At Almost 101, She Is the Oldest Living Actress
Hollywood doesn't usually let you age in peace — unless you're her. While most stars fade into obscurity or tabloid nostalgia, she's still around, still sharp, and officially the oldest living Oscar winner.
Eva Marie Saint turned 100 years old on July 4, 2024, and quietly became a living monument to Hollywood history. She's not just the oldest living Oscar winner — she's the earliest living winner, the last survivor of the 1950s blacklist era, and possibly the only person alive who remembers when studios handed out 7-year contracts and subpoenas in the same week.
She won her Oscar in 1955 for On the Waterfront, just two days before giving birth to her first child. That same year, she made a brief, well-meaning comment about dockworkers during her acceptance speech — and got herself subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee. When asked to name names, she refused. "I won't participate in ruining careers based on rumors and fear." That one sentence cost her everything: roles vanished, calls stopped, and by 1956, her name showed up in Red Channels, the blacklist bible of the time.
For a while, her career flatlined. But then came Hitchcock.
In 1959, Alfred Hitchcock cast her in North by Northwest opposite Cary Grant — and completely reinvented her. He taught her to lower her voice, use no hand gestures, and make every word count. One scene with Grant on a train became so charged, a photographer fell off a ladder trying to get a behind-the-scenes shot. The film was a massive hit, and Saint suddenly went from gritty drama actress to icy Hitchcock blonde.
She worked with everyone: Brando, Newman, Sinatra, Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Montgomery Clift. She did Broadway, she won an Emmy in 1990, and she played Martha Kent in Superman Returns at age 81. At 89, she popped up again in Winter's Tale.
She never stopped giving back. Bowling Green State University, where she first discovered acting, named a theater after her and made her birthday — October 13 — Eva Marie Saint Day. She also funds scholarships for young actors.
In 2018, she walked onto the Oscars stage at age 93, cracked a joke about being older than the Academy, and brought the house down. TCM dedicated July 2024 to her, airing On the Waterfront in prime time on her 100th birthday.