Virginia Christine (March 5, 1920 — July 24, 1996) was an American film and television actress and voice artist.[1] Christine had a long career as a character actress in film and television. She played "Mrs. Olsen" (or the "Folgers Coffee Woman") in a number of television commercials for Folgers.
Biography
Born as Virginia Christine Kraft in Stanton, Iowa, she began working in radio while attending UCLA. She was trained for a theatrical career by actor/director Fritz Feld, whom she married in 1940. In 1942, she signed a contract with Warner Bros., and started appearing in various films. Her first film was Edge of Darkness (1942), in which she played a Norwegian peasant girl.
She was adept at imitating foreign accents when the role required it. In "The Lady in Black", a 1953 episode of Adventures of Superman, she appears as the title character, affecting a stereotypically mysterious eastern-European accent. She guest starred in two 1950s Rod Cameron series, State Trooper and COronado 9 as well as the anthology series, The DuPont Show with June Allyson and Behind Closed Doors, and the syndicated sitcom How to Marry a Millionaire.
She also appeared in the first Brian Keith series, Crusader, a Cold War drama, and in the syndicated western series Frontier Doctor, with Rex Allen and fellow guest star Robert Vaughn.
Over the years she appeared in prestigious films such as High Noon (1952) and Judgment at Nuremberg (1961), as well as horror films such as The Mummy's Curse (1944) and Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). She was a favorite of director Stanley Kramer, appearing in a number of his films. One of her most notable roles was as Hilary St. George, the bigoted co-worker of the Katharine Hepburn character in the film Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967).
Her greatest fame came in 1965 when she started her 21-year stint as the matronly Mrs. Olsen, who always had comforting words for young married couples while pouring Folgers Coffee in the TV commercials.[1] In 1971, Christine's hometown honored her by transforming the city water tower to resemble a giant coffeepot.
She died in 1996, aged 76, from heart disease.[1]
External links
| File:Commons-logo.svg | Wikimedia Commons has media related to [[commons: Category:Virginia Christine
| Virginia Christine ]]. |
- Virginia Christine at the Internet Movie Database
- Virginia Christine at the TCM Movie Database
- Des Moines Register writeup on Virginia Christine
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 "Virginia Christine, TV's Mrs. Olson, 76". Associated Press in New York Times. July 26, 1996. Retrieved 2009-02-11.
Virginia Christine, a character actress who portrayed the motherly Mrs. Olson in Folger's coffee television commercials for 21 years, died on Wednesday at her home in the Brentwood section of Los Angeles. She was 76. The cause was heart complications, her family said.
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