Actress with a notable career in films and
television. Born and raised in Hollywood, she moved to New York at
eighteen to study acting with Charles Conrad and ballet with Nina
Fonaroff. She continued her training in Los Angeles at the Estelle
Harman Workshop, securing a contract with Twentieth Century Fox.
Baker's first film assignment was a true prestige picture: legendary
director George Stevens cast her
as Margot Frank, older sister of Anne, in
Das Tagebuch der Anne Frank (1959).
Baker remained at Fox as a contract player performing in films such as
Die Reise zum Mittelpunkt der Erde (1959),
Alle meine Träume (1959)
and Neun Stunden zur Ewigkeit (1963).
After her contract ended, she worked on a pair of distinguished
projects at Universal Studios:
Die 27. Etage (1965) with
Gregory Peck and
Marnie (1964) for director
Alfred Hitchcock.
Baker was also a reliable performer in episodic television. She
produced sensitive, affecting work in
Rod Serling's touching
They're Tearing Down Tim Riley's Bar/The Last Laurel (1971)
and, in a colorful turn as an unstable dipsomaniac, in
Der alte Mann und der Tod (1976).
While continuing to perform, Baker moved into producing small,
independent films such as
Portrait of Grandpa Doc (1977)
with director Randal Kleiser and
Never Never Land (1980) with
Petula Clark, and larger projects
such as the Emmy-nominated television miniseries adaptation of
Barbara Taylor Bradford's
Des Lebens bittere Süße (1984)
with Deborah Kerr.
More recently, she distinguished herself essaying the role of clan
matriarch Rose Kennedy in the CBS
miniseries
Jackie Bouvier Kennedy Onassis (2000)
and performed memorably with
Anthony Hopkins in
Das Schweigen der Lämmer (1991)
as the distraught Senator Ruth Martin and, with
Jim Carrey and
Matthew Broderick, in
Cable Guy - Die Nervensäge (1996).
In 2005, she acted with Frank Langella in
the HBO series Unscripted (2005)
directed by George Clooney. She also
teaches acting courses in the School of Motion Pictures, Television,
and Acting at the Academy of Art University, San Francisco.
