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Haila Stoddard
Haila Stoddard (November 14, 1913 – February 21, 2011) was an American actress, producer, writer and director.
During her career as an actress, Stoddard appeared in a number of plays, movies, and television series, including sixteen years as Pauline Rysdale in The Secret Storm from 1954 to 1970. Stoddard also worked as a producer, both independently and with her production company, Bonard Productions Incorporated, which Stoddard created with Helen Bonfils in 1960. In addition to adapting plays such as Come Play with Me, and Men, Women, and Less Alarming Creatures, Stoddard also wrote plays, such as A Round With Ring (1969) and Zellerman, Arthur (1979).
Born in Great Falls, Montana, she moved from Salt Lake City to Los Angeles with her family at the age of eight, graduating from high school in 1930, married, and graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Southern California in 1934 with a Bachelor of Science degree in speech, while appearing in leading roles with the National Collegiate Players.
On October 30, 1931, Stoddard married William Gude. The marriage ended in divorce in 1935. On April 3, 1938 she married Jack Kirkland with whom she had two children. The couple were divorced September 2, 1947, and on November 8 Stoddard married director-producer Harald Bromley with whom she had one child.
In 1953 Stoddard was hired as the leading lady for the Elitch Theatre summer stock cast and would play opposite leading man Whitfield Connor. Stoddard divorced Bromley in 1954 and on January 26, 1956, she and Connor married in New York City and the couple remained married until his death in 1988.
Stoddard's first professional stage appearance was in San Francisco in 1934 as a walk-on/under-study in a production of Merrily We Roll Along, before she succeeded to the ingenue's leading role for opening night in Los Angeles. She appeared for 65 weeks in 1935-36 as the mute Pearl in the national touring company of Jack Kirkland's Tobacco Road. She arrived on Broadway in 1937, succeeding Peggy Conklin in Yes, My Darling Daughter. She subsequently starred in A Woman's a Fool – To Be Clever, I Know What I Like, and Kindred (all 1939), Susannah and the Elders (1940), Mr. and Mrs. North (1941), The Rivals (1942), The Moon Vine and Blithe Spirit (1943), Dream Girl (1945), and The Voice of the Turtle (1947). During World War II she toured the South Pacific as Lorraine Sheldon in a 1945 USO production of The Man Who Came to Dinner. She drafted a cookbook entitled Applause and produced a short-lived play called Dead Pigeon. In the late 1960s she opened Carriage House Comestibles, a popular gourmet restaurant off the Boston Post Road in Westport, Connecticut.
She starred in Joan of Lorraine, The Trial of Mary Dugan, and The Voice of the Turtle (1947), Rip Van Winkle (1947–48), Goodbye, My Fancy, and Her Cardboard Lover (1949), Affairs of State (1950), Springtime for Henry (1951), Twentieth Century, Glad Tidings, and Biography (1952), ten summer stock productions at Denver's Elitch Gardens Theatre, and The Frogs of Spring, a revival which she co-produced with husband Harold Bromley on Broadway (1953). She took over the leading role on opening night when illness struck Constance Ford in her own Broadway production of One Eye Closed, took over for Mary Anderson in Lunatics and Lovers in 1954, and directed the national touring production. She played in Ever Since Paradise (1957), Patate (1958), and Dark Corners (1964).
Stoddard and Jack Kirkland were original share-holders in the creation of the Bucks County Playhouse in 1938; she appeared there in a total of sixteen productions from 1939 to 1958, including The Philadelphia Story, Golden Boy, The Play's the Thing, Petticoat Fever, Our Betters, Skylark, and Mr. and Mrs. North. During five seasons, she was the Playhouse's leading lady to leading men Walter Slezak and Louis Calhern. She produced her husband's plays The Clover Ring and Georgia Boy in Boston, and The Secret Room on Broadway (all 1945).
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Haila Stoddard
Haila Stoddard (November 14, 1913 – February 21, 2011) was an American actress, producer, writer and director.
During her career as an actress, Stoddard appeared in a number of plays, movies, and television series, including sixteen years as Pauline Rysdale in The Secret Storm from 1954 to 1970. Stoddard also worked as a producer, both independently and with her production company, Bonard Productions Incorporated, which Stoddard created with Helen Bonfils in 1960. In addition to adapting plays such as Come Play with Me, and Men, Women, and Less Alarming Creatures, Stoddard also wrote plays, such as A Round With Ring (1969) and Zellerman, Arthur (1979).
Born in Great Falls, Montana, she moved from Salt Lake City to Los Angeles with her family at the age of eight, graduating from high school in 1930, married, and graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Southern California in 1934 with a Bachelor of Science degree in speech, while appearing in leading roles with the National Collegiate Players.
On October 30, 1931, Stoddard married William Gude. The marriage ended in divorce in 1935. On April 3, 1938 she married Jack Kirkland with whom she had two children. The couple were divorced September 2, 1947, and on November 8 Stoddard married director-producer Harald Bromley with whom she had one child.
In 1953 Stoddard was hired as the leading lady for the Elitch Theatre summer stock cast and would play opposite leading man Whitfield Connor. Stoddard divorced Bromley in 1954 and on January 26, 1956, she and Connor married in New York City and the couple remained married until his death in 1988.
Stoddard's first professional stage appearance was in San Francisco in 1934 as a walk-on/under-study in a production of Merrily We Roll Along, before she succeeded to the ingenue's leading role for opening night in Los Angeles. She appeared for 65 weeks in 1935-36 as the mute Pearl in the national touring company of Jack Kirkland's Tobacco Road. She arrived on Broadway in 1937, succeeding Peggy Conklin in Yes, My Darling Daughter. She subsequently starred in A Woman's a Fool – To Be Clever, I Know What I Like, and Kindred (all 1939), Susannah and the Elders (1940), Mr. and Mrs. North (1941), The Rivals (1942), The Moon Vine and Blithe Spirit (1943), Dream Girl (1945), and The Voice of the Turtle (1947). During World War II she toured the South Pacific as Lorraine Sheldon in a 1945 USO production of The Man Who Came to Dinner. She drafted a cookbook entitled Applause and produced a short-lived play called Dead Pigeon. In the late 1960s she opened Carriage House Comestibles, a popular gourmet restaurant off the Boston Post Road in Westport, Connecticut.
She starred in Joan of Lorraine, The Trial of Mary Dugan, and The Voice of the Turtle (1947), Rip Van Winkle (1947–48), Goodbye, My Fancy, and Her Cardboard Lover (1949), Affairs of State (1950), Springtime for Henry (1951), Twentieth Century, Glad Tidings, and Biography (1952), ten summer stock productions at Denver's Elitch Gardens Theatre, and The Frogs of Spring, a revival which she co-produced with husband Harold Bromley on Broadway (1953). She took over the leading role on opening night when illness struck Constance Ford in her own Broadway production of One Eye Closed, took over for Mary Anderson in Lunatics and Lovers in 1954, and directed the national touring production. She played in Ever Since Paradise (1957), Patate (1958), and Dark Corners (1964).
Stoddard and Jack Kirkland were original share-holders in the creation of the Bucks County Playhouse in 1938; she appeared there in a total of sixteen productions from 1939 to 1958, including The Philadelphia Story, Golden Boy, The Play's the Thing, Petticoat Fever, Our Betters, Skylark, and Mr. and Mrs. North. During five seasons, she was the Playhouse's leading lady to leading men Walter Slezak and Louis Calhern. She produced her husband's plays The Clover Ring and Georgia Boy in Boston, and The Secret Room on Broadway (all 1945).