# Nina Foch
**Nina Foch** (born Nina Consuelo Maud Fock; April 20, 1924 – December 5, 2008) was a Dutch-born American actress, acting teacher, and occasional director whose screen career ran from the 1940s Columbia B-movies through Hollywood epics such as *The Ten Commandments* (1956) and *Spartacus* (1960), and who became one of the most respected teachers of actors and directors in Los Angeles.[1](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/bio/) • [2](https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-foch7-2008dec07-story.html)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Born / died | April 20, 1924, Leiden, Netherlands; December 5, 2008, Los Angeles, of complications from myelodysplasia, a blood disorder, at 84[1](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/bio/) |
| Signature early role | Title role in *My Name Is Julia Ross* (1945), a 65-minute Columbia thriller directed by Joseph H. Lewis[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/313745/my-name-is-julia-ross) |
| Highest acting honor | Academy Award nomination, Best Actress in a Supporting Role, for *Executive Suite* (1954); lost to Eva Marie Saint for *On the Waterfront*[4](https://www.oscars.org/oscars/ceremonies/1955) |
| Other awards for *Executive Suite* | National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actress (1954) and a shared Venice Film Festival Special Jury Prize for ensemble acting[5](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/awards/) |
| Famous screen roles | Milo Roberts in *An American in Paris* (1951), Bithiah in *The Ten Commandments* (1956), Helena Glabrus in *Spartacus* (1960)[6](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/) |
| Teaching career | Taught "Directing the Actor" at USC's School of Cinematic Arts for 40 years and at the American Film Institute; students included Randal Kleiser, Amy Heckerling, Ed Zwick, and Marshall Herskovitz[2](https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-foch7-2008dec07-story.html) |
| Television distinction | Played the first murder victim investigated by Lt. Columbo, in the pilot TV movie *Prescription: Murder* (1968)[1](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/bio/) |
## Early life and training
Foch was born in Leiden, Netherlands, to the Dutch composer and conductor Dirk Fock and the American actress and singer Consuelo Flowerton, who had appeared in *The Ziegfeld Follies* and the [Rudolph Valentino](https://www.edgepedia.org/rudolph-valentino) film *Camille* (1921). Her parents divorced when she was a toddler, and she moved to New York with her mother, who encouraged her artistic interests.[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22) She studied piano seriously enough to perform as a concert pianist, also painted and sculpted, and trained as an actor at the [American Academy of Dramatic Arts](https://www.edgepedia.org/american-academy-of-dramatic-arts), where she was taught by [Lee Strasberg](https://www.edgepedia.org/lee-strasberg) and Stella Adler and became an exponent of Method acting.[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22) • [1](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/bio/)
## Film career
**Columbia years.** Her first screen appearance, at age 19, was in the eighteen-minute Western short *Wagon Wheels West* (1943). Later that year she signed a contract with [Columbia Pictures](https://www.edgepedia.org/columbia-pictures) and appeared in the horror film *The Return of the Vampire* with [Bela Lugosi](https://www.edgepedia.org/bela-lugosi), followed by *Cry of the Werewolf* (1944) and a string of crime dramas including *Shadows in the Night* (1944), *Boston Blackie's Rendezvous* (1945), and *The Dark Past* (1948).[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22) • [8](https://www.dirkfock.org/wp-content/uploads/20081208-New-York-Times-Obituary-Nina-Foch.pdf) She later described the studio bluntly: "The whole damned studio was a 'B' unit."
**Breakthrough.** In 1945 she starred in *My Name Is Julia Ross*, playing a London secretary hired by a wealthy widow, trapped in a coastal mansion, and persuaded that she is someone else. The film was shot in about three weeks on a budget under $200,000, ran 65 minutes, and was later reexamined as a model of the low-budget gothic thriller; it made over $4 million.[3](https://www.tcm.com/articles/313745/my-name-is-julia-ross) A UCLA Film & Television Archive curator credited Foch herself as the reason for a retrospective series on Columbia's 1940s "noir girls."
**The 1950s peak.** After returning to Broadway, she was cast by [Gene Kelly](https://www.edgepedia.org/gene-kelly) as Milo Roberts, the wealthy patron who finances his art and loses him to [Leslie Caron](https://www.edgepedia.org/leslie-caron), in MGM's *An American in Paris* (1951), which won the Best Picture Oscar.[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22) • [9](https://walkoffame.com/nina-foch/) She played [Marie Antoinette](https://www.edgepedia.org/marie-antoinette) in *Scaramouche* (1952) and Erica Martin, the grief-stricken secretary, in the ensemble drama *Executive Suite* (1954), directed by Robert Wise. For *Executive Suite* she received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress, the National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actress, and a share of the Venice Film Festival's Special Jury Prize for ensemble acting.[4](https://www.oscars.org/oscars/ceremonies/1955) • [5](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/awards/) Cecil B. DeMille cast her as Bithiah, the pharaoh's daughter who adopts the baby Moses, in *The Ten Commandments* (1956), and she played the manipulative Helena Glabrus in Stanley Kubrick's *Spartacus* (1960).[8](https://www.dirkfock.org/wp-content/uploads/20081208-New-York-Times-Obituary-Nina-Foch.pdf) • [6](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/)
After 1960 she did not appear in another theatrical film until *Such Good Friends* (1971), and later decades brought smaller roles in *Mahogany* (1975), *Rich and Famous* (1981), *Skin Deep* (1989), *Sliver* (1993), and *It's My Party* (1996).[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22)
## Stage and directing
Foch scored a Broadway hit in the comedy *John Loves Mary* (1947), then played Olivia in *Twelfth Night* (1949), Cordelia opposite [Louis Calhern](https://www.edgepedia.org/louis-calhern)'s Lear in *King Lear* (1950), Isabella in *Measure for Measure* and Katharina in *The Taming of the Shrew* (both 1957), and was a member of the American Shakespeare Festival in Stratford.[10](https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-cast-staff/nina-foch-14784) • [1](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/bio/) She wanted to direct, but found the industry closed to women directors in the 1950s; she worked instead as assistant director to [George Stevens](https://www.edgepedia.org/george-stevens) on *The Diary of Anne Frank* (1959), helping with the young lead [Millie Perkins](https://www.edgepedia.org/millie-perkins), and concluded that directing was not then open to her.[2](https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-foch7-2008dec07-story.html) • [7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22) She did direct a Broadway revival of *Tonight at 8:30* in 1967, and in 1999 co-directed, with Deborah Raffin, the CBS telefilm *Family Blessings*.[10](https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-cast-staff/nina-foch-14784) • [7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22)
## Television
Foch worked extensively in television from the early 1950s, as a panelist on *Q.E.D.* (1951) and moderator of *Let's Take Sides* (1957–1959), and as a guest on programs including *Your Show of Shows*, *Rawhide*, *The Outer Limits*, *Route 66*, *Bonanza*, and *I, Spy*.[7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22) In 1968 she played the first person whose murder Lt. Columbo investigates, in the pilot TV movie *Prescription: Murder*.[1](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/bio/) She appeared in the miniseries *War and Remembrance* (1988) and *Tales of the City* (1993), earned a Primetime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series in 1980 for an episode of *Lou Grant*, and in her final years played [David McCallum](https://www.edgepedia.org/david-mccallum)'s mother on *NCIS*; her last performance was on *The Closer* in 2007.[5](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/awards/) • [7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22)
## Teaching
Teaching became the center of her later career. From the 1970s she taught her course "Directing the Actor" at the [University of Southern California](https://www.edgepedia.org/university-of-southern-california)'s School of Cinematic Arts, where it was a requirement in a master of fine arts program and where she taught for 40 years, and she offered the class for years at the [American Film Institute](https://www.edgepedia.org/american-film-institute).[2](https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-foch7-2008dec07-story.html) • [7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22) Her students included the directors Randal Kleiser, Amy Heckerling, Ed Zwick, and Marshall Herskovitz; Herskovitz, who met Zwick in her AFI class in the 1970s, recalled her principle of "idiosyncratic contrapuntal juxtaposition," the idea that a scene is often played as the opposite of what the character thinks.[2](https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-foch7-2008dec07-story.html) She also ran the Nina Foch Studio, worked privately as a creative consultant to entertainers, politicians, and speechmakers, and consulted on script breakdown for directors including Ron Underwood (*Speechless*, 1994), Stephen Hopkins (*Blown Away*, 1994), and Pen Densham (*Moll Flanders*, 1996).[11](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-01-04-ca-1101-story.html) • [7](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22) She told [United Press International](https://www.edgepedia.org/united-press-international) in 1994: "Believe it or not, teaching is the most rewarding thing I do. It has been the most successful thing I've done in my life."[2](https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-foch7-2008dec07-story.html)
## Personal life and death
Foch was married three times, all ending in divorce: to James Lipton, later the host of *Inside the Actors Studio*, from 1954 to 1959; to Dennis de Brito from 1959 to 1963, with whom she had a son, Dr. Dirk de Brito; and to Michael Dewell from 1967 to 1993.[10](https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-cast-staff/nina-foch-14784) • [2](https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-foch7-2008dec07-story.html) She received two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on February 8, 1960, for motion pictures at 6322 Hollywood Boulevard and for television at 7021 Hollywood Boulevard.[5](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/awards/)
She became ill on December 4, 2008, while teaching her class at USC, and died the next day at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center of complications from long-term myelodysplasia, a blood disorder, at the age of 84.[2](https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-foch7-2008dec07-story.html) • [1](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/bio/)
## References
1. [Nina Foch – Biography, IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/bio/)
2. [Nina Foch, actress and influential acting teacher, dies at 84, Los Angeles Times (Elaine Woo, Dec. 7, 2008)](https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-foch7-2008dec07-story.html)
3. [My Name is Julia Ross, Turner Classic Movies (Sean Axmaker)](https://www.tcm.com/articles/313745/my-name-is-julia-ross)
4. [The 27th Academy Awards | 1955, Oscars.org](https://www.oscars.org/oscars/ceremonies/1955)
5. [Nina Foch – Awards, IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/awards/)
6. [Nina Foch, IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001225/)
7. [Starring Nina Foch, Turner Classic Movies (Lorraine LoBianco, 2011)](https://www.tcm.com/articles/444031/starring-nina-foch-10-22)
8. [Nina Foch, Actress in Sophisticated Roles, Dies at 84, The New York Times (Anita Gates, Dec. 8, 2008)](https://www.dirkfock.org/wp-content/uploads/20081208-New-York-Times-Obituary-Nina-Foch.pdf)
9. [Nina Foch, Hollywood Walk of Fame](https://walkoffame.com/nina-foch/)
10. [Nina Foch – Broadway Cast & Staff, IBDB](https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-cast-staff/nina-foch-14784)
11. [Gifted Teacher of Actors, Directors Receives Many Gifts in Return, Los Angeles Times (Susan King, Jan. 4, 1992)](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-01-04-ca-1101-story.html)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Screen people and creators › Screen actors of the Anglosphere and Europe › American actors: 1940s to 1960s › Surnames F to G*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license