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for others with this name see Jennifer Jones (disambiguation)

Jennifer Jones
Born	March 2, 1919 (age 88) Tulsa, Oklahoma,  United States
Academy Awards
Best Actress 1943 The Song of Bernadette

Jennifer Jones (born March 2, 1919) is an Academy Award and Golden Globe-winning American actress.

Contents 1 Early life 2 Career 3 Private life 4 Filmography 5 Notes 6 External links

Jones was born Phylis Lee Isley in Tulsa, Oklahoma to Phillip R. Isley and Flora Mae Suber,^[1] who toured the Midwest in a traveling tent show they owned and operated. Jones attended Monte Cassino Junior College in Tulsa and Northwestern University, where she was a member of Kappa Alpha Theta sorority, before transferring to the Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York in 1938. There she met and fell in love with fellow acting student Robert Walker and they were married on January 2, 1939 when Jones was 19 years old.

They returned to Tulsa for a 13-week radio program arranged by her father, and then headed for Hollywood. Isley landed two small roles, first in a John Wayne western titled New Frontier (1939) and later a serial, Dick Tracy's G-Men (1939). In these two films, she was billed as "Phyllis Isley" (Phyllis now spelled with two L's). However, when she and Walker failed a screen test for Paramount Pictures, they decided to return to New York City.

While Walker found steady work in radio programs, Isley worked part-time work modeling hats for the Powers Agency and looked for possible acting jobs. When she learned of auditions for the lead role of Claudia in Rose Franken’s hit play of the same name, she presented herself to David O. Selznick’s New York office, but fled in tears after what she thought was a bad reading. Selznick, however, overheard her audition and was impressed enough to have his secretary call her back. Following an interview, she was signed to a seven-year contract.

She was carefully groomed for stardom and given her new name -- Jennie Jones. Director Henry King was impressed by her screen test as Bernadette Soubirous for The Song of Bernadette and she won the coveted role over hundreds of applicants. In 1944, she won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance as St. Bernadette. That year, Jones' friend, Ingrid Bergman was also a Best Actress nominee for her work in For Whom the Bell Tolls. Jones apologized to Bergman, who replied, "No, Jennifer, your Bernadette was better than my Maria." Jones presented the Best Actress Oscar the following year to Bergman for Gaslight.^[2]

Over the next two decades, Jones appeared in a wide range of roles selected by Selznick. Her dark beauty and sensitive nature appealed to audiences and she projected a variable range. Her initial saintly image, as shown in her first starring role, was a stark contrast three years later when she was cast as a provocative half-breed in Selznick’s controversial Duel in the Sun (1946). Other notable films included Since You Went Away (1944), Love Letters (1945), Cluny Brown (1946), Portrait of Jennie (1948), Madame Bovary (1949), We Were Strangers (1949), Carrie (1952), Ruby Gentry (1952), Indiscretion of an American Wife (1953), Beat the Devil (1954), Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing (1955), Good Morning Miss Dove (1955), The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit (1956), and A Farewell to Arms (1957). Her leading men during this period included Charles Boyer, Gregory Peck, James Mason, John Garfield, Charlton Heston, Laurence Olivier, Montgomery Clift, Humphrey Bogart, William Holden, Robert Stack and Rock Hudson.

The portrait of her for the film Portrait of Jennie was painted by Robert Brackman.

Jones's first marriage to Robert Walker produced two sons, Robert Walker Jr. born April 15, 1940, and Michael Walker, born March 13, 1941. Both of them became actors. The couple divorced in 1944.

Jones married Selznick on July 13, 1949, staying with him until his death on June 22, 1965. Following Selznick's death, she semi-retired from acting and appeared in only a few films. Her last appearance was a strong supporting role in The Towering Inferno (1974). Her only child with Selznick, Mary Jennifer Selznick, born August 12, 1954, committed suicide in 1976. This led to Jones' interest in mental health issues.

She married multi-millionaire industrialist, art collector and philanthropist Norton Simon on May 29, 1971, and remained married to him until his death on June 1, 1993. She is currently on the board of directors of the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena.

Jennifer Jones is a breast cancer survivor. The late actress Susan Strasberg, who died of breast cancer, was married to a fellow actor surnamed Jones, and named her only child, a daughter, Jennifer Jane Jones, after the esteemed older actress.

• 1939 New Frontier
• 1939 Dick Tracy's G-Men
• 1943 The Song of Bernadette
• 1944 Since You Went Away
• 1945 Love Letters
• 1946 Cluny Brown
• 1946 Duel in the Sun
• 1948 Portrait of Jennie
• 1949 We Were Strangers
• 1949 Madame Bovary
• 1949 Gone to Earth (released in the U.S. in 1952 in a heavily edited form as The Wild Heart)
• 1952 Carrie
• 1952 Ruby Gentry
• 1953 Beat the Devil
• 1954 Indiscretion of an American Wife
• 1955 Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing
• 1955 Good Morning Miss Dove
• 1956 The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit
• 1957 The Barretts of Wimpole Street
• 1957 A Farewell to Arms
• 1962 Tender Is the Night
• 1965 The Idol
• 1969 Cult of the Damned
• 1974 The Towering Inferno

• Oliver, Phillip. "Jennifer Jones Web Site" Retrieved February 3, 2005.
• Epstein, Edward. Portrait of Jennifer. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995. ISBN 0-671-74056-3
• Jennifer Jones at the Internet Movie Database

Awards
Preceded by Greer Garson for Mrs. Miniver	Academy Award for Best Actress 1943 for The Song of Bernadette	Succeeded by Ingrid Bergman for Gaslight
Preceded by None	Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture Drama 1944 for The Song of Bernadette	Succeeded by Ingrid Bergman for Gaslight