Actress, arts advocate Kitty Carlisle Hart dies

< Prev | 1 | 2

‘A great dame’
Elegant and sophisticated — with hair, makeup and dress perfectly in place — Hart has been called a “great dame.”

In a piece on CBS’ “60 Minutes” in 2000, Marie Brenner, author of “Great Dames: What I Learned From Older Women,” said: “A great dame is a soldier in high heels. ... They lived through the Depression. They lived through the war. They were tough, intelligent and brassy women.”

Discipline ruled Hart’s success. She began every day with an exercise routine, even after turning 90.

Story continues below ↓

Hart was born in New Orleans on Sept. 3, 1910. She attended the Sorbonne, the London School of Economics and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London.

She and Hart married in 1946 and had two children: Christopher and daughter Catherine. Her husband died in 1961 at 57. In later years, she lived on the next block from Kaufman’s daughter, Anne Kaufman Schneider, and the two would confer when a revival of a Kaufman-Hart play was in the offing. In a 2002 Associated Press interview, Schneider called her “my best friend.”

She served on the state arts council from 1971 to 1996, including 20 years as its chairwoman. In 1988, she testified in Albany to a legislative committee amid complaints that the council had financed gay-oriented projects.

“We fund art,” she said. “We don’t fund anyone’s point of view.”

Hart’s special concern for women’s role in society led to her appointment as chairwoman of the Statewide Conference of Women and later as special consultant to New York Gov. Nelson Rockefeller on women’s opportunities. She also moderated a TV series called “Women on the Move.”

She served on the board of Empire State College in New York and was an honorary trustee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art.

Besides her daughter and son, survivors include three grandchildren.

Funeral arrangements were incomplete. “We’re working on a terrific memorial,” her son said.

< Prev | 1 | 2