Academy Award for Best Actress

1956

Ingrid Bergman 

as

Anna Koreff / Anastasia

Anastasia

Ingrid Bergman (Swedish pronunciation: [ˈɪŋːrɪd ˈbærjman]; 29 August 1915 – 29 August 1982) was a Swedish actress who starred in a variety of European and American films. She won three Academy Awards, two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards and the Tony Award for Best Actress. She is best remembered for her roles as Ilsa Lund in Casablanca (1942), and as Alicia Huberman in Notorious (1946), an Alfred Hitchcock thriller starring Cary Grant.

Before becoming a star in American films, she had been a leading actress in Swedish films. Her first introduction to U.S. audiences came with her starring role in the English-language remake of Intermezzo (1939). Selznick started Bergman with a one-film role at her insistence (Intermezzo), then signed a four-film contract (also at her insistence) rather than a typical seven-year acting contract.

Selznick's financial problems meant that she was often loaned to the other studios. Apart from Casablanca, her performance from this period include Victor Fleming's remake of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941), For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943), Gaslight (1944), and The Bells of St. Mary's (1945). Her last films for Selznick were Alfred Hitchcock's Spellbound (1945) and Notorious (1946). Her final film for Hitchcock was Under Capricorn (1949).

After a decade in American films, she starred in Roberto Rossellini's Stromboli (1950), following the revelation that she was having an extramarital affair with the director. The affair and then marriage with Rossellini created a scandal in the US that forced her to remain in Europe for several years, when she made a successful Hollywood return in Anastasia (1956), for which she won her second Academy Award. Many of her personal and film documents can be seen in the Wesleyan University Cinema Archives.

According to the St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture, Bergman quickly became "the ideal of American womanhood" and a contender for Hollywood's greatest leading actress. In the United States, she is considered to have brought a "Nordic freshness and vitality" to the screen, along with exceptional beauty and intelligence; her producer David O. Selznick once called her "the most completely conscientious actress" he had ever worked with. In 2007, the American Film Institute ranked Bergman the as the fourth-greatest female actress of classic American cinema.