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At the beginning of her career she played several roles at the Greek National Theatre with Katina Paxinou and Alexis Minotis. At the same time she appeared at several movies and she became a star, a protagonist at once. she creates her own personal groups and plays mostly comedy with (1960) great successs.In 1968 she gets married to Kostas Kazakos and they create their own group on stage. They stage plays of Albee (Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf) Ibsen (Hedda Gabler), and the ancient Greek tragics Sophocles (Electra, Oedipus Rex), Euripides (Medea). Her last appearence on stage was at Loula Anagnostakis (a female Greek author) play "Diamonds and Blues".At the beginning of her career she played several roles at the Greek National Theatre with Katina Paxinou and Alexis Minotis.- Katina Paxinou was born in 1900, in Piraeus, Greece. She first appeared on stage in 1928, in an Athens production of Henry Bataille's "La femme nue". In the early 1930's she was one of the founding members of the National Theatre of Greece (previously named Royal Theatre) and performed several major roles in Sophocles' "Electra", Henrik Ibsen's "Ghosts" etc, often co-starring with her husband, Alexis Minotis. The outbreak of the Second World War found her in UK; she later managed to arrive at the US, where she was offered her first film role in 1943 in For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). For her superb portrayal of the Spanish revolutionary Pilar in this classic film adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's novel, she won a Best Supporting Actress Academy Award and a Golden Globe in 1944. She made a few more Hollywood movies, before returning to Greece in the early 1950's. During 1950 - 1971, some of her great performances were as Jocasta in Sophocles's "Oedipus Rex" (1951, 1952, 1955 and 1958, also staged at that time on Broadway with enormous success), as Countess Rosmarin Ostenburg in Christopher Fry's "The Dark Is Light Enough" (1957), as Clara Zachanassian in Friedrich Dürrenmatt's "The Visit" (1961), as Mary Tyrone in Eugene O'Neill's "Long Day's Journey Into Night" (1965) and in the title roles of Euripides' "Hecuba" (1955) and Bertolt Brecht's "Mother Courage" (1971). She also starred in some other movies; she was particularly touching as the Italian matriarch in the Luchino Visconti masterpiece Rocco and His Brothers (1960). She died of cancer in 1973 and is justly considered as the greatest Greek actress of the 20th century.First non-American actress to win an Oscar for "Best Actress in a Supporting Role" and at her first screen appearance.
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Melina Mercouri was born in Athens, Greece on October 18, 1920. An early woman activist, she was elected to the Greek Parliament in 1977. Later Miss Mercouri was to become the first woman to hold a Senior cabinet post "Minister of Culture" in the Greek government. In 1971 she wrote her autobiography titled "I Was Born Greek." Melina wed actor Jules Dassin in 1966 and remained married to him until her death in 1994. Melina Mercouri died of lung cancer in New York City, on March 6, 1994.After the fall of the Greek junta she was involved in politics serving as Minister of Culture- Actress
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Aliki Vougiouklaki was born in 1934 (or 1933, according to some sources), in Maroussi Attikis, Greece. She studied at the Drama School of the Greek National Theater and made her stage debut in a 1953 Athens production of Molière's "Le malade imaginaire". Around the same time she made her movie debut in To pontikaki (1954). The late 1950's was her breakthrough period: she starred in a successful revival of George Bernard Shaw's "Pygmalion" (as Eliza Doolittle) and took the leading part in a very popular movie, Maiden's Cheek (1959). She instantly became Greece's most popular star, created her personal stage group (with a repertory including Aristophanes' "Lysistrata", Tennessee Williams' "Sweet Bird of Youth" and Sophocles' "Antigone") and starred in many films, light comedies and melodramas (in many of them she co-starred with Dimitris Papamichael, who was her husband and theater partner during 1965-1974). Her film Ypolohagos Natassa (1970) has been the biggest moneymaker in the history of Greek cinema.- Actress
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Mary Chronopoulou was born in 1933, in Athens, Greece. She studied at the Drama School of the Greek National Theater, where she made her stage debut in 1953 as a member of the Chorus in Euripides' "Hippolytus". She had a fruitful theatrical career, appearing in many plays, like Lillian Hellmann's "The Little Foxes" (as Regina), Tennesse Williams' "The Fugitive Kind" (as Carol), John Osborne's "Look Back in Anger" (as Alison Porter)and Maxim Gorky's "The Enemies" (as Tatiana Bartin). She was very active in films, too, playing a wide variety of parts in comedies, musicals, melodramas and film noirs. She also sang in some of her plays and movies; some of the songs she performed in 1960's musicals are still popular today in Greece.- Zoe Laskari was born in Thessaloniki, Greece. In 1959 she won the title of "Miss Greece" and two years later she played the female lead in Giannis Dalianidis's youth melodrama _Katiforos, O (1961)_. The success of that film made Laskari a star; she signed an exclusive contract with Finos Film, the most powerful Greek studio of the period, and appeared in many films, musicals, comedies and melodramas (most of them were directed by the prolific Dalianidis, who became her mentor). She made her stage debut in the late 1960s, but really concentrated on theater after the decline of the Greek commercial cinema in the mid-1970s; her stage work includes Edward Albee's "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" (as Martha), Euripides' "The Trojan Women" (as Eleni), Neil Simon's "Barefoot in the Park" etc.
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Martha Vourtsi was born in 1937, in Athens, Greece. She studied acting at the Drama School of "Theatro Technis" and made her professional stage debut in a 1958 Athens production of Carlo Goldoni's "Locandiera". She collaborated with many important stage groups, appearing in diverse roles: she played Sarah Muller in Lillian Hellman's "Watch on the Rhine", Hecuba in Euripides' "The Trojan Women", Mother Superior in Rogers - Hammerstein's "The Sound of Music", Asta in Iakovos Kabanellis' "I Avli ton Thavmaton" etc. She also became very popular appearing in more than 30 films during the 1960's; most of them were melodramas, in which she was typecast as a poor girl who falls in love with an upper-class man.- Actress
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Rena Vlahopoulou was born in 1923 in Corfu, Greece. She was an actress and producer, known for The Girl from Corfu (1956), A Greek Woman in the Harem (1971) and I Rena einai 'off-side' (1972). She was married to Giorgos Lafazanis, Giannis Kostopoulos and Kostas Vasileiou. She died on 29 July 2004 in Athens, Greece.Rena Vlahopoulou was born in 1923 in Corfu, Greece as Irini Vlahopoulou. She was an actress, known for I hartopaihtra (1964), A Greek Woman in the Harem (1971) and The Girl from Corfu (1957). She was married to Giorgos Lafazanis, Giannis Kostopoulos and Kostas Vasileiou. She died on July 29, 2004 in Athens, Greece.- Actress
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Vasiliadou was born in 1897, in Athens, Greece. Her real name was Georgia Athanasiou. She was obliged to leave school early and work as a shop girl, in order to help her family. She made her stage debut in 1918, but began her studies at the Gennadeios Phonetic School in 1923 and appeared in some operas. She then worked with the major theater companies of the period (Kyveli , Marika Kotopouli, Dimitris Myrat), playing a wide range of parts. In the mid-1930s she decided to retire, but Alekos Sakellarios offered her a small part in the 1939 musical comedy "Koritsia tis pantreias"; that was the genesis of a second career for the middle-aged actress, who went on to star in many comedies and revues and created personal stage groups until the late 1960s. She also made a tentative movie debut in 1930, but became one of the all-time greats of the Greek cinema during the 1950s, when she starred in extremely popular comedies like I oraia ton Athinon (1954), in which Nikos Tsiforos played with her unconventional external appearance, and The Auntie from Chicago (1957), in which director-writer Alekos Sakellarios cast her as a wealthy Greek-American who returns to Greece after thirty years and brings a fresh lifestyle to the family of her conservative brother. She died in 1980, but is always fondly remembered by Greek audiences.- Actress
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Gelly Mavropoulou was born in 1932, in Thessaloniki, Greece, but raised in Athens. She belongs to a large theatrical family and studied at the prestigious Theatro Technis (Art Theater)under the direction of Carolos Koun. She made her stage debut in a 1955 Athens production of George Axelrod's "The Seven-Year Itch" starring Melina Mercouri, and quickly became a top actress, playing important leading roles in Shakespeare's "Othello" (as Dysdemona) and "The Taming of the Shrew" (as Bianca), Aeschylus' "Oresteia" (as Goddess Athena), Molière's "Le Tartuffe" (as Dorine) and many other modern and classical plays; she often created personal groups and finished her career in the early 1990s as a member of the Greek National Theater. She also acted regularly in films and became one of the major Greek female movie stars of the 1950's and 1960's, satisfactory in both comedies and melodramas. But she enjoyed the biggest success of her career in 1971, when she starred in the legendary TV series Agnostos polemos (1971).