Joan Bennett

**Joan Geraldine Bennett** (February 27, 1910 – December 7, 1990) was a prominent American stage, film, and television actress who originated from a notable show-business family. Her career, which spanned from silent films into the sound era, included more than 70 films. Bennett's roles often included playing a *film noir* femme fatale in films directed by Fritz Lang, as well as the matriarchal character Elizabeth Collins Stoddard in the 1960s gothic soap opera Dark Shadows, where she earned an Emmy nomination in 1968. Bennett's acting career can be categorized into three distinct phases: first as an enchanting blonde ingenue, then as a sensual brunette *femme fatale*, before finally transitioning into a warmhearted wife-and-mother figure. A scandal in 1951, in which her third husband, film producer Walter Wanger, shot and injured her agent Jennings Lang in a fit of jealousy, marred her career. She was married four times and had four children. For her final film role in Dario Argento's horror film *Suspiria* (1977), she received a Saturn Award nomination.