[Deathwatch] Katy Jurado, Actress, 78

Fri, 5 Jul 2002 15:32:10 -0700 (PDT)

Actress Katy Jurado dies at 78
July 5, 2002 Posted: 6:10 PM EDT (2210 GMT)

http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/americas/07/05/obit.katy.jurado.ap/index.
html

MEXICO CITY, Mexico (AP) -- Katy Jurado, the Mexican actress who played
a sultry wildcat in some of the top American films of the 1950s and
gained an Academy Award nomination, died Friday at the age of 78. 

Jurado died at her home in Cuernavaca, 35 miles south of the capital,
according to Francisco Corona, spokesman for the National Actors
Association. She had suffered from lung and heart ailments. 

Most famous in the United States for her role as Gary Cooper's former
mistress in 1952's "High Noon," she was nominated for a
supporting-actress Oscar for her role opposite Spencer Tracy in the
1954 western "Broken Lance." 

She was divorced from actor Ernest Borgnine, who once called her
"beautiful, but a tiger." While that phrase defined her most famous
film roles, she played a variety of characters in movies such as "Under
the Volcano," "The Children of Sanchez" and "Barabbas." 

She acted alongside some of the most famous male stars: John Wayne,
Marlon Brando, Clark Gable, Burt Lancaster and Elvis Presley. 

In her home country -- where she continued acting in movies until 1998
-- she was more remembered for her role in the 1957 Mexican melodrama
"Nosotros Los Pobres," or "We the Poor," featuring the country's most
famous male heartthrob, Pedro Infante. 

She won an Ariel, Mexico's highest acting award, for her role in
Spanish director Luis Bunuel's 1952 film "El Bruto." 

"She planted the Mexican flag in the U.S. film industry, and made her
country proud," said Mauricio Hernandez, an actors' association
official. 

Born Maria Cristina Jurado Garcia on Jan. 16, 1924, in the western city
of Guadalajara, she is survived by a daughter. Her remains were
transferred to a funeral home in Mexico City. Burial plans were not
immediately announced. 