Audrey Hepburn

Audrey Kathleen Hepburn (née Ruston; 4 May 1929 – 20 January 1993) was a British actress admired for her charm and elegance.

Early life

She was born in Brussels, Belgium on May 4, 1929. Her name at birth was Edda van Heemstra Hepburn-Ruston. Her father, Joseph Ruston, was an English banker, and  her mother Ella van Heemstra was a Dutch baroness. Her parents divorced in 1935 due to her father leaving them.

During World War II, she lived in Arnhem, The Netherlands with her mother. Life was very hard for her—one of her two maternal half-brothers was captured by the Nazis, and the other spent the war in hiding. Hepburn developed edema as a result of food shortages and she and her family nearly starved to death. To help the war effort, she staged secret ballet shows—she had taken up the sport before the war began—and transmitted secret messages from Allied troops at risk of her own life.

When the war ended, she and her mother moved to England. There, she studied ballet, and began working as a model and appearing in bit parts in the theatre and in movies.

Career

Hepburn played her first major role in 1951, when she was chosen by French writer Colette to play the lead role in the English version of her play Gigi on Broadway.
This led to her being cast in the lead female part in the movie Roman Holiday (1953), opposite Gregory Peck. The movie  made her an instant international star. Her performance won her the Academy Award, the Golden Globe Award and the BAFTA for best actress, becoming the first actress to win all three for the same role. 

She then appeared in a string of successful romantic comedies, such as Sabrina (1954), Love in the Afternoon (1957), Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961), Charade (1963), How to Steal a Million (1967), etc. She also appeared in two musicals; Funny Face (1957) and My Fair Lady (1964) and tackled more dramatic roles in movies such as War and Peace (1956), The Nun's Story (1959), The Children's Hour (1961), Two for the Road (1967) and the thriller Wait Until Dark (1967).

After not having taken an acting role in eight years to take care of her family, she returned with Robin and Marian (1976) with Sean Connery.Chicago Sun-Times review by Roger Ebert, 21 April 1976, Retrieved on291 March 2024 She also appeared in Bloodline (1979) and They All Laughed (1981) but retired for good shortly after.

In later life, she worked as a Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF and hosted a television series The Gardens of the World with Audrey Hepburn.

Personal life

She was married twice; first in 1954 to actor and director Mel Ferrer with whom she had a son Sean (b. 1960), and second to Italian psychiatrist Doctor Andrea Dotti in 1969, with whom she had a second son Luca (b. 1970). Both marriages ended in divorce. In 1980, she began dating Dutch actor Robert Wolders. They stayed together until Hepburn died in 1993, and she has referred to him as the love of her life.

Hepburn became an EGOT winner in 1994, becoming the first person to do so posthumously.

 Death and legacy 
Hepburn died of appendix cancer on 20 January 1993. Her elder son, Sean Ferrer, later wrote a book about his mother, called Audrey Hepburn: an elegant spirit.

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References

 Other websites 




 Official web site by the Audrey Hepburn Children's Fund 
 Audrey Hepburn's Gravesite


Category:1929 births
Category:1993 deaths
Category:Deaths from appendix cancer
Category:Actors from Brussels
Category:BAFTA Award winning actors
Category:Best Actress Academy Award winners
Category:Cancer deaths in Switzerland
Category:Deaths from colorectal cancer
Category:English movie actors
Category:English stage actors
Category:English television actors
Category:Golden Globe Award winning actors
Category:Screen Actors Guild Award winners
Category:Tony Award winning actors