Dina Merrill
Publicity photo of Merrill in 1968 by John Engstead
Born	Nedenia Marjorie Hutton (1923-12-29)December 29, 1923 New York City, U.S.
Died	May 22, 2017(2017-05-22) (aged 93) East Hampton, New York, U.S.
Education	George Washington University American Academy of Dramatic Arts HB Studio
Occupation(s)	Actress, businesswoman, socialite
Years active	1945–2009
Spouses	Stanley M. Rumbough Jr. ​ ​ (m. 1946; div. 1966)​ Cliff Robertson ​ ​ (m. 1966; div. 1986)​ Ted Hartley ​ ​ (m. 1989)​
Children	4
Parents	Edward Francis Hutton (father) Marjorie Merriweather Post (mother)
Relatives	Eleanor Post Close (half-sister) C. W. Post (grandfather) Barbara Hutton (first cousin) Lance Reventlow (first cousin once removed)

Dina Merrill (bornNedenia Marjorie Hutton; December 29, 1923 – May 22, 2017) was an American actress.^[1][2] She had more than a hundred film and television credits from the late 1950s until 2000s. She married three times.

Merrill was born in New York City on December 29, 1923, but for many years, her date of birth was given as December 9, 1925.^[3][4] She was the only child ofPost Cereals heiressMarjorie Merriweather Post and her second husband,Wall Street stockbrokerEdward Francis Hutton, founder ofE. F. Hutton & Co.^[5] Merrill had two older half-sisters, Adelaide Brevoort Close (July 26, 1908 – December 31, 1998) andEleanor Post Hutton (December 3, 1909 – November 27, 2006), by her mother's first marriage to Edward Bennett Close, grandfather of actressGlenn Close. Merrill was also first cousin—and first cousin once removed, respectively—to heiressBarbara Hutton and her sonLance Reventlow.^[6][7]

Merrill graduated fromMiss Porter's School, then attended George Washington University in Washington, DC for one term, but then enrolled at theAmerican Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City. She studied acting atHB Studio^[8] underUta Hagen.^[9]

On advice from her half-sister's (then) husband, she adopted the stage name Dina Merrill, borrowing fromCharles E. Merrill, a famous stockbroker like her father.^[10] Merrill made her debut on the stage in the playThe Mermaid Singing in 1945.^[11]

During the late 1950s and 1960s, Merrill was believed to have been marketed as a replacement forGrace Kelly,^[2] and in 1959, she was proclaimed "Hollywood's new Grace Kelly".^[12]

Merrill's film credits includedDesk Set (1957),A Nice Little Bank That Should Be Robbed (1958),Don't Give Up the Ship (1959),Operation Petticoat (1959, withCary Grant, who had been married to her cousin,Woolworth heiressBarbara Hutton),The Sundowners (1960),Butterfield 8 (1960),The Young Savages (1961),The Courtship of Eddie's Father (1963),I'll Take Sweden (1965),The Greatest (1977),A Wedding (1978),Just Tell Me What You Want (1980),Anna to the Infinite Power (1983),Twisted (1986),Caddyshack II (1988),Fear (1990),True Colors (1991),The Player (1992),Suture (1993), andShade (2003). She also appeared in made-for-TV movies, such asSeven in Darkness (1969),The Lonely Profession (1969),Family Flight (1972), andThe Tenth Month (1979).

Merrill appeared in numerous television series in the 1960s, such as playing the villain Calamity Jan in two 1968 episodes ofBatman with then-husbandCliff Robertson. She also made guest appearances on twoBonanza episodes as Susannah Clauson,The Alfred Hitchcock Hour episode "Bonfire" (1962),The Investigators,The Bold Ones,Wagon Train (1964),Mission: Impossible,The Love Boat;Quincy, M.E.;Murder, She Wrote;Roseanne, andThe Nanny, as Maxwell Sheffield's disapproving and distant British mother. In 1971, Merrill appeared as Laura Duff inThe Men from Shiloh (rebranded name for the TV WesternThe Virginian) in the episode titled "The Angus Killer".

Her stage credits include the 1983 Broadway revival of theRodgers and Hart musicalOn Your Toes, starring Russian prima ballerinaNatalia Makarova. In 1991, she appeared in the rotating cast of the off-Broadway staged reading ofWit & Wisdom.^[13]

In 1991, Merrill and her third husband Ted Hartley merged their company Pavilion Communications with RKO to formRKO Pictures, which owns the intellectual property of the RKO Radio Pictures movie studio.

In the 1960s and 1970s, Merrill was a recurring guest on several network television game and panel shows, includingMatch Game,To Tell the Truth,What's My Line, andHollywood Squares.

Merrill was a presidential appointee to the board of trustees of theJohn F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, a trustee of theEugene O'Neill Theater Center, and a vice president of the New York City Mission Society. In 1980, Merrill joined the board of directors of her father's E. F. Hutton & Co., continuing on the board and the compensation committee ofLehman Brothers when it acquired Hutton, for over 18 years.^[10][14]

Merrill was married three times. In 1946, she wedStanley M. Rumbough Jr., an heir to theColgate-Palmolive toothpaste fortune and entrepreneur.^[15] They had three children, Nedenia Colgate Rumbough; David Post Rumbough; and Stanley Rumbough III,^[15] before divorcing in 1966.^[16] Later that year, she wed actorCliff Robertson, with whom she had a daughter, Heather Robertson.^[11] The couple divorced in 1986.^[16]

In 1989, she married producerTed Hartley, and they remained married until her death.^[15]

On May 22, 2017, Merrill died at her home in East Hampton, New York at age 93. She had been suffering fromLewy Body Dementia.^[15]

Two of Merrill's four children predeceased her.^[17][18] David died in a boating accident a few weeks before his 24th birthday, and Heather died from ovarian cancer at the age of 38.^{[citation needed]}

Merrill received the Women's International Center (WIC) Living Legacy Award, in 1994,^[19] and a lifetime achievement award from theAmerican Academy of Dramatic Arts in April 2005.^[20]

Wikimedia Commons has media related toDina Merrill.

• Dina Merrill atIMDb
• In Step with: Dina Merrill^{[permanent dead link‍]}, news.google.com; accessed 2014-07-09.

• 1923 births
• 2017 deaths
• 20th-century American actresses
• 21st-century American actresses
• Actresses from New York City
• American billionaires
• American Academy of Dramatic Arts alumni
• American film actresses
• American musical theatre actresses
• American stage actresses
• American television actresses
• Philanthropists from New York (state)
• American socialites
• American debutantes
• California Republicans
• Deaths from dementia in New York (state)
• Deaths from Lewy body dementia
• Florida Republicans
• George Washington University alumni
• Hutton family
• Miss Porter's School alumni
• New York (state) Republicans
• People from Palm Beach, Florida

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