Jean Simmons. Three films. One year: 1960.

The Grass Is Greener

Elmer Gantry

Spartacus

As fine a year as any performer has ever had. Three distinctly different films – comedy, drama, period spectacle. And three distinctly different characterizations by Jean Simmons. Each performance spot-on, not an off-note.

Or, take 1953. Four films. In this one year, Ms. Simmons starred opposite: Richard Burton, Spencer Tracy, Teresa Wright, Deborah Kerr, Anthony Perkins, Stewart Granger, Charles Laughton, and Victor Mature, to name but a handful.

And yet, a glance at the career of Ms. Simmons reveals that these two years barely crack the surface of her remarkable talent and output.

Consider the following directors:

David Lean. Laurence Olivier. Michael Powell. Basil Dearden. Ralph Thomas. Otto Preminger. George Sidney. George Cukor. Michael Curtiz. John Farrow. Joseph Mankiewicz. Robert Wise. William Wyler. Mervyn LeRoy. Henry King. Richard Brooks. Stanley Kubrik. Stanley Donen. Ted Kotcheff. Delbert Mann. George Schaefer. Bud Yorkin.

Or, consider the following actors:

Alec Guinness. Deborah Kerr. John Mills. Laurence Olivier. Claude Rains. Vivian Leigh. Stewart Granger. Dirk Bogarde. Anthony Quayle. Peter Cushing. Trevor Howard. Richard Burton. Victor Mature. Spencer Tracy. Teresa Wright. Anthony Perkins. Robert Mitchum. Charles Laughton. Gene Tierney. Marlon Brando. Frank Sinatra. Paul Newman. Gregory Peck. Charlton Heston. Burl Ives. Carroll Baker. Rock Hudson. Dorothy McGuire. Robert Preston. Shirley Jones. Kirk Douglas. Tony Curtis. Cary Grant. James Garner.

Jean Simmons has worked with them all. In a career which began in the 1940s, when she was a teen-ager (and which continues to this day – her latest, The Wreck, will be released in 2008), Ms. Simmons has played in Shakespeare, Shaw, comedies, dramas, westerns, noir, thrillers, spectacles, romances, melodramas, and musicals.

Tune in to ICONS Radio Hour this Sunday, October 14, 8 pm, EST, as Jean Simmons explores her extraordinary career with Steve Bogart and John Mulholland. Her warmth and intelligence shine through as Ms. Simmons discusses her co-stars, directors and films with a delightfully sharp British wit.