Watched some Taste of Fear today which got me thinking about Susan Strasberg. She seemed to pop up a lot in films I watched growing up - Picnic, The High Bright Sun, The Trip, Psych Out. She'd pop up in memoirs too usually having an affair with someone - Richard Burton, Warren Beatty, Chris Jones. No one seems to really rate her acting but I've always liked her.
She was the daughter of famous Lee and Paula Strasberg and rose to fame relatively quickly - a role in Picnic and then Anne Frank on Broadway. She was the lead in Stage Struck - big shoes to fill as it was a remake of Morning Glory. Her reviews weren't good and she never got it back. She wasn't in the Anne Frank film, she bummed around Europe, was in some unremarkable films, lost career momentum.
She seemed a natural as a precocious kid - she developed into specialty of "scared young woman". But she never seemed to really develop her gift.Or maybe she did - I don't know. The drugs and exotic love life couldn't have helped. But it is harder for women.
Her film CV includes some films to be proud of: Picnic, Taste of Fear, The Trip, Psych Out. I think it was just she started with such a bang with such tremendous lineage that her career had this aura of disappointment about it.
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