Uta Thyra Hagen (12 June 1919 – 14 January 2004) was a German American actress and drama teacher. She originated the role of Martha in the 1962 Broadway premiere of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee (who called her "a profoundly truthful actress"). Because Hagen was on the Hollywood blacklist, in part because of her association with Paul Robeson, her film opportunities dwindled and she focused her career on New York theater. She twice won the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play and received a Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in 1999. She later became a highly influential acting teacher at New York's Herbert Berghof Studio and authored best-selling acting texts, Respect for Acting, with Haskel Frankel, and A Challenge for the Actor. She was elected to the American Theatre Hall of Fame in 1981.

Biography

Uta Hagen was married to José Ferrer from 1938 until 1948. They had one child together, their daughter Leticia (born October 15, 1940). They divorced partly because of Hagen's long-concealed affair with Paul Robeson, their co-star in Othello. Hagen would later marry Herbert Berghof on January 25, 1957. They would be together for 33 years, until his death in 1990.

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