Claire Bradley Griswold

Biography

Claire Bradley Griswold (October 30, 1936 – March 28, 2011) was an American actress and model, active in television during the late 1950s and early 1960s. She is perhaps best known as the wife of acclaimed film director and producer Sydney Pollack, whom she married in 1958.

== Early life == Born in Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii, she was the daughter of General Francis H. Griswold and Jeff Bradley Southerland Griswold, and she had a sister. She spent her childhood living in various locations including Japan, Germany, and Washington, D.C. When the family was in London she studied ballet at the Sadlers Wells school. Griswold eventually moved to New York City, where she pursued acting and studied at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre. Before she began those studies she was a model, with her pictures appearing on the covers of Ladies' Home Journal and other magazines.

== Career == Griswold began her acting career in the late 1950s, appearing in a number of prominent American television series of the era. Her credits include:

Studio One (1948–1958) The Twilight Zone (1963) 77 Sunset Strip (1958) Lawman (1958) The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (1962) The Investigators (1961) Her work on The Alfred Hitchcock Hour led to a personal contract with director Alfred Hitchcock. At the end of 1963, Griswold retired from acting to focus on raising her children and supporting her husband's career. She had been credited with approximately 20 television appearances during her years as an actress.

== Personal life == While studying acting, Griswold was a student of Sydney Pollack, who was then working as an acting teacher. The two married in 1958, and they had a son. Pollack would go on to become one of Hollywood's most celebrated directors, winning two Academy Awards and two Primetime Emmy Awards over his four-decade career. Pollack died on May 26, 2008, of stomach cancer, after nearly 50 years of marriage. Following her husband's death, Claire Griswold died on March 28, 2011, in West Hollywood, California, at the age of 74, after suffering from Parkinson's disease.

== Legacy == Though her acting career was brief, Griswold was recognised by contemporaries as a talented and committed performer. Her connection to the Hitchcock circle and her long marriage to Sydney Pollack place her within the broader cultural history of Hollywood's golden age of cinema and television. Architect Frank Gehry, who was acquainted with the couple, recalled meeting her through mutual friends and described her as an exceptionally striking personality.

== Filmography ==