By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
Eva Marie Saint, who won an Academy Award, multiple Emmys, and a Lifetime Achievement Award from her alma mater Bowling Green State University, died today (Oct. 6, 2026) at age 102.
Ms. Saint to BGSU came following her sister to become a teacher. But skits performed in her pajamas in her sorority and then on stage, first as a “sexy lady from Hollywood” in “Personal Appearance” and later Rosalind in Shakespeare’s “As You Like It,” her only Shakespearean role, had her heading to New York City to pursue a career in acting when she graduated in 1946.
Ms. Saint went on to flub an early appearance in a television advertisement and lost a dream role of the nurse in “Mr. Roberts,” starring Henry Fonda. She did the out-of-town previews, but when the show was about to open on Broadway she was replaced by Jocelyn Brando. She was heart-broken, she told students during her last visit to BGSU in 2018. She was determined to continue her career and make sure she never felt that crushed again. She srecalled she told herself: “You can never, ever allow yourself to feel like you feel right now. You’ll never make it in acting. You’re not going to make it in life. I couldn’t survive feeling like I did losing that part.”
Ms. Saint had better luck later when she starred with Jocelyn’s younger brother Marlon in “On the Waterfront.” She won the Oscar for best supporting actress.
The New York Times in the secondary headline for her obituary summed up her career thus: “A luminous beauty with dramatic depth, she brought a layered intensity to harrowing roles and seduced Cary Grant in the romantic thriller ‘North by Northwest.’”
The role, though, she especially cherished was as a wife and mother. Saint was married to director Jeffrey Hayden for 65 years. He died in 2016. Mr. Hayden would accompany her to campus where they would perform together.
In 2018, after her husband’s death her children, Darrell and Laurette, came with her to see her receive the university’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
Ms. Saint reflected about being on campus without her husband. “It’s a little hard. I had a moment of such sorrow… because he died last year. It’s like a wave that comes over you, then you get through it. I can’t control it, it just subsides.”
From the BG Independent News archives:
