Hollywood actress Taina Elg pictured during Midnight Sun Film Festival 2012 in Sodankyla, Finland on June 14, 2012. Photo: Vesa Moilanen / Lehtikuva
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Taina Elg, Finland’s first Hollywood actress and the only Finnish recipient of a Golden Globe for best actress, has died at the age of 95 in Helsinki.
Her family confirmed that she passed away on 15 May in a care facility in the capital, where she had spent her final years.
Born in Helsinki in 1930, Elg rose to international fame in the 1950s after signing a seven-year contract with the American film studio MGM.
Trained as a ballerina, she had worked in Sweden, Britain, and Monaco before her screen test in Hollywood led to a rapid ascent during the golden age of studio musicals.
Her breakthrough came with the 1957 film Les Girls, starring opposite Gene Kelly, Mitzi Gaynor and Kay Kendall. For her role, she received the Golden Globe for best actress in a musical or comedy. A year earlier, she had already won a Golden Globe for most promising newcomer.
These accolades placed Elg alongside major names of the era such as Elizabeth Taylor and James Dean, who were honoured in the same years.
Despite high expectations, Elg’s Hollywood career never reached the heights predicted. The decline of studio musicals and the rise of television transformed the entertainment industry just as she was establishing herself.
She left MGM before her contract ended and moved to New York in 1961, where she transitioned to stage and television work. Though typecast as a musical actress, Elg performed in a range of roles, including in the Broadway musical Nine in the 1980s and in Titanic at the turn of the millennium.
She also appeared in American television soap operas such as One Life to Live and in films, including Hercules in New York (1970) with a then-unknown Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Elg remained the only Finnish actress to win a Golden Globe for best actress in any category.
Her early success and lasting legacy as a pioneer of Finnish talent in Hollywood remained a
Source: www.helsinkitimes.fi
