The Tragedies and Triumphs of Actress Patricia Neal

By PopEater Staff Posted Aug 9th 2010 06:00PM

Patricia Neal experienced as many tragedies off screen as as she did triumphs on screen.

The Oscar-winning actress, who succumbed to lung cancer at the age of 84 this past Sunday, had a life marked with tragic circumstances immersed with her Hollywood success.

While filming 'The Fountainhead,' the actress began an affair with the married Gary Cooper. Neal became pregnant but Cooper would not leave his wife and daughter for the young starlet, and encouraged her to have an abortion.

Furthermore, the movie itself was a bomb. "You knew, from the very first reel, it was destined to be a monumental bomb ... My status changed immediately. That was the end of my career as a second Garbo," Neal said after watching, The New York Times reports.

It was around this time that she left Hollywood for New York, due to the stress of the end of her romance with Cooper.

She then met and married acclaimed author Roald Dahl in 1953, despite the fact that she did not love him, according to her autobiography.

In 1960, Neal's 4-month-old son with Dahl, named Theo, was hit by a taxi, leaving him brain-damaged. Two years later, their oldest daughter Olivia died of measles at the age of 7.

But her career continued to peak. She appeared in 1961's classic 'Breakfast at Tiffany's,' and at the 1964 Academy Awards, Neal earned the trophy for best actress in a leading role for 'Hud.'

Tragedy was never far away, though. The honored actress became pregnant with her youngest child Lucy in 1965, but suffered a series of strokes that left her in a coma for three weeks. Fortunately, she gave birth without complications, but her road to recovery was not easy.

According to the New York Times, surgeons worked on Neal for 14 hours after she collapsed in her Beverly Hills home. Two weeks later, her doctor told Dahl his wife would live. "I'm not sure whether or not I've done her a favor," the surgeon told him at the time.

But Dahl became merciless with her recovery, putting her into physical and speech therapy and continued to be demanding of her on his own. Gradually, she regained her ability to walk and talk.

Then he announced, in 1967, that she would speak at a charity dinner for brain-damaged children, and later Neal recollected in her tome: "I knew at that moment that Roald the slave driver, Roald the bastard, with his relentless scourge, Roald the Rotten, as I had called him more than once, had thrown me back into the deep water. Where I belonged."

Shortly thereafter, she was offered the now-iconic role of Mrs. Robinson in 'The Graduate,' but turned it down, believing it to be too soon after her strokes.

Nevertheless, she would work on the big screen again. 'The Subject Was Roses' became her next feature film, which earned her a second Oscar nomination in 1969.

Of course, her personal life struck again. Her 30-year marriage to Dahl ended in 1983, when she found out about her husbands infidelities with her close friend, Felicity Crosland.

After her divorce, Patricia continued to appear on the big and small screens in lesser roles and worked to open and fund raise for the Patricia Neal Rehabilitation Center which aids brain-injured adults and children.

"I can't see from one eye. I've been paralyzed. I've fallen down and broken a hip. Stubbornness gets you through the bad times. You don't give in," she said in 1988.

Tags: Gary Cooper, Patricia Neal, roald dahl

Comments

(87)

Monday 09 August

By Ricahrd

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I worked at your rehab for many years in knoxville tennessee and spoke with her many times she will so be missed by all of us

By don

Probably one of the greatest actress ever. RIP.

By colleen

I am wondering how a 4 month old gets hit by a taxi?

By trop10

How does a FOUR MONTH OLD KID get hit by a taxi? Four months? They can barely crawl... that cannot be right...

By Dave in NY

The baby was in a carriage at the time and the taxi hit the carriage.

By missy

Theo was in a baby carraige i believe he was with the nanny and the carraige rolled in front of the taxi.

By mikeyram

Miss Neal was a fine lady and a great actress. RIP.

By maze39

Ms. Neal helped me find my young son, who was hiding in a clothes rack in a store on Martha's Vineyard. For that I will always be grateful.

Tuesday 10 August

By Nick Mayor

What an irony that someone whose work brought joy to millions could have endured so much tragedy. Ms. Neal was a great actress and an inspiration at a time when people with conditions like hers would have been written off. RIP.

By Fred

This story suggests, but never clarifies whether she aborted Cooper's baby.

By GG357

The chemistry between Ms. Neal and Gary Cooper was wonderful to watch onscreen; they sizzled. I enjoyed "The Fountainhead" and always thought the characters in the movie paralleled the personalities of the two stars. As for the affair: What woman wouldn't want Gary Cooper?! And what man wouldn't want Patricia Neal?!

By Susan

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Doesn't anybody remember the Good Housekeeping article about her printed in the 80s? She evidently was not ashamed to admit that she slept her way through Hollywood. Gary was far from the only one. It's always the mistress who is offended when the wife doesn't step aside for her. The word for this woman is a tramp. All the bad things that happened to her have nothing to do with her choices before that except her choice to be a heavy smoker. That scratchy voice was nothing more than a smoker's voice. I never saw any redeeming qualities in her acting.

By ashley

Please show some respect for the grieving family. She was an amazing woman and a loving mother, sister, and aunt to those still alive. Spewing hatred from a keyboard about a person you did not know is low. Pat was a great actress, but she was an even better person.

By Joe Durbin

Two excellent movies also starring Patricia Neal were A Face in the Crowd with Andy Griffith and Hud with Paul Newman.
She was a great actress.

By Sue Ellen

How does a four month old baby get hit by a taxi?

By Stina

I wondered the same thing. Hit while in a baby carriage.

By Amanda

The article mentioned her abortion but it did not mention the fact that MS. Neal greatly regretted that decision and that she spoke out about the fact that all children deserve to have their life protected. She carried that experience with her throughout her life and fought to protect the lives of all the unborn babies in this world.

By Brian Workman

P.O. was a real sweetheart and it's sad that she's gone, but she's now walking on soft green pastures, in cool breezes, in painless bliss.

By maria

She said the only thing she regretted in her life was having an abortion. Bet ther'll be multitudes of woman saying that when they hit 60-70.

I particularly remember her as the mother in the Waltons pilot movie. She kind of played a creepy Mrs. Walton to me, and as I child I was afraid of her during the movie . . lol. Anyway, sad when any life ends. RIP. Say hi to "Frank" for me Patricia.

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