Biography
Evelyn Varden, born Mae Evelyn Hall, was an American character actress who worked in theatre, film, radio and television. She made her Broadway debut at the age of sixteen in 1910 and appeared in more than thirty Broadway productions, including the original 1938 production of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town as Mrs Gibbs.
Varden did not begin appearing in films until 1949, when she was 56, with a role in Pinky. Her best-known screen performance was as the storekeeper Icey Spoon in The Night of the Hunter (1955). She recreated her stage role as Monica Breedlove in the 1956 film of The Bad Seed and appeared in other films including Désirée (1954) and Athena (1954). She also had television roles, among them an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents.
She died in New York City on 11 July 1958, shortly after receiving a critics’ award for her performance in the London production of Roar Like a Dove.
