Phyllis Thaxter obit

Phyllis Thaxter was not on the list.

Actress Phyllis Thaxter, Superman's Mom, Dies at 90

She played Ma Kent in the 1978 superhero film after appearing years earlier in such classics as “Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo” and “Act of Violence.”

Phyllis Thaxter, the wholesome actress who played Ma Kent in 1978’s Superman and the faithful girlfriend to vengeful POW Robert Ryan in the 1948 film noir classic Act of Violence, has died. She was 90.

Thaxter died Tuesday at her home in Orlando after a long bout with Alzheimer's, according to her daughter, actress Skye Aubrey.

A contract player at MGM and Warner Bros. in the 1940s and ’50s before her career was derailed by illness, Thaxter also starred in the psychological thriller Bewitched (1945), playing opposite Edmund Gwenn as a woman fighting to hold off a conniving, murderous alter ego.

“She was one of the most beautiful and patrician icons of the golden age of movies, TV and theater,” veteran movie critic Rex Reed told The Hollywood Reporter.

Born Nov. 20, 1921, in Portland, Maine, her mother was a former Shakespearean actress and her father a state Supreme Court justice. She joined the Montreal Repertory Theatre troupe as a teenager before graduating to Broadway. Appearing in such productions as Claudia and the 1940 drama There Shall Be No Night -- whose cast included Alfred Lunt, Lynn Fontanne, Sydney Greenstreet and Montgomery Clift -- Thaxter attracted the attention of Hollywood and signed with MGM in the early '40s.

Her film debut came in Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944) as the wife of Van Johnson. A year later, she starred in Bewitched and then appeared in Week-End at the Waldorf, a remake of the Greta Garbo classic Grand Hotel.

The hazel-eyed brunette followed with The Sea of Grass (1947), opposite Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn; Tenth Avenue Angel (1948) with Margaret O’Brien; Blood on the Moon, a Western with Robert Mitchum; and Fred Zinneman’s taut Act of Violence (1948), as the woman who stands by Ryan, an embittered POW out for revenge against his former war buddy Van Heflin.

Thaxter then joined Warner Bros. and appeared in such films as Michael Curtiz'sThe Breaking Point (1950) with John Garfield and Patricia Neal; Come Fill the Cup (1951) with Gig Young; Springfield Rifle (1952) with Gary Cooper; another Curtiz film, Jim Thorpe — All-American (1951), with Burt Lancaster; and She’s Working Her Way Through College (1952) with Ronald Reagan. However, she contracted a form of infantile paralysis while visiting her family in Portland, Maine, and her contract was terminated.

That led Thaxter to television, where she appeared in guest-starring roles in Lux Video Theatre, Climax!, Wagon Train, Rawhide, The Defenders, Medical Center, Marcus Welby, M.D. and many other series.

In 1978, Thaxter made one final movie splash when she was cast along with Glenn Ford as Clark Kent’s adoptive parents on Earth in Richard Donner’s Superman, starring Christopher Reeve. Her daughter Skye was married to Superman executive producer Iiya Salkind.

“I worked harder on that film than anything I’d done — I couldn’t be bad,” Thaxter once said.

The actress, who has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, spent the 1980s on the stage in such productions as The Little Foxes with Anne Baxter and The Gin Game with Larry Gates.

In 1944, Thaxter married James Aubrey Jr., who was president of CBS in the early 1960s and then was hired by Kirk Kerkorian to preside over MGM during a brutal budget-slashing period in the '70s. They divorced in 1962 (he died in 1994). Thaxter then wed former Princeton football star Gilbert Lea, a marriage that lasted for 46 years until his death in May 2008.

In addition to her daughter, survivors include grandchildren Devin, Jessica, Jackie, Anastasia and Sebastian and great-grandson Elijah.

Partial filmography

    Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944) as Ellen Lawson

    Bewitched (1945) as Joan Alris Ellis

    Week-End at the Waldorf (1945) as Cynthia Drew

    The Sea of Grass (1947) as Sara Beth Brewton

    Living in a Big Way (1947) as Peggy Randall

    Tenth Avenue Angel (1948) as Helen Mills

    The Sign of the Ram (1948) as Sherida Binyon

    Blood on the Moon (1948) as Carol Lufton

    Act of Violence (1948) as Ann

    No Man of Her Own (1950) as Patrice Harkness

    The Breaking Point (1950) as Lucy Morgan

    Fort Worth (1951) as Flora Talbot

    Jim Thorpe – All-American (1951) as Margaret Miller

    Come Fill the Cup (1951) as Paula Copeland

    She's Working Her Way Through College (1952) as Helen Palmer

    Springfield Rifle (1952) as Erin Kearney

    Operation Secret (1952) as Maria Corbet

    Women's Prison (1955) as Helene Jensen

    Man Afraid (1957) as Lisa Collins

    The World of Henry Orient (1964) as Mrs. Avis Gilbert

    Superman (1978) as Ma Kent

Selected television appearances

    Alfred Hitchcock Presents and The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (1956-1964), nine appearances as various characters

    Wagon Train (1959-1960) as Christine Elliot / Vivian Carter

    Rawhide (TV series) (Episode: "The Blue Spy") (1961) as Pauline Cushman

    The Twilight Zone (Episode "Young Man's Fancy") (1962) as Virginia Lane Walker

    The Invaders (TV series) (Episode: "The Peacemaker") (1968) as Sarah Concannon

    The Longest Night (1972) as Norma Chambers

    Once an Eagle (TV miniseries) (1976) as Alma Caldwell

    The Fugitive, episode "Detour on a Road Going Nowhere" (1964 - S2/E12) as Enid Langer

Radio appearances

Year       Program               Episode/source

1952      Stars in the Air   Christmas in Connecticut

1953      Lux Radio Theatre            Close to My Heart

1953      Lux Radio Theatre            The Bishop's Wife

1955      Lux Radio Theatre            The Bishop's Wife