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
Seven Days Leave
Amelia Twymley
Sensation Seekers
Mrs. Lodge
Hell's Angels
Helen's Maid (uncredited)
Young Bride
Landlady (uncredited)
Street Scene
Alice Simpson - Welfare Worker
Manslaughter
Lydia's Chaperone (uncredited)
Car 99
Granny Adams
The Millionaire Cat
Aunt Mathilda
The Fortune Hunter
Betty Carpenter
Collegiate
Miss Curtiss
Mr. Bride
Mrs. Cecil
Bachelor Bait
Mrs. Trutmanner (uncredited)
Young People
Righteous Old Lady
Little Men
Head of Orphanage
I Married a Witch
Harriet Wooley (uncredited)
Doctor Bull
Aunt Emily Banning
The Cavalier
Lucia's Aunt
The Bank Dick
Lompoc Ladies Auxiliary (uncredited)
Night of Mystery
Opened by Mistake
Head Nurse
Little Miss Nobody
Mrs. Robinson
The Unknown Guest
Martha Williams
Mixed Nuts
Mrs. Twitchett
Borrowing Trouble
Dressmaker
Three Girls About Town
Casket Customer
Footlights and Fools
(uncredited)
King of the Jungle
Spinster in park (uncredited)
The Social Secretary
Spinster (uncredited)
Blossoms On Broadway
Leader of Committee (uncredited)
Footfalls
Lady on a Train
Girl of the Ozarks
Miss Trent
The Demi-Bride
School Teacher
Way Down East
Townswoman at Party
By Hook or Crook
Aunt Marie
Stagecoach
Boone's Landlady (uncredited)
Too Many Crooks
(uncredited)
Girl Grief
Miss Tuttle, Principal
Upperworld
Stream's Housekeeper (uncredited)
Those Were the Days!
Mrs. Moffett
The Town That Forgot God
(uncredited)
The Wild Girl
Undetermined Role (uncredited)
You're Telling Me!
Mrs. Price
Asleep in the Feet
Female Police Officer
Obliging Young Lady
Miss Hollyrod - Bird Lover (uncredited)
Wreckety Wrecks
Miss Winterbottom
Some Like It Hot
Mrs. Beckett (uncredited)
Everything’s Rosie
Hotel Proprietress
Fury
Albert's Mother (uncredited)
Woman, Woman!
Mrs. Lindsay
Union Pacific
Snoring Woman on Train (uncredited)
The Sea of Grass
Mrs. Ryan - Nurse (uncredited)
The Missing Lady
Miss Millie
The Mighty Treve
Old Maid at Dog Show
The Thin Man Goes Home
Miss Peavy
Arrowsmith
Nurse (uncredited)
Hot Saturday
Gossip on Telephone (Uncredited)
Chained
Edith (uncredited)
Tillie Wakes Up
Gossip in Ice Cream Parlor / Woman Having Picture Taken
Pack Up Your Troubles
Welfare Association Officer (uncredited)
Easy Living
Miss Swerf
The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek
Hospital Nurse (uncredited)
An Amateur Widow
Nothing Sacred
Schoolteacher (uncredited)
Prunella
The Bitter Tea of General Yen
Missionary
The Merry Widow
Animal Woman (uncredited)
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Mrs. Shackleford (uncredited)
Hail the Conquering Hero
Train Ticket Clerk (uncredited)
Going Hollywood
Briarcroft's Teacher
Little Accident
Dr. Zernecke
Champagne Waltz
Train Passenger
Design for Living
Tom's Secretary (uncredited)
Two Sisters from Boston
Mrs. Mulberry - Recital Guest (uncredited)
The Devil Dancer
Julia
The Big Parade of Comedy
Actress in 'Hollywood Party' (archive footage) (uncredited)
Stage Mother
Miss Gilford, Kitty's Music Store Boss (uncredited)
Hold Your Man
Miss Campbell (uncredited)
Mourning Becomes Electra
Louisa Ames
Amateur Daddy
Saleslady
A Girl, a Guy, and a Gob
Charwoman
Gold Diggers of 1935
Housekeeper (uncredited)
International Settlement
English Woman
Appearance of Evil
Miss Spurgeon
Millie
Helen and Angie's Landlady (uncredited)
The Story of Alexander Graham Bell
Miss Jenkins
The Return of Dr. Fu Manchu
Two in the Dark
Mrs. Potter, Landlady (uncredited)
Dancing Pirate
Landlady (uncredited)
The Old-Fashioned Way
Mrs. Wendelschaffer
Lucky Partners
Women's Club President (uncredited)
Peg o' My Heart
Smythe (maid)
What a Life
Miss Eggleston
Apache Trail
Passenger (uncredited)
Fast Workers
Tall Window-Shopper (Uncredited)
The Poor Little Rich Girl
One of Gwendolyn's Teachers (uncredited)
Vagabond Lady
Miss Perkins (uncredited)
Only Saps Work
Mrs. Partridge (uncredited)
Seven Footprints to Satan
Old Witch
Night Must Fall
College Holiday
Miss Elkins (uncredited)
Under Your Spell
School Teacher (uncredited)
Search for Beauty
Miss Pettigrew
Laughing at Trouble
Mrs. Wigby - Townswoman
Love Net
Miss Prudence Tilly
Partners in Crime
Housekeeper
Once to Every Woman
Miss Baxter’s Sister (uncredited)
The Wife Takes a Flyer
Miss Updike
Three Smart Boys
Miss Witherspoon, Superintendent
East Lynne
Charity Bazaar Committee
His Majesty, Bunker Bean
Countess Casanova
Mr. Boggs Steps Out
Widow Peddie
The Ruling Voice
Malcom's Nurse (uncredited)
Meet the Baron
Professor Winterbottom (uncredited)
One-Horse Farmers
Subway Passenger (uncredited)
Biography of a Bachelor Girl
Ship's Matron (uncredited)
American Buds
Emily
Driftwood
Mrs. Prouty
The Silent Rider
Mrs. Randall
Slightly Static
Beauty Products Announcer (uncredited)
Big Town
Miss Lovelace (uncredited)
Girls
Matron Helen Hunt
The Big Broadcast of 1937
Home Economics Woman
The Daughter Pays
Chip of the Flying U
Dr. Cecil Grantham
A Royal Romance
Miss McPherson
She Asked for It
Elderly lady (uncredited)
The Spectacle Maker
Duchess
The Arrival of Perpetua
Abigail Majendrie
Let's Make a Million
Darwin Was Right
Aunt Priscilla
The Baby Cyclone
Mrs. Crandall
Laughing Boy
Schoolteacher
Midnight Faces
Mrs. Hart
Nature in the Wrong
Muriel's mother
Timothy's Quest
Townswoman
A Trick of Hearts
The Mayor
Memories and Melodies
Customer (uncredited)
A Model Husband
Mrs Gossip
Born to Battle
Ma Cowan
Red Foam
Miss Crusoe
Miss Meeker (uncredited)
The Zero Hour
Mrs. Winslow (uncredited)
The Deadwood Coach
Matilda Shields - in play