Kim Hunter

Kim Hunter
Arthur P. Jacobs

Stars

Kim Hunter
Film: West side of the 1600 block of Vine Street
Kim Hunter
TV: West side of the 1700 block of Vine Street
Actress
Born Janet Cole on Nov. 12, 1922 in Detroit, Mich.
Died Sept. 11, 2002 of heart attack in Greenwich Village, NY

The versatile stage and film actress Kim Hunter won an Academy Award for best supporting actress as Stella Kowalski, Blanche Dubois' long-suffering sister in "A Streetcar Named Desire."

Hunter created the stage role of Stella in Tennessee Williams' towering Broadway play and later rode the character to fame in Elia Kazan's Oscar-nominated film, each time playing opposite an electrifying young actor named Marlon Brando, whose shouted mating call "Stella!" has become an enduring part of cinematic history.

"I had read 'A Streetcar Named Desire' before I read for the part of Stella," Hunter would recall in a 1999 interview. "I knew it was a good play, but I don't think I knew how special it was, what a milestone it would be. I don't think my mind worked that way."

Hunter originated her role on Broadway along with Brando, who played Stanley Kowalski, and Karl Malden, who played Mitch. Jessica Tandy played the tragic Blanche DuBois in the stage version, but the film role went to Vivien Leigh, who had appeared in the play in London. Leigh, Malden and Hunter won Oscars for their roles, but Brando was passed over for Humphrey Bogart in "The African Queen."

Hunter's Oscar, however, did not translate into roles of equal stature. Her subsequent films included "Deadline U.S.A.," "Anything Can Happen," "Storm Center," "The Young Stranger," "Bermuda Affair" and "Money, Women and Guns."

In addition to "Streetcar," Hunter expressed fondness for two other film roles: the 1946 British fantasy "Stairway to Heaven," in which she played a young American woman working for the Royal Air Force, and as Dr. Zira, the chimpanzee psychiatrist in the 1968 science-fiction classic "Planet of the Apes." She appeared in two sequels, "Beneath the Planet of the Apes" (1970) and "Escape from the Planet of the Apes" (1971).

At 17, she joined a traveling stock company, then got involved with regional theater, auditioning in California for the acclaimed Pasadena Playhouse, where she got the ingenue part in a production of "Arsenic and Old Lace" and a similar role in "The Women."

In 1943, an agent spotted her in Pasadena and she signed a seven-year movie contract with David O. Selznick. It was Selznick who suggested she change her name because Janet Cole was not theatrical enough and there were already other Janets around, including Janet Gaynor and Janet Blair. Hunter was delighted because she loathed her real name. She tossed out the name "Kim" because it was the name of Magnolia's daughter in "Show Boat." A secretary of an RKO producer suggested "Hunter." Selznick put the two together.

She made her film debut in a low-budget RKO horror film, "The Seventh Victim," and followed with secondary roles in other features, eventually returning to the New York theater.

In 1947, Irene Mayer Selznick was producing "A Streetcar Named Desire" and recommended to her ex-husband that Hunter play Stella Kowalski.

"I had done a lot of theater — summer stock, winter stock — and ... David O. Selznick put me under contract to do films," she recalled. "By the time of 'Streetcar,' I had done about five. I didn't have to come back and read again; I got it. Incredible!"

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Points of interest

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    Academy Awards

    Year Category Work
    1951 Best Supporting Actress A Streetcar Named Desire Win

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