ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, April 7, 1996 TAG: 9604080058
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-10 EDITION: METRO
TYPE: NEWS OBIT
SOURCE: PETER B. FLINT THE NEW YORK TIMES
HER PORTRAYALS were so proper that one sequence in ``Random Harvest'' created a sensation when she was allowed to wear kilts and show her shapely legs.
Greer Garson, the actress who epitomized a noble, wise, courageous wife in some of the sleekest and most sentimental American movies of the 1940s, died Saturday morning at Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas. She was 92.
Garson, who had a history of heart problems, had lived at the long-term-care hospital for the last three years, according to Ann Harper, a spokeswoman at the hospital.
Garson became an instant success as a captivating young wife in the sentimental 1939 film ``Goodbye, Mr. Chips.'' She was nominated for an Academy Award for this first film performance and quickly became one of the 10 most popular Hollywood stars.
She received five more Oscar nominations in five years for self-sacrificing portrayals in ``Blossoms in the Dust'' (1941), ``Mrs. Miniver'' (1942), ``Madame Curie'' (1943), ``Mrs. Parkington'' (1944) and ``The Valley of Decision'' (1945). She won the Oscar for best actress for ``Mrs. Miniver,'' in which she superbly symbolized the spirit and virtue of a British homemaker in wartime.
With much of the earth ravaged by World War II, the Scotch-Irish actress with beautiful hair, blue-green eyes and alabaster complexion filled a need for a dignified and intrepid wife-mother figure. Her portrayals were so proper that one sequence in ``Random Harvest,'' a major dramatic hit of 1942, created a sensation when she was allowed to wear kilts and show her shapely legs. Otherwise, she was heavily costumed and wholesomely typecast by Louis B. Mayer.
After the war, because of inferior vehicles and changing tastes, she was unable to escape the mold.
Nonetheless, in her Broadway debut in 1958, Garson won acclaim in a comedy, succeeding Rosalind Russell as the devil-may-care ``Auntie Mame.'' Two years later, Garson received a seventh Oscar nomination for her portrayal of Eleanor Roosevelt in the film ``Sunrise at Campobello.''
While preparing for ``Auntie Mame'' she told an interviewer: ``I'm tired of playing four-handkerchief heroines in crinoline roles. I think there's a little bit of `Auntie Mame' in every woman - a kind of counterpart to the `Walter Mitty' in every man. I think Mrs. Miniver and Auntie Mame would have gotten along real well. Mame's really a doll. She promoted a liveliness and kindliness, and isn't that the best one can do?''
Greer Garson was born Sept. 29, 1903, in County Down, Ireland. Her father, George Garson, a businessman, died soon after, and she and her mother, Nina, moved to London. The name Greer was a contraction of MacGregor, her mother's ancestral name.
Garson obtained a secure post as a market researcher for a London advertising firm, but gave it up to study acting with the Birmingham Repertory Theater during two years in the provinces, where she received increasingly favorable notices.
In one theater audience in 1938 was the head of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Riveted by her performance, Mayer persuaded her to sign a movie contract for an uncommonly high starting salary of $500 a week. She confirmed his faith by her performance in ``Goodbye, Mr. Chips'' and the 1940 film version of Jane Austen's novel ``Pride and Prejudice,'' co-starring Laurence Olivier.
Her postwar, mostly unsuccessful, movies included ``Adventure'' (1946), co-starring Clark Gable; ``That Forsyte Woman'' (1949), with Errol Flynn and Pidgeon; and the cameo role of Calpurnia in ``Julius Caesar'' (1953).
LENGTH: Medium: 73 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP file/1963. Greer Garson, shown in character as Mrs.by CNBDisraeli in 1963, portrayed the dignified and intrepid wife-mother
figure in most of her films.