Familiar faces go prime time

Local stars of stage, screen find success in the spotlight

By Ross Raihala
The Forum - 05/23/1999

Angie Dickinson won a Golden Globe for best actress in 1975 for her role in "Police Woman."

North Dakota's stars of stage and screen are a varied lot, indeed. But Roger Maris?

Yes, Fargo's home run king appeared in three films playing ... himself. Maris joined fellow Yankee Mickey Mantle in two 1962 films, "That Touch of Mink" and "Safe at Home." He made another cameo in 1980's "It's My Turn," starring Michael Douglas and Jill Clayburgh.

These days, Fargo's most famous blues guitarist is following Maris' lead. Jonny Lang played a janitor in last year's "Blues Brothers 2000" and appeared as himself on an episode of TV's "The Drew Carey Show."

And while she's best known as a vocalist, Jamestown native Peggy Lee picked up roles in a handful of films in the '50s, providing songs and vocals for "Lady and the Tramp" and earning a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her performance in 1955's "Pete Kelly's Blues."

As far as full-time careers in acting go, it's tough to beat Angie Dickinson. After all, she spent four years playing Los Angeles' toughest undercover cop in "Police Woman."

The NBC drama ran from 1974 to 1978 and earned Dickinson three Emmy and Golden Globe nominations and a Golden Globe win for Best TV Actress in 1975.

Born Angeline Brown in 1931, the youngster grew up in Kulm, 50 miles southwest of Jamestown.

After moving to California in 1942, the aspiring actress changed her name to Angie Dickinson, won a beauty contest and was soon on her way to screen stardom.

She made her screen debut in an uncredited part in 1954's "Lucky Me" and appeared in more than a dozen films before director Howard Hawks cast her alongside John Wayne and Dean Martin in 1959's "Rio Bravo."

In 1965, Dickinson married composer Burt Bacharach and spent the decade starring in films like "The Chase" with Marlon Brando and "Point Blank" with Lee Marvin.

After "Police Woman," Dickinson continued to work steadily in both film and television. The National Association of Theater Owners named her "Star of the Year" in 1980.

Dickinson's recent work includes the TV movies "Deep Family Secrets" and "Danielle Steel's Remembrance."

Fans of NBC's medical drama "ER" might recognize Phyllis Frelich, who played Dr. Lisa Parks in several recent episodes.

The Devils Lake native was born Feb. 29, 1944. Deaf like her parents, Frelich became one of the founding members of the National Theater of the Deaf. She performed on stage in "Songs from a Milkwood," "Woyzeck," "The Fantasticks" and "In the Hands of the Enemy."

In 1980, Frelich became the first North Dakotan - and first deaf person - to win a Tony award. She took home the prize for her role in "Children of a Lesser God," a Broadway play based in part on Frelich's life.

Frelich also starred in the TV movie "Love is Never Silent" and earned an Emmy nomination in the process.

"It isn't easy for a woman who is over 40 and deaf in show business," she said in 1988. "So I have to manufacture my own opportunities and try to sell them to someone."

Moorhead's Kurt Knudson is another local stage success. The 1954 graduate of Fargo Central High School spent years in local theater, culminating with a stint as resident director of the Fargo-Moorhead Community Theatre in 1968.

He moved to New York and landed a role in the national tour of "All Over Town," directed by Dustin Hoffman. He also acted in productions with Faye Dunaway, Lillian Gish, Peter Ustinov and Hal Linden.

Knudson also appeared on various television shows and played Baron Von Steuben in the 1985 miniseries "George Washington."

In 1995, he returned to Broadway to play Maurice in "Beauty and the Beast."

"This is a wonderful role for an old man to play," he said at the time. "I get a nap in the middle and everything."

Dickinson native Dorothy Stickney also boasted a substantial Broadway career, creating the role

of the mother in "Life with Father."

Born June 21, 1896, in Dickinson, Stickney studied at Minneapolis' North Western Dramatic School and traveled the vaudeville circuit as one of the four "Southern Belles."

Stickney got her Broadway break in 1926's "The Squall" and became known for playing character roles in hits like "Chicago" and "The Front Page."

"Life with Father," by Stickney's husband Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, opened Nov. 8, 1939, at the Empire Theater and closed seven years later, making it the longest-running nonmusical show in Broadway history.

The New York Times praised Stickney as "both sweet and witty, with a supple response to the storminess of her domestic economy."

Stickney died in 1998 at age 101. Her longtime personal secretary later donated a crate of Stickney memorabilia to Dickinson's Joachim Regional Museum.

A 1929 Paramount Pictures biography described Virginia Bruce as "a spiritual blonde of fragile sweetness ... (with) dainty beauty and that certain something called 'It.'"

That "It" girl was born Helen Virginia Briggs, Sept. 29, 1910, in Minneapolis. A month later, her family moved to Fargo.

After graduating from Fargo Central High School, Briggs moved to California to go to college, but was discovered by director William Beaudine, who urged her into a career in motion pictures.

Under the new name Virginia Bruce, the young actress made a name for herself starring in secondary films and playing the "other" woman in top-shelf movies of the day. She starred in more than 60 films, including "Slightly Scarlet," "Only the Brave" and "The Ziegfield Follies." Bruce's final screen role in America was playing Kim Novak's mother in 1960's "Strangers When We Meet."

Bruce married screen legend John Gilbert in 1932, but later divorced and remarried twice before dying in Los Angeles in 1982 at age 72.

Ann Sothern has denied she is from North Dakota, even if most biographies report she was born in Valley City on Jan. 22, 1912.

She began her film career as an extra in 1927 and starred alongside Eddie Cantor in "Kid Millions." After a long spell of B movies for Columbia and RKO, Sothern picked up a the title role of "Maisie," which was originally intended for Jean Harlow. A series of "Maisie" films continued until 1947.

In 1950, Sothern turned to the small screen, starring first in "Private Secretary" and then her own "Ann Sothern Show" from 1958 to 1961. After providing the voice of "My Mother the Car," little was heard from Sothern until she appeared with Lillian Gish and Bette Davis in "The Whales of August," a turn that earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress.

Several lesser-known North Dakota natives carved out successful, smaller-scale careers in the early days of Hollywood:

Betty Ross Clark, born in Langdon in 1896, appeared in 25 films from 1920 to 1940, including "Love Finds Andy Hardy," "Brewster's Millions" and "Murders in the Rue Morgue." Clark died in 1947.

Jamestown's Brenda Fowler was born in 1883 and landed screentime in more than a dozen movies, the most notable of which are "Stagecoach," "All This, and Heaven Too" and "Bride of Frankenstein." Fowler died in 1942.

Leroy Mason was born in Larimore in 1903 and was featured in more than 100 films, mostly westerns, thrillers and other genre pictures. He died in 1947.

Shadoe Stevens began his career on the oldest form of broadcasting, radio.

Born Terry Ingstad in 1947, he started his own radio show at age 11 in his native Jamestown. While attending the University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, he commuted to Fargo and worked nights at KQWB.

A successful radio run in Boston led Stevens to Los Angeles where he spent the early '70s as one of the city's most popular DJs. In 1975, Billboard magazine named him "Progressive Personality of the Year." Stevens also took over as the announcer of "American Top 40" and "Hollywood Squares."

Stevens made the transition from radio to movies, with roles in "The Kentucky Fried Movie," "Traxx" and "Mr. Saturday Night." For a four-year run beginning in 1993, he starred in the CBS sitcom "Dave's World."

Today, Stevens acts as the announcer for various award shows, including the Grammys, Emmys and Comic Relief. He is also the announcer for the new "Hollywood Squares" and has written several children's books.

Fargo's Charlie Korsmo decided he wanted to become an actor after attending a taping of the sitcom "Punky Brewster."

It worked. His screen debut was 1990's "Men Don't Leave" with Jessica Lange and Chris O'Donnell. He went on to star with Warren Beatty in "Dick Tracy" and Robin Williams, Dustin Hoffman and Julia Roberts in Steven Spielberg's "Hook."

After "Hook," Korsmo left Hollywood. "I had been working pretty much non-stop for three years," he said. "I was away from home all that time and when I got back at the end of it, I realized I didn't really have any of my old friends anymore. I didn't know anybody my own age and it just didn't seem like it was worth it."

Korsmo finished his high school career in Minneapolis. After his second year studying physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, he returned to the big screen with a role in 1998's "Can't Hardly Wait."

Fargo native Kristin Rudrud brought some authentic Fargo-ness to Joel and Ethan Coen's Oscar-winning "Fargo," playing the small-but-integral role of kidnapped wife Jean Lundegaard.

"My first entrance says: 'Jean enters, sobbing uncontrollably.' That was my first day on the set," Rudrud said in 1996. "It was an interesting scene to shoot. You have to be about as raw as you've ever been in your life.

"At one point, Joel came up to me and said, 'This is really hard, staying at this emotional pitch and being clear enough to take physical directions. You're doing a great job.' It was very heartening to hear that on my first day."

Before "Fargo," Rudrud acted Off-Broadway in shows with the likes of Al Pacino and Ian McKellen. Since the film, she scored a spot on TV's "Chicago Hope" as well as in the feature "Pleasantville." She also has roles in this summer's "Drop Dead Gorgeous" and "Herman, U.S.A.," a comedy currently seeking a distributor.