Happy Birthday!

Shirley MacLaine celebrates her 90th with a new film

Shirley MacLaine is celebrating her 90th birthday - and has no intention of retiring.

(Bild: APA/Getty Images via AFP/GETTY IMAGES/Steven Simione)

She won the Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role in "Time of Tenderness", made "Always Trouble with Harry" with Alfred Hitchcock and starred alongside Jack Lemmon in Billy Wilder's classic "The Apartment": Shirley MacLaine is undoubtedly a Hollywood icon. Next Wednesday (April 24), the actress celebrates her 90th birthday. And she remains true to her profession even in old age and is currently shooting a new film.

She will be spending the milestone anniversary with a few good friends and doing something she still enjoys - "making a new movie - what a wonderful way to celebrate!", MacLaine wrote in her latest newsletter for April.

Still in front of the camera
In the newsletter to friends and fans, she goes on to say that in the movie "People Not Places" she plays a spry woman who begins an unlikely friendship with a homeless man while trying to mend a difficult relationship with her son. Brad Furman ("The Client", "City of Lies") is on board as director.

Shirley MacLaine on the way to her birthday party last weekend

(Bild: www.photopress.at)

She can currently be seen with "Game of Thrones" star Peter Dinklage (54) in the tragicomedy "American Dreamer", as a rich widow with a large mansion who offers an underpaid professor a deal to move in with her and inherit the house. They hit it off straight away, MacLaine told the US program "Extra TV" in March. Dinklage raved about working with the film icon as one of the "greatest experiences" of his career.

Hollywood legend
The Oscar winner is one of the last Hollywood legends - quick-witted, talented, with a penchant for the esoteric. Her once fiery red head of hair has turned gray in recent years. The old star is still very much involved in front of the camera as well as in discussions and ideas.

Shirley MacLaine in the successful US series "Only Murders in the Building"

(Bild: ©Hulu / Everett Collection / picturedesk.com)

MacLaine often talks about questions of meaning and extraterrestrials. "I read a lot about prophecies and how people receive such predictions. I'm just as interested in the phenomenon of UFOs and want to find out as much as possible about this reality," she told the German Press Agency in 2011.

"If I could wish for something for the future, it would be for us humans to turn away from materialism and turn more towards nature again." In her latest April newsletter, she shares her thoughts on Earth Day, the healing power of nature, meditation and extraterrestrial beings.

Shirley MacLaine is celebrating her 90th birthday - and has no intention of slowing down.

(Bild: APA/Getty Images via AFP/GETTY IMAGES/Steven Simione)

Thanks to Hitchcock Hollywood breakthrough
The daughter of a psychology professor and an acting teacher, Shirley MacLaine took ballet lessons at an early age and was dancing on Broadway at 18. Her younger brother Warren Beatty (87, "Reds") also became an Oscar-winning film star. MacLaine owed her first feature film role to Alfred Hitchcock. The legendary director had seen the then 20-year-old on Broadway and hired her for his black comedy "Always Trouble with Harry" (1955). In 1959, she received her first Oscar nomination with her first drama role alongside Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin in "Damn Them All".

Shirley MacLaine (far right) attending the 1976 Opera Ball with Rudolf Kirchschläger

(Bild: Kristian Bissuti, Kristian Bissuti / KURIER / picturedesk.com)

In the 1960s, MacLaine was one of Hollywood's most sought-after comedians. Under the direction of Billy Wilder, she made the romantic comedy "The Apartment" (1960) with Jack Lemmon, followed by the Wilder comedy "The Girl Irma La Douce" (1963). MacLaine shines as a naive prostitute in Paris with Lemmon as an ex-policeman who involuntarily becomes her pimp.

Her first Berlinale appearance in 1959 brought her a Silver Bear for Charles Waters' comedy "Immer die verflixten Frauen", followed by another in 1971 for her portrayal of an embittered wife in the psychodrama "Verzweifelte Menschen".

Had to wait a long time for an Oscar
The actress had to wait a long time for an Oscar: After several nominations, she finally received this award in 1984 for her leading role as a prickly widow in "Time of Tenderness". It was her fifth Oscar nomination as a leading actress. "I deserve this," she said triumphantly on stage at the time.

Shirley MacLaine won her first Oscar in 1984.

(Bild: Reed Saxon / AP / picturedesk.com)

At the Oscars in 2017, the actress was met with loud applause when she and Charlize Theron were presented with the trophy for Best Foreign Film. That year, she put her skills to the test in "Last but not least". In the comedy, she transforms herself into a mean old lady who, shortly before her death, wants to leave nothing to chance and commissions an obituary while she is still alive. Unfortunately, no one around her has anything good to say about the rich pensioner.

Affairs with actors and directors
In her autobiography "I'm through with that: and other confessions", published in 2011, MacLaine spoke candidly about her previous affairs with actors, directors and politicians. Her marriage to producer Steve Parker, which ended in divorce in 1982, lasted almost 30 years, at least on paper. Their only child, daughter Sachi Parker, was born in 1956.

In the book "Lucky Me: My Life With - and Without - My Mom, Shirley MacLaine" (2013), the daughter complained about a lonely, loveless childhood and estrangement from her mother. At the time, MacLaine rejected the account as "fictitious" and regretted her daughter's "dishonest" claims, as reported by "People".

The star left Hollywood early: MacLaine lives on a small farm near Santa Fe in the US state of New Mexico and in Malibu, California.