Joan is 5' 3" tall and has hazel eyes and blond hair.
She is a licensed Interior Decorator. Her own home is furnished with English, French and Italian antiques. Coral
and beige are her favorite decorating colors.
A rose has been named in her honor. The "Joan Fontaine Rose" is an Heirloom rose that is pale peach and white.
Her personal favorite rose is the "Mon Cherie" which is a red rose with a deep pink center. Joan's favorite colors
in roses are white, red, and deep pink.
Joan had her own syndicated talk/interview show in the 1980's. It was broadcast from New York City.
Joan's hand, foot and signature are in the forecourt of the Mann's Grauman Chinese Theatre.
Among Joan's current hobbies and interests are reading, gardening, her large dogs, and charity work.
She supports many charities. She has made sizeable donations to many humane societies and donates to various
missions in and around Carmel.
Her best-selling, well-written autobiography, "No Bed of Roses" was published in 1978.
Joan's mother, Lilian Fontaine, appeared with Joan in two movies: "Ivy" and "The Bigamist." In the latter film, her
then-husband Collier Young produced the film and appeared in the film as a barfly. "The Bigamist" was directed by
Mr. Young's ex-wife, Ida Lupino, who also starred in the production.
Joan loves to do needlepoint and has painted a picture of a spooky house and a fruit still life which she
donated to a charity auction in New York City.
Joan has said that her favorites of her own movies are "Letter From An Unknown Woman" and "The Constant
Nymph."
Joan's daughter, Deborah Dozier Potter, is married to an attorney and lives in Sante Fe, New Mexico where they have
many real estate holdings including a hotel in downtown Santa Fe which is operated by native American Indians.
Joan was a crew member of the winning hot-air balloon race in Holland.
Ms. Fontaine was a nurses' aide during World War II and also made appearances at the Hollywood Canteen in support
of the American troops.
Columbia Pictures is the only major studio where Joan did not make a film.
Joan Fontaine and her second husband, William Dozier, formed Rampart Productions and produced two films, "Letter
From An Unknown Woman" and "You Gotta Stay Happy." These films were released by Universal-International.
Joan held the distinction for 45 years of being the youngest Best Actress Oscar winner at age 24 until Marlee
Matlin won in 1986 at the age of 21.
Joan Fontaine's house in Brentwood, California burned to the ground in 1961 due to wildfires in the hills above Los
Angeles.
Boston University houses Joan Fontaine's important papers, photographs, guest books, fan letters, films, and other
documents concerning her career and her private life.
Joan Fontaine is distantly related to the late Princess Diana through the Molesworth lineage.
Joan's cousin, Sir Geoffrey de Havilland, designed and built airplanes used in both World War I and World War II.
He also designed and built commercial aircraft.
Joan Fontaine holds the distinctions as being the only actor or actress to win an acting Oscar for an Alfred
Hitchcock film (Suspicion) and as starring in the only Hitchcock-directed film to win an Oscar as Best Picture of
the Year (Rebecca).
Joan Fontaine's monologue in "This Above All" about what England means is one of the longest, if not the
longest, ever spoken by an actress in a film.
Joan's Oscar was prominently featured in an episode of the TV series, "Mr. Adam and Eve" which starred Ida Lupino
and Howard Duff.
Younger sister of actress Olivia de Havilland.
Daughter of film and stage actress Lillian Fontaine.
Joked that the musical comedy A Damsel in Distress (1937) set her career back four years. At the premiere, a woman
sitting behind her loudly exclaimed, "Isn't she awful!" during Fontaine's onscreen attempt at dancing.
Attended Oak Street School in Saratoga, California.
Daughter, with William Dozier, Debbie Dozier (Deborah Leslie Dozier - born 11/5/1948).
She is a licensed pilot, champion balloonist, expert rider, prize-winning tuna fisherman, Cordon Bleu chef and
licensed interior decorator.
Joan is a hole-in-one golfer at Cypress Point Golf Club and at Carmel Valley in California.
At the age of three she scored 160 on an infant IQ test.
Took her stage name from her step-father, George Fontaine.
Became pregnant twice in 1964, at the age of 46, but miscarried both times.
First husband Brian Aherne had a friend call her the night before their wedding to tell her he had cold feet and
couldn't marry her. Joan told the friend to tell him it was too late to call it off, that he had better be at the
altar the next morning to marry her, and he could divorce her afterwards if he wanted. He was there at the altar
and they remained married six years, never mentioning this incident to each other.
Daughter, Martita, born 3 November 1946, adopted 1952. Ran away in 1963. When Joan found her she was refused
contact with the child on the premise that her Peruvian adoption was not valid in the United States. Martita
maintained a relationship with her sister Debbie, but never spoke to or saw Joan again.
Howard Hughes, who dated her sister Olivia de Havilland for awhile, proposed to Joan many times.
She and Olivia de Havilland are the first sisters to win Oscars and the first ones to be Oscar-nominated in the
same year.
Head of jury at the Berlin International Film Festival in 1982
When her sister, Olivia de Havilland, was 9 years old, she made a will in which she stated "I bequeath all my
beauty to my younger sister Joan, since she has none".
Ex-sister-in-law of Pierre Galante and Marcus Goodrich.
Relations between Fontaine and her sister Olivia de Havilland were never strong but worsened in 1941, when both
were nominated for best actress Oscar. Their mutual dislike and jealousy escalated into an all-out feud after
Fontaine won for Suspicion (1941). Despite the fact de Havilland went on to win two Academy Awards of her own, they
have remained permanently estranged.
Alfred Hitchcock and George Cukor were her favorite directors.
According to an in-depth article on Joan by Rod Labbe in "Classic Images" magazine, Joan was offered the role of
Karen Holmes, the Army wife and adulteress, in James Jones' From Here to Eternity (1953) by Columbia after it had
purchased the film rights. Joan was subsequently forced to decline the role because, at the time, she was embroiled
in a particularly ugly custody battle over daughter Deborah from William Dozier. Leaving California to film
extensively in Hawaii would have jeopardized Joan's case. The part went to second choice Deborah Kerr, who earned
an Oscar nomination. Joan later replaced Ms. Kerr on Broadway in the original production of "Tea and Sympathy".
Allegedly was treated horribly by Laurence Olivier during their time together on the set of Rebecca (1940) as he
had campaigned for his then-girlfriend Vivien Leigh to be given the part of Mrs. De Winter.
Born Joan de Beauvoir de Havilland, Joan Fontaine began her acting career in her late teens with various West Coast
stage companies under the name Joan Burfield.
