moved on to other forms of dancing as well as acting and musical theater.
MacLaine attendedWashington-Lee High School in Arlington, Virginia, where she was on the cheerleading squad and acted in school theatrical productions.
The summer before her senior year of high school in Arlington, Virginia, MacLaine went to New York City to try acting and had minor success in the chorus of a production ofOklahoma! that toured thesubway circuit.[11][12] After graduation, she returned and made her Broadway debut dancing in the ensemble of the Broadway production ofMe and Juliet (1953–1954).[13] Afterwards she became an understudy to actressCarol Haney inThe Pajama Game; in May 1954 Haney injured her ankle during a Wednesday matinee, and MacLaine performed in her place.[14] A few months later, with Haney still injured,Jerry Lewis saw a matinee and urged film producerHal B. Wallis to attend the evening performance with him, hoping to cast her inArtists and Models. Wallis signed her to work forParamount Pictures.[15]
MacLaine appeared with Frank Sinatra in 1960'sCan-Can, then made a cameo appearance in theRat Pack movieOcean's 11 (1960). MacLaine would become an honorary member of the Rat Pack.[16]
Jack Lemmon and MacLaine, in a still fromThe Apartment's final scene-“Shut up and deal!”
MacLaine starred inThe Children's Hour (1961), based on the play byLillian Hellman, and directed byWilliam Wyler. Reunited with Wilder and Lemmon forIrma la Douce (1963); she received her third nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress, in addition to winning her second Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Comedy or Musical.
In 1970, MacLaine published a memoir titledDon’t Fall off the Mountain, the first of her numerous books. She devoted some pages to a 1963 incident in which she had marched into the Los Angeles office ofThe Hollywood Reporter and punched columnistMike Connolly in the mouth.[18] She was angered by what he had said in his column about her ongoing contractual dispute with producerHal Wallis, who had introduced her to the movie industry in 1954 and whom she eventually sued successfully for violating the terms of their contract.[19] The incident with Connolly garnered a headline on the cover of theNew York Post on June 11, 1963.[20] The full story appeared on page 5 under the headline “Shirley Delivers A Punchy Line!” with a byline byBernard Lefkowitz.[20]
In the mid-1960s,Twentieth Century-Fox offered her a salary of $750,000 on a "pay or play" basis to appear in a movie adaptation of the musicalBloomer Girl, a fee equivalent to the paydays enjoyed by top box office stars of the time. However, the project was canceled, triggering a lawsuit.[21]
MacLaine next starred in seven roles as seven different women inVittorio DeSica's episodic filmWoman Times Seven (1967), a collection of seven stories of love and adultery set against a Paris backdrop. She followed that film with another comedy,The Bliss of Mrs. Blossom in 1968. Both films were box office flops.
In 1969, MacLaine starred in the film version of the musicalSweet Charity, directed byBob Fosse, and based on the script forFederico Fellini'sNights of Cabiria which was released a decade earlier.Gwen Verdon, who originated the role onstage, had hoped to play Charity in the film version; however, MacLaine won the role because her name was better known to audiences at the time. Verdon signed on as assistant to choreographer Bob Fosse, helping teach MacLaine dance moves and some of the more intricate routines.[22] MacLaine received a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Comedy or Musical nomination. The film was not a financial success.[citation needed]
MacLaine was top-billed inTwo Mules for Sister Sara (1970), in a role written for Elizabeth Taylor, who chose not to appear in the movie. TheWestern film was a hit, primarily due to her co-starClint Eastwood, one of the top box office stars in the world at that time. The film's director,Don Siegel, said of her: "It's hard to feel any great warmth to her. She's too unfeminine, and has too much balls. She's very, very hard."[23]
MacLaine started a career comeback with the dramaThe Turning Point (1977), portraying a retired ballerina. Her performance in the film received critical acclaim, earning her a fourth nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress.
She was awarded theWomen in FilmCrystal Award in 1978 for outstanding women who, through their endurance and the excellence of their work, have helped to expand the role of women within the entertainment industry.[29]
In 1979, she starred alongsidePeter Sellers inHal Ashby's satirical filmBeing There. The film received widespread acclaim withRoger Ebert writing that he admired the film "for having the guts to take this totally weird concept and push it to its ultimate comic conclusion". MacLaine received aBritish Academy Film Award, andGolden Globe Award nomination for her performance.
MacLaine and Hopkins did not get along onA Change of Seasons and the film was not a success; critics faulted the screenplay. MacLaine, however, did receive positive notices from critics.Vincent Canby wrote in hisThe New York Times review that the film "exhibits no sense of humor and no appreciation for the ridiculous ... the screenplay [is] often dreadful ... the only appealing performance is Miss MacLaine's, and she's too good to be true.A Change of Seasons does prove one thing, though. A farce about characters who've been freed of their conventional obligations quickly becomes aimless."[31]
MacLaine followed up her Oscar win with a role inCannonball Run II (1984). After a four-year hiatus from acting, she starred in the dramaMadame Sousatzka (1988), in the eponymous lead role as a Russian-American immigrant. She received positive reviews for her performance, earning her a second Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama. In 1989, she released her VHS,Shirley MacLaine's Inner Workout: A Program for Relaxation and Stress Reduction through Meditation, a companion to her 1989 book,Going Within: A Guide for Inner Transformation.
MacLaine continued to star in films, such as the family southern dramaSteel Magnolias (1989) directed byHerbert Ross. The film focuses on the bond that a group of women share in a small-town Southern community, and how they cope with the death of a loved one. The film was a box office success, earning $96.8 million off a budget of $15 million. MacLaine received aBritish Academy Film Award for her performance. She starred inMike Nichols' filmPostcards from the Edge (1990), withMeryl Streep, playing a fictionalized version ofDebbie Reynolds from a screenplay by Reynolds's daughter,Carrie Fisher. Fisher wrote the screenplay based on her book. MacLaine received anotherGolden Globe Award nomination for her performance.
MacLaine was married to businessman Steve Parker from 1954 until their divorce in 1982. Their daughter,Sachi Parker, was born in 1956. In April 2011, while promoting her new book,I'm Over All That, she revealed toOprah Winfrey that she had had an open relationship with her husband.[37] MacLaine also told Winfrey that she often fell for the leading men she worked with, the exceptions beingJack Lemmon (The Apartment,Irma la Douce) andJack Nicholson (Terms of Endearment).[38] MacLaine also had long-running affairs withLord Mountbatten, whom she met in the 1960s, and Australian politician and two-timeLiberal leaderAndrew Peacock.[39][40]
MacLaine claimed that in a previous life inAtlantis she was the brother of a 35,000-year-old spirit named Ramtha, channeled by mystic teacher and authorJ. Z. Knight.[45][46]
She has a strong interest in spirituality and metaphysics, which are the central themes of some of her best-selling books, includingOut on a Limb andDancing in the Light. Her spiritual explorations include walking theWay of St. James, working with Chris Griscom,[47] and practicingTranscendental Meditation.[48]
The topic ofNew Age spirituality has also found its way into several of her films. InAlbert Brooks's romantic comedyDefending Your Life (1991), the recently deceased lead characters, played by Brooks andMeryl Streep, are astonished to find MacLaine introducing their past lives in the "Past Lives Pavilion"; inPostcards from the Edge (1990), MacLaine sings a version of "I'm Still Here", with lyrics customized for her by composerStephen Sondheim (for example, one line in the lyrics was changed to "I'm feeling transcendental – am I here?"); and in the 2001 television movieThese Old Broads, MacLaine's character is a devotee of New Age spirituality.
She has an interest inUFOs, and gave numerous interviews onCNN,NBC andFox news channels on the subject during 2007–08. In her bookSage-ing While Age-ing (2007), she described having alien encounters and witnessing the1952 Washington, D.C. UFO incident.[49] On an episode ofThe Oprah Winfrey Show in April 2011, MacLaine stated that she and her neighbor had observed numerous UFOs at her New Mexico ranch for extended periods of time.[50]
On February 7, 2013,Penguin Group USA published Sachi Parker's autobiographyLucky Me: My Life With – and Without – My Mom, Shirley MacLaine.[57] One of its claims was that, when Sachi was in her 20s, her mother told her she believed that Steve Parker was a clone of her real father, an astronaut named Paul then traveling in thePleiades.[58][59] MacLaine denied this and called the book "virtually all fiction".[59]In her 2024 book,The Wall of Life, MacLaine states that she and her daughter "have never been closer."[60]
In 1959, MacLaine sued Hal Wallis over a contractual dispute. The lawsuit has been credited with ending the old-style studiostar system of actor management.[19] In 1966, MacLaine suedTwentieth Century-Fox for breach of contract when the studio reneged on its agreement to star MacLaine in a film version of the Broadway musicalBloomer Girl based on the life ofAmelia Bloomer, a mid-nineteenth century feminist, suffragist, and abolitionist, that was to be filmed in Hollywood. Instead, Fox gave MacLaine one week to accept their offer of the female dramatic lead in theWesternBig Country, Big Man to be filmed in Australia. The case was decided in MacLaine's favor, and affirmed on appeal by theCalifornia Supreme Court in 1970. The case is discussed in many law-school textbooks as an example of employment-contract law.[61][62][63]
MacLaine, Shirley (2000).The Camino: A Journey of the Spirit. New York: Simon & Schuster Adult Publishing Group.ISBN978-0-7434-0072-5. (Published in Europe as:MacLaine, Shirley (2001).The Camino: A Pilgrimage of Courage. London: Pocket Books.ISBN0-7434-0921-3.)
MacLaine, Shirley (2013).What If...: A lifetime of questions, speculations, reasonable guesses, and a few things I know for sure. New York: Simon & Schuster.ISBN978-1-47113-139-4.
MacLaine, Shirley (2016).Above the Line: My 'Wild Oats' Adventure. Simon & Schuster.ISBN978-1501136412.
MacLaine, Shirley (2024).The Wall of Life: Pictures and Stories from This Marvelous Lifetime. Crown.ISBN978-0593735312.
^Finstad, Suzanne,Warren Beatty: A Private Man (2005, NY, Random House) page 106. The exact nature of Haney's injury - a sprain, a torn ligament, a break, a fracture - varies from source to source.
^MacLaine, Shirley (2024).The Wall of Life: Pictures and Stories from This Marvelous Lifetime (1st ed.). New York: The Crown Publishing Group.ISBN978-0593735312.
.jpg)
.jpg)
