Booth, Shirley

Booth, Shirley [née Thelma Booth Ford] (1898–1992), actress. A native New Yorker, she made her debut with the Poli Stock Company in Hartford in 1919 in The Cat and the Canary and her New York debut as Nan Winchester in Hell's Bells (1925). A variety of roles followed before she made her mark as Mabel, a gambler's moll, in Three Men on a Horse (1935). Booth won further popularity as Elizabeth Imbrie, the wisecracking photographer, in The Philadelphia Story (1939) and as Ruth Sherwood, the would‐be authoress, in My Sister Eileen (1940). Turning to drama, she played Leona Richards, who tries to re‐educate a young Nazi, in Tomorrow the World (1943), and she earned her first Tony Award as Grace Woods, the back‐talking secretary, in Goodbye, My Fancy (1948). Her second Tony came for what many believe her finest performance, the slovenly Lola in Come Back, Little Sheba (1950). The versatile, baby‐voiced actress was hailed by Brooks Atkinson, who noted, “She has the shuffle, the maddening garrulity and the rasping voice of the slattern, but withal she imparts to the role the warmth, generosity and valor of a loyal and affectionate woman.” After playing the feisty Aunt Cissy in the musical A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1951), she garnered her third Tony as the lonely Leona Samish in The Time of the Cuckoo (1952). Booth next scored personal success in two minor works, the musical By the Beautiful Sea (1954) and a comedy, The Desk Set (1955). Her last Broadway appearances were in the short‐lived musical Look to the Lilies (1970) and that same year in a revival of Hay Fever.