Ann Wedgeworth: A Tribute to the Tony Award-Winning Actress (1934–2017)

Ann Wedgeworth, Tony Award-winning actress, was born on January 21, 1934, in Abilene, Texas, to Cortus “Wedge” Wedgworth, a school superintendent, and Martha Elizabeth (Thompson) Wedgeworth, who died two years after her daughter was born. Wedgeworth graduated from Highland Park High School (where she was a classmate of Vera Jane Peers, later known as Jayne Mansfield) in 1950 and attended Southern Methodist University in Dallas. She graduated from the University of Texas at Austin (where she was a member of the Curtain Club) in 1954. Wedgeworth married actor Rip Torn, also a UT-Austin graduate, on January 15, 1955. They had one daughter, Danae, born in 1956, before divorcing in 1961.

Early Acting Career

Wedgeworth studied under Sanford Meisner at the renowned Actors Studio in New York. Her first television appearance was in an episode of the anthology series Kraft Theater in 1957. She began her Broadway career with Make a Million in 1958 and made her film debut playing a barmaid in Andy, a 1965 drama starring Fort Worth-born Norman Alden. Wedgworth had recurring roles on the soap operas The Edge of Night from 1966 to 1967, Another World from 1967 to 1970, and the Another World spinoff Somerset from 1970 to 1973. In 1973 Wedgeworth had notable supporting roles in the films Scarecrow, starring Gene Hackman and Al Pacino, and Bang the Drum Slowly, starring Robert De Niro, Michael Moriarty, and Vincent Gardenia. In 1976 she appeared with her ex-husband, Rip Torn, in Birch Interval, a drama set in the Pennsylvania Amish country.

Wedgeworth had something of a breakthrough year in 1977. She appeared in the films Thieves, a film adaptation of the 1974–75 Broadway play in which she had also appeared, and Citizens Band, soon re-released as Handle with Care. She also starred in Chapter Two, Neil Simon’s semi-autobiographical Broadway play. Her role as the Dallas wife of a bigamist trucker in Citizens Band garnered her the Best Supporting Actress award from the National Society of Film Critics, and she received the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play for Chapter Two. Of her performance in the play, Newsweek critic Jack Kroll wrote, “She moves like Isadora Duncan and has the comic timing of Jack Benny, the forlorn sweetness of Marilyn Monroe and the wise innocence of Judy Holliday.” Chapter Two marked Wedgeworth’s final Broadway performance, though she continued to act onstage. In 1986 she was nominated for a Drama Desk Award for her performance in Sam Shepard’s A Lie of the Mind, which also featured Geraldine Page, then the wife of Rip Torn.

Later Television and Film Career

Wedgeworth became a familiar face on situation comedies. She had recurring roles on Three’s Company in 1979 and Filthy Rich from 1982 to 1983 and starred in Evening Shade (1990–94) as Merleen Elldridge, the wife of a small-town doctor played by Charles Durning. Wedgeworth and Durning also starred in Harlan & Merleen (1993), the unsold pilot for an Evening Shade spinoff.

Wedgworth continued to appear in films, notably as the mother of Texas country music legend Patsy Cline (played by Jessica Lange) in Sweet Dreams (1985). Her performance netted her another nomination for Best Supporting Actress from the National Society of Film Critics. Another memorable role was that of Aunt Fern in Steel Magnolias (1989). In 1991 Wedgeworth appeared with Sissy Spacek (the cousin of Rip Torn) in Hard Promises. She also worked with another native Texan and University of Texas alumna, Renee Zellweger, in Love and a .45 (1994) and The Whole Wide World (1996). In the later film Wedgeworth played the invalid mother of famed Texas pulp author Robert E. Howard (played by Vincent D’Onofrio). Her last film role was in The Hawk Is Dying with Paul Giamatti in 2006, after which she remained out of the public eye.

Death and Family

Ann Wedgeworth died at the age of eighty-three on November 16, 2017, at a nursing home in North Bergen, New Jersey, after a “long illness.” Her body was cremated, and her family retained the ashes. While never a leading star, Wedgeworth had a memorable persona (she was remembered by the Hollywood Reporter as “the sexy actress with the whispery voice”) and worked steadily as a supporting actress and in ensemble casts (particularly in comedies) for almost half a century.

At the time of her death, she was married to Ernie Martin, a theater director and acting teacher whom she had wed in 1970. Martin, who had mentored a number of well-known actors (including Sean Penn, Harvey Keitel, and Lorraine Bracco), survived his wife by only a few weeks. The couple had one child, Diánna, who also became an acting teacher after working as a radio disc jockey, television reporter, and actress.