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Roberta Farnham Maxwell (born June 17, 1941) is a Canadian stage, film, and television actress.

Biography

Maxwell began studying for the stage in her early teens. She joined John Clark for two years as the child co-host of his Junior Magazine series for CBC Television. She first performed at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival in 1956.

She appeared as Ursula in Much Ado About Nothing, Lady Anne in Richard III, Olivia in Twelfth Night, and Anne in The Merry Wives of Windsor, before going on to England, where she spent three years in repertory. She made her West End debut with Robert Morley and Molly Picon in A Majority of One.

She first traveled to New York at age 19 in 1960. She debuted on Broadway in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie in 1968, going on to five more plays with the Tyrone Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis, Minnesota. In 1974, she was back on Broadway playing the role of Jill in Equus, which starred Anthony Hopkins and Peter Firth.

Maxwell played Lavinia Mannion (opposite Joan Hackett's Christine Mannion) in the 1978 PBS adaptation of Mourning Becomes Electra. In 1982, she starred as Rosalind in the Stratford Festival's stage production of Shakespeare's As You Like It, a production which was videotaped and telecast on Canadian television in 1983. In 2011, she played the duchess of York in Richard III In 2009-10 she appeared in two episodes of the Syfy series Warehouse 13.

Maxwell has also appeared in several noteworthy films including Rich Kids (1979), Popeye and The Changeling (both 1980), Psycho III (1986), Philadelphia (1993), Dead Man Walking (1995) and Brokeback Mountain (2005). Her performance in the 1998 independent Canadian dramady Last Night garnered Maxwell a nomination for a Genie Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role.

Filmography

Awards and recognition

• 1970: Obie Award for Distinguished Performance by an Actress, Whistle in the Dark — Winner
• 1971: Drama Desk Award for Best Lead Performance, Slag — Winner
• 1977: Obie Award for Distinguished Performance by an Actress, Ashes — Winner
• 1999: Genie Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role, Last Night — Nominee
• 2003: Gemini Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Dramatic Program or Mini-Series, Scar Tissue — Nominee
• 2006: Online Film & Television Association Award for Best Ensemble, Brokeback Mountain — Winner
• 2006: International Online Cinema Award for Best Ensemble (INOCA), Brokeback Mountain — Nominee

References

1. Lucas, Ralph (September 17, 2014). "Roberta Maxwell".
2. "A short trip for Roberta Maxwell". The Gazette. Montreal. March 21, 1986. p. D1. Retrieved June 19, 2014.
3. Roberta Maxwell at the Internet Broadway Database
4. 1958 sound interview, Stratford, Ontario, cbc.ca; accessed March 30, 2018.
5. "Warehouse 13 (TV Series 2009–2014)", IMDb.com, retrieved May 8, 2020

External links

• Roberta Maxwell at IMDb
• Roberta Maxwell at the Internet Off-Broadway Database

• Living people
• Canadian film actresses
• Canadian stage actresses
• Canadian television actresses
• Canadian voice actresses
• Canadian Shakespearean actresses
• Actresses from Toronto
• Dora Mavor Moore Award winners
• 1941 births