Peggy Wood

Peggy Wood was an American actress who worked on the stage for close to 50 years and became a Broadway singing star. Born in Brooklyn, she trained her voice in France with the soprano Emma Calvé, then made her 1910 stage debut in the chorus of Naughty Marietta. She starred in Maytime in 1917, and in 1928 she played Portia when The Merchant of Venice was produced. Noël Coward chose her for the original London staging of his operetta Bitter Sweet, and she took the part of Ruth Condomine in the 1941 New York premiere of Blithe Spirit. From 1949 to 1957 she played the matriarch Marta Hansen in the television series Mama, earning an Emmy nomination. Her few films include A Star Is Born (1937), The Story of Ruth (1960), as Naomi, and The Sound of Music (1965), as the Mother Abbess, which brought her Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations. She also wrote plays and autobiographies.