Joan Plowright

Joan Ann Olivier, Baroness Olivier^[1] (née Plowright; 28 October 1929 – 16 January 2025), commonly known as Dame Joan Plowright, was an English actress whose career spanned over six decades. She received several accolades including two Golden Globe Awards, an Olivier Award, and a Tony Award as well as nominations for an Academy Award, two BAFTA Awards, and a Primetime Emmy Award. She was made a Dame by Queen Elizabeth II in 2004.

The Right Honourable The Lady Olivier DBE
Plowright in 1958
Born	Joan Ann Plowright (1929-10-28)28 October 1929 Brigg, Lincolnshire, England
Died	16 January 2025(2025-01-16) (aged 95) London, England
Alma mater	Old Vic Theatre School
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1948–2014 2018
Spouses	Roger Gage ​ ​ (m. 1953; div. 1960)​ Laurence Olivier ​ ​ (m. 1961; died 1989)​
Children	3
Relatives	David Plowright (brother)

Plowright studied at the Old Vic Theatre School^[2] before acting onstage at the Royal National Theatre where she met her husband Laurence Olivier. She acted opposite him in the John Osborne play The Entertainer on the West End in 1957 and on Broadway in 1958. She earned the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play for her A Taste of Honey (1961). She won the Laurence Olivier Award for Filumena (1978).

She made her film debut in an uncredited role in Moby Dick (1956). She later won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for Enchanted April (1991). She was BAFTA-nominated for her roles in The Entertainer (1960) and Equus (1977). She also acted in the films Uncle Vanya (1963), Three Sisters (1970), Avalon (1990), Dennis the Menace (1993), 101 Dalmatians (1996), Jane Eyre (1996), Tea with Mussolini (1999), Bringing Down the House (2003) and Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont (2005). She also voiced roles for the children's films Dinosaur (2000) and Curious George (2006).

On television she was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Limited Series or Movie and won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Series, Miniseries or Television Film for her role in the HBO television film Stalin (1992). She retired from acting due to macular degeneration in 2014. She made her final filmed appearance in the documentary Nothing Like a Dame (2018).

Early life and education

Plowright was born on 28 October 1929 in Brigg, Lincolnshire, the daughter of Daisy Margaret (née Burton) and William Ernest Plowright, who was a journalist and newspaper editor.^[3] She attended Scunthorpe Grammar School^[4] and then trained at The Old Vic Theatre School.^[5][6]

Career

Plowright as Jo (right) with Angela Lansbury as Helen, in the 1961 Broadway production of A Taste of Honey

Plowright made her stage debut at Croydon in 1948^[7] and her London debut in 1954. In 1956 she joined the English Stage Company at the Royal Court Theatre and was cast as Margery Pinchwife in The Country Wife. She appeared with George Devine in the Eugène Ionesco play The Chairs, and Shaw's Major Barbara and Saint Joan.

Plowright made her film debut in an uncredited role in Moby Dick (1956). In 1957, Plowright co-starred with Sir Laurence Olivier in the original London production of John Osborne's The Entertainer, taking over the role of Jean Rice from Dorothy Tutin when the play transferred from the Royal Court to the Palace Theatre. She continued to appear on stage and in films such as The Entertainer (1960). In 1961, she received a Tony Award for her role in A Taste of Honey on Broadway.

Through her marriage to Olivier, Plowright became closely associated with his work at the National Theatre from 1963 onwards. She also acted in the films Uncle Vanya (1963), Three Sisters (1970), and Equus (1977). In the 1990s, she began to appear more regularly in films, including I Love You to Death (1990), Avalon (1990), Enchanted April (1992) for which she won a Golden Globe Award and an Academy Award nomination, Dennis the Menace (1993) where she played Martha Wilson, The Scarlet Letter (1995), Jane Eyre (1996), 101 Dalmatians (1996) where she played the dog nanny, Dance with Me (1998), and Tea With Mussolini (1999). Among her television roles, she won another Golden Globe Award and earned an Emmy Award nomination for the HBO film Stalin in 1992 as the Soviet dictator's mother-in-law. Her pair of 1992 performances (Enchanted April and Stalin) marked only the second time an actress (after Sigourney Weaver, for performances in 1988) won two Golden Globes in the same year; as of the January 2023 presentation, only Helen Mirren (for performances in 2006) and Kate Winslet (for performances in 2008) have duplicated this feat. In 1994, she was awarded the Women in Film Crystal Award.^[8]

In 2003, Plowright performed in the stage production Absolutely! (Perhaps) in London. She was appointed honorary president of the English Stage Company in March 2009, succeeding John Mortimer who died in January 2009. She was previously vice-president of the company.^[9] Her later films included Bringing Down the House (2003), Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont (2005), and The Spiderwick Chronicles (2008), as well as voiced roles for the children's films Dinosaur (2000) and Curious George (2006). She made her final filmed appearance in the British documentary Nothing Like a Dame (2018) with her acting Dame friends Maggie Smith, Judi Dench and Eileen Atkins.^[10]

Personal life

Plowright with Laurence Olivier, President Ronald Reagan and Nancy Reagan, 1983

Marriages and family

Plowright was first married to the actor Roger Gage in September 1953. She later divorced him and in 1961 married Laurence Olivier shortly after the end of Olivier's twenty-year marriage to the actress Vivien Leigh. Plowright and Olivier had three children together,^[11] all three of whom have worked in the theatre.^[12] The couple remained married until Olivier's death in 1989. Plowright's younger brother, David Plowright (1930–2006), was an executive at Granada Television.^[6]

She published her memoirs, And That's Not All, in 2001.^[13]

Illness and death

Plowright's vision declined steadily during the late 2000s and early 2010s due to macular degeneration. In 2014 she officially announced her retirement from acting because she had become legally blind.^[14]

Plowright died at Denville Hall in Northwood, London, on 16 January 2025, aged 95.^[2][15]

Legacy

The Plowright Theatre in Scunthorpe is named in Plowright's honour.^[16]

In her obituary, Variety described Plowright as "perhaps the greatest Anglophone actor of the 20th century".^[17][12]

Honours

Plowright was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 1970 New Year Honours^[18] and was promoted to Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in the 2004 New Year Honours.^[19]

She received an honorary Doctor of Letters (DLitt) from the University of Hull in 2001.^[20]

Acting credits

Film

Film roles

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1956	Moby Dick[6]	Starbuck's wife	Uncredited
1957	Time Without Pity[21]	Agnes Cole
1960	The Entertainer[22]	Jean Rice
1963	Uncle Vanya[23]	Sonya
1970	Three Sisters[24]	Masha Kulighina
1977	Equus[25]	Dora Strang
1982	Britannia Hospital[26]	Phyllis Grimshaw
	Brimstone and Treacle[27]	Norma Bates
1985	Revolution[28]	Mrs. Daisy McConnahay
1988	Drowning by Numbers[29]	Cissie Colpitts 1
	The Dressmaker[29]	Nellie
1990	I Love You to Death[24]	Nadja
	Avalon[30]	Eva Krichinsky
1991	Enchanted April[6]	Mrs. Jane Fisher
1993	Dennis the Menace[24]	Mrs. Martha Wilson
	Last Action Hero[24]	Teacher
1994	A Pin for the Butterfly[31]	Grandma
	Widows' Peak[32]	Mrs. Dawn Doyle-Counihan
1995	The Scarlet Letter[6]	Harriet Hibbons
	A Pyromaniac's Love Story[33]	Mrs. Wendy Linzer
	Hotel Sorrento[34]	Marge Morrisey
1996	101 Dalmatians[35]	Nanny
	Surviving Picasso[36]	Françoise's Grandmother
	Mr. Wrong[37]	Mrs. Jessica Crawford
	Jane Eyre[24]	Mrs. Maddie Fairfax
1997	The Assistant[38]	Mrs. Ida Bober
1998	Dance with Me[39]	Bea Johnson
1999	Tom's Midnight Garden[40]	Mrs. Ortensia Bartholomew
	Tea with Mussolini[6]	Mary Wallace
2000	Dinosaur[41]	Baylene	Voice
	Back to the Secret Garden[42]	Martha Sowerby
2002	Global Heresy[43]	Lady Foxley
	Callas Forever[6]	Sarah Keller
2003	Bringing Down the House[24]	Virginia Arness
	I Am David[24]	Sophie
2004	George and the Dragon[44]	Mother Superior
2005	Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont[6]	Mrs. Sarah Palfrey
2006	Goose on the Loose[45]	Beatrice Fairfield
	Curious George[6]	Victoria Plushbottom	Voice
2008	The Spiderwick Chronicles[46]	Aunt Lucinda Spiderwick
2009	Knife Edge[6]	Marjorie
2018	Nothing Like a Dame[6]	Herself	Documentary

Television

Television roles

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1951	Sara Crewe[47]	Winnie	4 episodes
1954	BBC Sunday-Night Theatre[47]	Adriana	3 episodes
1955	Moby Dick—Rehearsed[48]	A Young Actress/Pip	Uncompleted and lost Orson Welles film
1958	Sword of Freedom[49]	Lisa Giocondo	Episode: "The Woman in the Picture"
1959	Theatre Night[citation needed]	Arlette Le Boeuf	Episode: Hook, Line, and Sinker
	World Theatre[47]	Lady Teazle	Episode: The School for Scandal
	ITV Play of the Week[citation needed]	Winnie Verloc	Episode: The Secret Agent
	ITV Television Playhouse[citation needed]	Jane Maxwell	Episode: Odd Man In
1967	NET Playhouse[50]	Sonya	Episode: Uncle Vanya
1970	ITV Playhouse[citation needed]	Lisa	Episode: "The Plastic People"
	ITV Sunday Night Theatre[51]	Viola/Sebastian	Episode: "Twelfth Night"
1973	The Merchant of Venice[52]	Portia	Film
1978	Saturday, Sunday, Monday[53]	Rosa
	Daphne Laureola[54]	Lady Pitts
1980	The Diary of Anne Frank[55]	Mrs Frank	US film
1982	All for Love[56]	Edith	Episode: "A Dedicated Man"
1983	Wagner[57]	Mrs Taylor	Episode: "1.2"
1986	The Importance of Being Earnest[24]	Lady Bracknell	Film
1987	Theatre Night[58]	Meg Bowles	Episode: "The Birthday Party"
1989	And a Nightingale Sang[59]	Mam	Film
1990	Sophie[60]	Sophie
1991	The House of Bernarda Alba[61]	La Poncia
1992	Stalin[24]	Olga
	Driving Miss Daisy[62]	Daisy Werthan
1993	Screen Two[63]	Mrs Monro	Episode: "The Clothes in the Wardrobe"; released in the US as The Summer House
1994	The Return of the Native[64]	Mrs Yeobright	Film
	A Place for Annie[65]	Dorothy
	On Promised Land[66]	Mrs Appletree
1998–1999	Encore! Encore![67]	Marie Pinoni	12 episodes
1998	Aldrich Ames: Traitor Within[68]	Jeanne Vertefeuille	Film
	This Could Be the Last Time[69]	Rosemary
2000	Frankie & Hazel[70]	Phoebe Harkness
2001	Bailey's Mistake[71]	Aunt Angie
	Scrooge and Marley[72]	Narrator

Theatre

Theatre roles

Year	Title	Role	Venue
1948	If Four Walls Told[29]	Hope (stage debut)	Croydon Repertory Theatre, England
1954	The Merry Gentlemen[73]	Allison	Bristol Old Vic, England
	The Duenna[74]	Donna Clara	Westminster Theatre, London
1955	Moby Dick[6]	Pip	Duke of York's Theatre, London
1956	The Crucible[29]	Mary Warren	Royal Court Theatre, London
	Don Juan[75]	Baptista	Royal Court Theatre
	The Death of Satan[74]	Receptionist	Royal Court Theatre
	Cards of Identity[74]	Miss Tray	Royal Court Theatre
	The Good Woman of Setzuan[74]	Mrs. Shin	Royal Court Theatre
1957	The Country Wife[29]	Margery Pinchwife	Royal Court Theatre Adelphi Theatre, London
	The Making of Moo[76]	Elizabeth Compton	Royal Court Theatre
	The Entertainer[29]	Jean Rice	Palace Theatre, London
1958	The Lesson[77]	The Student	Phoenix Theatre, Off-Broadway
	The Chairs[77]	Old Woman
	The Entertainer[77]	Jean Rice	Royale Theatre, Broadway
	Major Barbara[29]	Major Barbara	Royal Court Theatre
	Hook, Line and Sinker[78]	Arlette	Piccadilly Theatre, London
1959	Roots[6]	Beatie Bryant	Belgrade Theatre, Coventry Royal Court Theatre Duke of York's Theatre
1960	Rhinoceros[29]	Daisy	Royal Court Theatre
	A Taste of Honey[77]	Josephine	Booth Theatre, Broadway
1962	The Chances[79]	Another Constatia	Chichester Festival Theatre, England
1962–1963	Uncle Vanya[24]	Sonya	Chichester Festival Theatre Old Vic Theatre, London
1963	Saint Joan[24]	Saint Joan	Old Vic Theatre
1964	Hobson's Choice[80]	Maggie Hobson	Old Vic Theatre
	The Master Builder[6]	Hilda Wangel	Old Vic Theatre
1967–68	Much Ado About Nothing[29]	Beatrice	Old Vic Theatre
	Three Sisters[6]	Masha	Old Vic Theatre
	Tartuffe[81]	Dorine	Old Vic Theatre
1968	The Advertisement[82]	Teresa	Old Vic Theatre
	Love's Labour's Lost[6]	Rosaline	Old Vic Theatre
1969	Back to Methuselah, Part II[83]	Voice of Lilith	Old Vic Theatre
1970	The Merchant of Venice[6]	Portia	Cambridge Theatre, London Old Vic Theatre
1971	A Woman Killed with Kindness[6]	Mistress Anne Frankford	New Theatre, London
	The Rules of the Game[84]	Silla	New Theatre
1972	The Doctor's Dilemma[85]	Jennifer Dubedat	Chichester Festival Theatre
	The Taming of the Shrew[86]	Katharina	Chichester Festival Theatre
1973	Rosmersholm[87]	Rebecca West	Greenwich Theatre, London
1973 1974–75	Saturday, Sunday, Monday[6]	Rosa	Old Vic Theatre, London Queen's Theatre, London
1974	Eden End[88]	Stella Kirby	Old Vic Theatre
1975	The Seagull[6]	Irena Arkadina	Lyric Theatre, London
	The Bed before Yesterday[6]	Alma	Lyric Theatre
1977	Filumena[29]	Filumena Marturano	Lyric Theatre
1980	Filumena[77]	Filumena Marturano	St. James Theatre, Broadway
	Enjoy[89]	Mam	Vaudeville Theatre, London
1981	Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?[90]	Martha	Royal National Theatre, London
1982	Cavell[6]	Edith Cavell	Chichester Festival Theatre
1983	The Cherry Orchard[6]	Madame Ranevskaya	Haymarket Theatre, London
1984	The Way of the World[6]	Lady Wishfort	Chichester Festival Theatre Haymarket Theatre
1985	Mrs. Warren's Profession[91]	Mrs. Warren	Royal National Theatre
1986–87	The House of Bernarda Alba[6]	La Poncia	Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, London Globe Theatre, London
1990	Time and the Conways[6]	Mrs. Conway	Old Vic Theatre

Awards and nominations

Plowright was nominated for all the Triple Crown of Acting awards (Academy Award, Emmy Award, and Tony Award), winning the Tony Award in 1961. In 1993, she also became the second of only four actresses (as of 2024) to have won two Golden Globe Awards in the same year.

Awards and nominations

Award	Year	Category	Nominated work	Result	Ref.
Academy Awards	1993	Best Supporting Actress	Enchanted April	Nominated	[24]
British Academy Film Awards	1961	Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Roles	The Entertainer	Nominated	[92]
	1977	Best Actress in a Supporting Role	Equus	Nominated
Golden Globe Awards	1993	Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture	Enchanted April	Won	[93]
		Best Supporting Actress – Series, Miniseries or Television Film	Stalin	Won
Primetime Emmy Awards	1993	Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or Special		Nominated	[94]
Tony Awards	1961	Best Actress in a Play	A Taste of Honey	Won	[77]
Society of West End Theatre Awards	1976	Actress of the Year in a New Play	The Bed Before Yesterday	Nominated	[95]
	1978		Filumena	Won	[96]
	1980		Enjoy	Nominated	[97]

Book

• Plowright, Joan (2001). And That's Not All: The Memoirs of Joan Plowright. Weidenfeld & Nicolson. ISBN 978-0-297-64594-8.

See also

• List of Academy Award winners and nominees from Great Britain
• List of actors with Academy Award nominations