Kim Novak

American actress

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Born 1933 · age 93United States

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Wikipedia
56 languages
Cross-language footprint
Age
93
Born 1933
Known for
Vertigo
1958

Summary

Updated 2026-08-29

She was Columbia's answer to Monroe in the mid-fifties — then Hitchcock cast her in Vertigo and locked her into film history. The performance that seemed like just another studio assignment became the center of what critics now call one of the greatest movies ever made.

Biography

About

Born Marilyn Pauline Novak on February 13, 1933, she signed with Columbia Pictures in 1954 and shot to the top of the box office within a year, anchoring Picnic and The Man with the Golden Arm in 1955. Pal Joey followed in 1957, then Hitchcock's Vertigo in 1958 — a thriller that would grow in stature for decades. She worked steadily through the early sixties in Bell, Book and Candle, Strangers When We Meet, and Kiss Me, Stupid, but by 1965 she'd mostly stepped away, turning to painting and showing her work in major galleries. She surfaced occasionally — The Mirror Crack'd in 1980, a stint on F…

Voice

In their own words

Sourced, dated quotes from Kim Novak

Kim Novak

said2020

You know, I wasn't gonna wait around.

— On leaving Hollywood in the 1960s

Kim Novak

said2020

It was a tool for me. I could express what I was feeling, whether it's good feelings or bad feelings. In that case it was bad feelings.

— Answering the question "What did painting do for you after you came home from the Oscars?"

Kim Novak

saidundated

I live way out in the country, so there's not a lot of people around to remind me. And my friends don't think of me as `Kim Novak' anymore anyway. It's like they forgot, too.

Kim Novak

saidundated