When they saw her in one of the plays, they immediately signed the legendary Hollywood diva

Born Shirley MacLaine Beaty in Richmond, Virginia on April 24, 1934 (her first name is a tribute to the famous child actress Shirley Temple), she is the younger brother of Oscar-winning actor-director Warren Beatty. She could dance almost before she could walk, she took ballet from an early age, she was so captivated by the dance that she once danced through the performance with a broken ankle.

Over time, it became clear that she could never be a ballerina due to her height, but she insisted on acting. She joined the high school cheerleading team and the drama club, and during one of her vacations she was a dancer in a theater on Broadway. After graduation, he returned to the stage, now dropping the Beaty member from his name.

Warren Beatty and his sister Shirley MacLaine in June 2008. (Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images for AFI)

His life turned out like in a fairy tale: in one of the plays, the main character was injured, he had to jump in, and producer Hal B. Wallis was sitting in the audience, who immediately signed him to Paramount Pictures. She made her debut on the screen in 1955 in Alfred Hitchcock’s The Trouble with Harry, which was a great opportunity for her talent to shine – she was bubbly, irreverent and seductive, and for her performance in 1955 she received the Golden Globe Award for Discovered of the Year.

The following year, she played a Hindu princess in the film version of the Verne novel Around the Earth in Eighty Days, and in 1958 she was already nominated for an Oscar in the work They Came Running. The film directed by Vincente Minnelli, in which Frank Sinatra was his partner, aptly reflected the mood of an era and the feeling of life of the “lost generation” after the war.

Two years later, he was again in the running for an Oscar for his performance alongside Jack Lemmon in the comedy The Bachelorette, directed by Billy Wilder, but the award was ultimately denied to him by Elizabeth Taylor for The Modern Camellia Lady (Butterfield 8), while he won another Golden Globe -, as well as the BAFTA award from the British Film Academy.

In Wilder’s 1961 drama The Children’s Hour, she played the role of a teacher who is fired for bullying a female student. Audrey Hepburn played the other teacher in the film, which was considered a bold subject at the time of its creation. In 1963, he worked again with Jack Lemmon and Billy Wilder in the film Irma, Sweetie, and his reward was another Golden Globe Award. In 1967, at the request of the Italian director Vittorio de Sica, he took the lead role in the light-hearted comedy The Woman Seven Times, in which he played together with Peter Sellers and Michael Caine.

MacLaine did not make films between 1972 and 1977, preferring to travel. He traveled to China, Cuba, Pakistan, India and Japan (he speaks excellent Japanese), and was nominated for an Oscar for his documentary The Other Side of the Sky: A Chinese Memoir (1975). In 1976, she was honored with an Emmy Award for the TV movie Gypsy in My Soul. Returning to the screen, she played a retired ballet dancer in the 1977 drama Turning Point.

She reached the top in 1983 with the film Nicknames, which brought her the highest recognition in the film industry – she was able to turn her sixth nomination into an award and receive the Oscar in the best actress category. Five years later, he received another Golden Globe Award for the musical Madame Sousatzka.

In 1989, she played a grumpy and constantly suspicious aging woman alongside Julia Roberts in Steel Magnolias, admittedly with great pleasure.

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In 2000, he made his debut as a director with the film Bruno, whose hero is a boy who cannot and does not want to be like the others. MacLaine remained in demand beyond her seventieth year, playing aging women in accordance with her age in the comedy The Witch Landed or They Talk, and in 2008 she played the aged Coco Chanel in the film about the life of the fashion designer. He also took on a role in the British TV series Downton Abbey, and then the audience saw him in the romantic adventure film The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, directed by and starring Ben Stiller.

In 2016, he starred in the comedy Wild Oats alongside Jessica Lange and Demi Moore. A year later, in The Last Word, she took on the clothes of a tough retired businesswoman. His latest film (American Dreamer) was released in American theaters a few weeks ago.

Shirley MacLaine at the premiere of Elsa and Fred in 2014. (Photo by Earl Gibson III/WireImage)

MacLaine’s busy but scandal-free personal life is known for the fact that she married director-producer Steve Parker as a junior, with whom she had a daughter. His long list of lovers includes many celebrities, but interestingly, Jack Lemmon and Jack Nicholson, with whom he played the most important roles of his life, were left out of the list.

In addition to her film roles, the actress has made a big splash with her spiritual journeys, her interest in UFOs and the New Age, and her unwavering belief in meditation and rebirth, and has written several books on these topics.

Among her countless honors, she received the Golden Globe Award six times out of twenty nominations, in 1999 she was honored with the honorary Golden Bear Award at the Berlinale, and as the only actress to be recognized twice – 1959, 1971 – with the Silver Bear Award for Best Actress. He received the French Order of Honor in 2011, the American Film Institute in 2012, and the Kennedy Center Lifetime Achievement Award the following year. Since 1960, his star has decorated the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Featured Image: Shirley MacLaine in The Yellow Rolls-Royce in 1964 (Photo: Getty Images).