Ingrid Bergman
The mid-twentieth century saw Hollywood consolidate its hold on global popular culture, drawing talent from across Europe and reshaping it for international screens. Ingrid Bergman, born on August 29, 1915, in Hedvig Eleonora parish in Sweden, became one of the most visible figures to move through that transatlantic exchange.
A Swedish citizen who worked fluently in both Swedish and English, Bergman trained at Palmgrenska samskolan and later at Dramatens elevskola before establishing herself as a film actor, stage actor, and musician. Her career spanned multiple performance modes and national industries, and she also worked as an autobiographer, leaving a record of her own account of that varied professional life. The range of forms she worked in — screen, stage, and the written page — marked her as someone whose practice resisted easy categorization within any single medium.
The honors Bergman accumulated across decades reflect the breadth of that work. She received the Academy Award for Best Actress as well as the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, recognitions that placed her among a small number of performers to have won in both categories. Beyond Hollywood, she received the Nastro d'Argento for Best Actress and the David di Donatello for Best Foreign Actress, honors from Italian cinema that acknowledged her standing in European film culture. On stage, she received a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Play and Donaldson Awards, while her television work brought her a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie. France recognized her with an Honorary César.
Her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame stands as one of the more durable institutional markers of her film career. Bergman died in London on August 29, 1982 — her birthday — having received formal recognition from the film, stage, and television industries of multiple countries across four decades of work.
Quotes by Ingrid Bergman
I won’t do this movie because I don’t believe the love story,” she told Selznick. “The heroine is an intellectual woman, and an intellectual woman simply can’t fall in love so deeply.
I have grown up alone. I’ve taken care of myself. I worked, earned money and was independent at 18.
I’m only interested in two kinds of people, those who can entertain me and those who can advance my career.
There are advantages to being a star though – you can always get a table in a full restaurant.
I can do everything with ease on the stage, whereas in real life I feel too big and clumsy. So I didn’t choose acting. It chose me.
I don’t think anyone has the right to intrude in your life, but they do. I would like people to separate the actress and the woman.
Never again! I can see no reason for marriage – ever at all. I’ve had it. Three times is enough.