1921-07-06 New York City, New York, USA
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Nancy Davis Reagan (born Anne Frances Robbins; July 6, 1921 – March 6, 2016) was an American film actress and the wife of Ronald Reagan, the 40th President of the United States. She served as the First Lady of the United States from 1981 to 1989. Davis' film career began with small supporting roles in two films that were released in 1949, The Doctor and the Girl with Glenn Ford and East Side, West Side starring Barbara Stanwyck. She played a child psychiatrist in the film noir Shadow on the Wall (1950) with Ann Sothern and Zachary Scott; her performance was called "beautiful and convincing" by New York Times critic A. H. Weiler. She co-starred in 1950's The Next Voice You Hear..., playing a pregnant housewife who hears the voice of God from her radio. Influential reviewer Bosley Crowther of The New York Times wrote that "Nancy Davis [is] delightful as [a] gentle, plain, and understanding wife." In 1951, Davis appeared in Night into Morning, her favorite screen role, a study of bereavement starring Ray Milland. Crowther said that Davis "does nicely as the fiancée who is widowed herself and knows the loneliness of grief," while another noted critic, The Washington Post's Richard L. Coe, said Davis "is splendid as the understanding widow." MGM released Davis from her contract in 1952; she sought a broader range of parts, but also married Reagan, keeping her professional name as Davis, and had her first child that year. She soon starred in the science fiction film Donovan's Brain (1953); Crowther said that Davis, playing the role of a possessed scientist's "sadly baffled wife," "walked through it all in stark confusion" in an "utterly silly" film. In her next-to-last movie, Hellcats of the Navy (1957), she played nurse Lieutenant Helen Blair, and appeared in a film for the only time with her husband, playing what one critic called "a housewife who came along for the ride." Another reviewer, however, stated that Davis plays her part satisfactorily, and "does well with what she has to work with." Author Garry Wills has said that Davis was generally underrated as an actress because her constrained part in Hellcats was her most widely seen performance. In addition, Davis downplayed her Hollywood goals: promotional material from MGM in 1949 said that her "greatest ambition" was to have a "successful happy marriage"; decades later, in 1975, she would say, "I was never really a career woman but [became one] only because I hadn't found the man I wanted to marry. I couldn't sit around and do nothing, so I became an actress." Ronald Reagan biographer Lou Cannon nevertheless characterized her as a "reliable" and "solid" performer who held her own in performances with better-known actors. After her final film, Crash Landing (1958), Davis appeared for a brief time as a guest star in television dramas, such as the Zane Grey Theatre episode "The Long Shadow" (1961), where she played opposite Ronald Reagan, as well as Wagon Train and The Tall Man, until she retired as an actress in 1962.
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Crack: Cocaine, Corruption & Conspiracy | Self | 2021-01-11 |
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The New Air Force One: Flying Fortress | Self (archive footage) | 2021-02-16 |
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Zappa | Self (archive footage) | 2020-11-27 |
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The Way I See It | Self (archive footage) | 2020-09-18 |
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Bully. Coward. Victim. The Story of Roy Cohn | Self (archive footage) | 2019-09-29 |
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The Road to Mass Incarceration | Self | 2018-06-13 |
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Reversing Roe | Self (archive footage) | 2018-09-01 |
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Get Me Roger Stone | Self (archive footage) | 2017-04-23 |
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Silk Road: Drugs, Death and the Dark Web | Herself (archive footage) | 2017-08-21 |
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The Reagan Show | Self (archive footage) | 2017-04-22 |
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American Made | Herself (archive footage) | 2017-08-18 |
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How to Win the US Presidency | Self (archive footage) | 2016-08-01 |
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13th | Self (archive footage) | 2016-10-07 |
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The Making of Trump | Self (archive footage) | 2015-11-30 |
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Kill the Messenger | Self (archive footage) (uncredited) | 2014-10-09 |
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The Presidents' Gatekeepers | Self (archive footage) | 2013-09-12 |
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Our Nixon | Self | 2013-01-23 |
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The House I Live In | Self (archive footage) (uncredited) | 2012-10-05 |
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Reagan | Self (archive footage) | 2011-02-07 |
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Ronald Reagan: An American Journey | Self | 2011-02-01 |
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How to Win the TV Debate | Self (Archive Footage) | 2010-04-12 |
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Casino Jack and the United States of Money | Self (archive footage) | 2010-05-09 |
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Secret Origin: The Story of DC Comics | Self (archive footage) | 2010-11-09 |
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Nancy Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime | Herself/archival footage | 2010-02-06 |
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La Coupe Stanley à Montréal en 1993 | Self (archive footage) | 2008-01-01 |
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All the Presidents' Wives | Self | 2008-06-24 |
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Le Cirque: A Table in Heaven | Self | 2007-04-11 |
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Stand-up Reagan | Self (archive footage) | 2004-09-07 |
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Remembering Reagan at His Ranch | (archive footage) | 2004-06-22 |
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Family Fundamentals | Self - First Lady (archive footage) | 2002-05-26 |
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Reagan | Self | 1998-02-23 |
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Inside the White House | Self (archive footage) | 1996-01-01 |
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Superstar: The Life and Times of Andy Warhol | Self (archive footage) (uncredited) | 1990-07-18 |
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Myrna Loy: So Nice to Come Home To | (archive footage) | 1990-06-04 |
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James Stewart: A Wonderful Life | Self | 1988-11-22 |
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The Flintstone Kids' "Just Say No" Special | Herself | 1988-09-15 |
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Tyranny of the Status Quo: Bureaucrats | Self (Archival Footage) | 1984-01-01 |
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Tyranny of the Status Quo: Beneficiaries | Self (Archival Footage) | 1984-01-01 |
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Тревога. Раздумья старого человека | Self (archive footage) | 1984-01-01 |
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Tyranny of the Status Quo: Politicians | Self (Archival Footage) | 1984-01-01 |
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The Chemical People | 1983-11-02 | |
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The Killing of America | Self (archive footage) | 1981-09-05 |
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Crash Landing | Helen Williams | 1958-07-01 |
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Hellcats of the Navy | Nurse Lt. Helen Blair | 1957-05-01 |
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The Dark Wave | 1956-06-01 | |
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Donovan's Brain | Janice Cory | 1953-09-30 |
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Shadow in the Sky | Betty Hopke (as Nancy Davis) | 1952-07-18 |
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Talk About a Stranger | Marge Fontaine | 1952-04-18 |
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It's a Big Country | Miss Coleman | 1951-11-20 |
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Night Into Morning | Mrs. Katherine Mead | 1951-06-08 |
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Shadow on the Wall | Dr. Caroline Canford | 1950-05-19 |
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The Next Voice You Hear... | Mary Smith | 1950-06-29 |
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The Doctor and the Girl | Mariette Corday | 1949-09-29 |
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East Side, West Side | Helen Lee | 1949-12-22 |
