Nora Cecil
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Nora Cecil (September 20, 1878 – May 1, 1951) was a British-American character actress whose 30-year career spanned both the silent and sound film eras. Cecil's career began on the stage, where she appeared in a single Broadway production, The Sleeping Beauty and the Beast, which ran for more than 240 performances at the Broadway Theatre in 1901-02. (A 1930 newspaper article says that Cecil "made her debut, three decades ago, on the London stage.")
Cecil appeared in well over 100 feature films and film shorts.
In 1915, she moved from the stage into films, her first appearance being in a starring role in The Arrival of Perpetua, directed by Émile Chautard. She often played "thin-lipped, stern-visaged dowagers and forbidding mothers-in-law" and "welfare workers, landladies, schoolmistresses and maiden aunts".
One of the most significant roles was in the W.C. Fields vehicle, The Old Fashioned Way in 1934. Some of the other notable films in which Cecil appeared include: Ernst Lubitsch's historical romance, The Merry Widow, starring Maurice Chevalier and Jeanette MacDonald; the 1939 version of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, starring Mickey Rooney; the John Ford classic, Stagecoach, with John Wayne.
Her final acting performance was in a featured role in Mourning Becomes Electra in 1947, starring Rosalind Russell.
Known for
Stagecoach
Boone's Landlady (uncredited)
Two in the Dark
Mrs. Potter, Landlady (uncredited)
Manslaughter
Lydia's Chaperone (uncredited)
Everything’s Rosie
Hotel Proprietress
Millie
Helen and Angie's Landlady (uncredited)
Little Men
Head of Orphanage
Borrowing Trouble
Dressmaker
Design for Living
Tom's Secretary (uncredited)
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Mrs. Shackleford (uncredited)
I Married a Witch
Harriet Wooley (uncredited)
Nothing Sacred
Schoolteacher (uncredited)
Hell's Angels
Helen's Maid (uncredited)
Fury
Albert's Mother (uncredited)
Union Pacific
Snoring Woman on Train (uncredited)
She Asked for It
Elderly lady (uncredited)
The Merry Widow
Animal Woman (uncredited)
The Sea of Grass
Mrs. Ryan - Nurse (uncredited)
Lady on a Train
Dancing Pirate
Landlady (uncredited)
You're Telling Me!
Mrs. Price
Pack Up Your Troubles
Welfare Association Officer (uncredited)
The Thin Man Goes Home
Miss Peavy
Hail the Conquering Hero
Train Ticket Clerk (uncredited)
Chained
Edith (uncredited)
Lucky Partners
Women's Club President (uncredited)
International Settlement
English Woman
Peg o' My Heart
Smythe (maid)
Mourning Becomes Electra
Louisa Ames
The Story of Alexander Graham Bell
Miss Jenkins
The Bitter Tea of General Yen
Missionary
The Devil Dancer
Julia
The Missing Lady
Miss Millie
The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek
Hospital Nurse (uncredited)
Easy Living
Miss Swerf
Street Scene
Alice Simpson - Welfare Worker
The Ruling Voice
Malcom's Nurse (uncredited)
The Bank Dick
Lompoc Ladies Auxiliary (uncredited)
Arrowsmith
Nurse (uncredited)
Gold Diggers of 1935
Housekeeper (uncredited)
Three Smart Boys
Miss Witherspoon, Superintendent
Sensation Seekers
Mrs. Lodge
Under Your Spell
School Teacher (uncredited)
Obliging Young Lady
Miss Hollyrod - Bird Lover (uncredited)
A Girl, a Guy, and a Gob
Charwoman
Wreckety Wrecks
Miss Winterbottom
Young People
Righteous Old Lady
Seven Footprints to Satan
Old Witch
Doctor Bull
Aunt Emily Banning
His Majesty, Bunker Bean
Countess Casanova
Hold Your Man
Miss Campbell (uncredited)
Night Must Fall
Search for Beauty
Miss Pettigrew
The Poor Little Rich Girl
One of Gwendolyn's Teachers (uncredited)
Seven Days Leave
Amelia Twymley
The Wife Takes a Flyer
Miss Updike
Young Bride
Landlady (uncredited)
Mr. Boggs Steps Out
Widow Peddie
The Big Parade of Comedy
Actress in 'Hollywood Party' (archive footage) (uncredited)
Only Saps Work
Mrs. Partridge (uncredited)
Going Hollywood
Briarcroft's Teacher
Car 99
Granny Adams
The Old-Fashioned Way
Mrs. Wendelschaffer
College Holiday
Miss Elkins (uncredited)
Apache Trail
Passenger (uncredited)
Once to Every Woman
Miss Baxter’s Sister (uncredited)
Three Girls About Town
Casket Customer
Stage Mother
Miss Gilford, Kitty's Music Store Boss (uncredited)
The Mighty Treve
Old Maid at Dog Show
Asleep in the Feet
Female Police Officer
The Unknown Guest
Martha Williams
Fast Workers
Tall Window-Shopper (Uncredited)
Some Like It Hot
Mrs. Beckett (uncredited)
By Hook or Crook
Aunt Marie
Hot Saturday
Gossip on Telephone (Uncredited)
Vagabond Lady
Miss Perkins (uncredited)
Meet the Baron
Professor Winterbottom (uncredited)
Upperworld
Housekeeper (uncredited)
Amateur Daddy
Saleslady
East Lynne
Charity Bazaar Committee
The Wild Girl
Undetermined Role (uncredited)
Biography of a Bachelor Girl
Ship's Matron (uncredited)
The Return of Dr. Fu Manchu
Mixed Nuts
Mrs. Twitchett
Laughing Boy
Schoolteacher
King of the Jungle
Spinster in park (uncredited)
An Amateur Widow
Night of Mystery
Midnight Faces
Mrs. Hart
Way Down East
Townswoman at Party
Too Many Crooks
(uncredited)
Champagne Waltz
Train Passenger
Footlights and Fools
(uncredited)
The Cavalier
Lucia's Aunt
Big Town
Miss Lovelace (uncredited)
Tillie Wakes Up
Gossip in Ice Cream Parlor / Woman Having Picture Taken
The Big Broadcast of 1937
Home Economics Woman
Memories and Melodies
Customer (uncredited)
Prunella
Love Net
Miss Prudence Tilly
Collegiate
Miss Curtiss
What a Life
Miss Eggleston
Little Miss Nobody
Mrs. Robinson
Girls
Matron Helen Hunt
A Royal Romance
Miss McPherson
Laughing at Trouble
Mrs. Wigby - Townswoman
Two Sisters from Boston
Mrs. Mulberry - Recital Guest (uncredited)
Those Were the Days!
Mrs. Moffett
Driftwood
Mrs. Prouty
Little Accident
Dr. Zernecke
The Demi-Bride
School Teacher
The Silent Rider
Mrs. Randall
The Arrival of Perpetua
Abigail Majendrie
Timothy's Quest
Townswoman
Bachelor Bait
Mrs. Trutmanner (uncredited)
Let's Make a Million
Girl of the Ozarks
Miss Trent
Born to Battle
Ma Cowan
The Deadwood Coach
Matilda Shields - in play
Footfalls
The Fortune Hunter
Betty Carpenter
American Buds
Emily
One-Horse Farmers
Subway Passenger (uncredited)
Blossoms On Broadway
Leader of Committee (uncredited)
The Spectacle Maker
Duchess
The Baby Cyclone
Mrs. Crandall
The Millionaire Cat
Aunt Mathilda
Slightly Static
Beauty Products Announcer (uncredited)
Woman, Woman!
Mrs. Lindsay
Chip of the Flying U
Dr. Cecil Grantham
Mr. Bride
Mrs. Cecil
Girl Grief
Miss Tuttle, Principal
Partners in Crime
Housekeeper
Red Foam
The Social Secretary
Spinster (uncredited)
Opened by Mistake
Head Nurse
Nature in the Wrong
Muriel's mother
A Trick of Hearts
The Mayor
The Daughter Pays
A Model Husband
Mrs Gossip