On Reflection: An Autobiography

New York: M. Evans and Company, Inc, 1968. First edition. First Editon [stated]. Presumed first printing. Hardcover. Very good/very good. Sewn binding. Cloth over boards. 253, [1] pages. Price clipped. Signed by author. DJ is in a plastic sleeve and shows slight wear and soling. Signed on fep. Distributed in association with J. B. Lippincott Company. From Wikipedia: "Helen Hayes MacArthur (October 10, 1900 March 17, 1993) was an American actress whose career spanned almost 80 years. She eventually garnered the nickname "First Lady of the American Theatre" and was one of twelve people who have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony Award (an EGOT). Hayes also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, America's highest civilian honor, from President Ronald Reagan in 1986. In 1988, she was awarded the National Medal of Arts. The annual Helen Hayes Awards, which have recognized excellence in professional theatre in the greater Washington, D.C. area since 1984, are her namesake...She said her stage debut was as a 5-year-old singer at Washington's Belasco Theatre (on Lafayette Square, across from the White House. ) By the age of ten, she had made a short film called Jean and the Calico Doll, but moved to Hollywood only when her husband, playwright Charles MacArthur, signed a Hollywood deal. Her sound film debut was The Sin of Madelon Claudet, for which she won the Academy Award for Best Actress. She followed that with starring roles in Arrowsmith (with Myrna Loy), A Farewell to Arms (with actor Gary Cooper, whom Hayes admitted to finding extremely attractive), The White Sister (opposite Clark Gable), What Every Woman Knows (a reprise from her Broadway hit) and Vanessa: Her Love Story. However, Hayes did not prefer that medium to the stage. Hayes eventually returned to Broadway in 1935, where for three years she played the title role in the Gilbert Miller production of Victoria Regina, with Vincent Price as Prince Albert. She returned to Hollywood in the 1950s, and her film star began to rise. She starred in My Son John (1952) and Anastasia (1956), and won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role as an elderly stowaway in the disaster film Airport (1970). She followed that up with several roles in Disney films such as Herbie Rides Again, One of Our Dinosaurs is Missing and Candleshoe."