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Creator
Fraser, Elisabeth, 1920-2005
Call number
*T-Mss 1999-025
Physical description
2.44 linear feet (4 boxes, 2 scrapbooks)
Preferred Citation

Elisabeth Fraser Papers, *T-Mss 1999-025, Billy Rose Theatre Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.

Repository
Billy Rose Theatre Division
Access to materials
Request an in-person research appointment.Restrictions apply

Elisabeth Fraser was a stage, screen and television actress. Her papers consist of correspondence, diaries and journals, scripts and ephemera documenting her career.

Biographical/historical information

Elisabeth Fraser, actress of the stage, screen and television, was born Elisabeth Fraser Jonker in Brooklyn, NY in 1920. Miss Fraser attended school in Haiti, France and New York, graduating from Washington Irving High School. As a result of her various travels she learned to speak several languages. She also spent a number of summers in Vermont performing in summer stock companies.

Elisabeth Fraser made her New York debut in 1940 in a production of Robert E. Sherwood's play There Shall Be No Night, produced by the Playwright's Company and the Theatre Guild and starring Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne. She played the character of Kaatri Alquist, opposite Montgomery Clift. In the midst of the national tour of the production, Fraser went to Hollywood and completed a successful screen test. She made her screen debut in 1941 playing the character of Eileen Spence in One Foot in Heaven, which starred Frederic March.

For the next forty years she worked continuously on the stage, screen and television. Her best known appearance was as Sergeant Joan Hogan on the CBS television series The Phil Silvers Show, from 1955-1958. She also made guest appearances in numerous other television shows including Maude, The Monkees, The Man From U.N.C.L.E., Rawhide, Perry Mason and Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Her stage and screen appearances include Winged Victory, The Tunnel of Love, The Best Man, The Man Who Came to Dinner, Commandos Strike at Dawn, Death of a Salesman, The Glass Bottom Boat, Seconds, The Way West, The Graduate and Nine to Five.

Scope and arrangement

The Elisabeth Fraser Papers consist of correspondence, a diary, journal, clippings, scripts, screenplays, photographs, programs and ephemera relating to her various stage, screen and television roles. The collection is divided into three series: Personal Papers, Productions, and Scrapbooks. The bulk of the collection contains material directly related to a number, but not all, of the various productions she appeared in throughout her career. This material consists primarily of programs, opening night telegrams, sides, photographs and a few contracts. The photographs are all organized in a separate scrapbook. There is one full script, for Blood, Sweat and Stanley Poole; two screenplays, one for The Tunnel of Love and one for The Way West ; and a teleplay for The Scarlett O'Hara War.

The Elisabeth Fraser papers are arranged in three series:

  • Series I: Personal Papers
    1939-1966
    2 boxes

    The personal papers consist of correspondence; a diary, which she kept during the national tour of There Shall Be No Night; and a journal she wrote during the filming of The Way West and ephemera. The journal for The Way West encompasses nearly half the collection. There is both a handwritten and a typewritten manuscript copy of the journal, along with background material such as notes and correspondence. The overall correspondence is minimal, but it does include personal letters (including letters from her mother to her grandmother) as well as a few business letters. Some of the letters are photocopies.

  • Series II: Productions
    1940-1979
    2 boxes

    The production papers include clippings, scripts, programs, contracts, press releases and opening night telegrams. The scripts include sides, screenplays and a teleplay. The one full script is for Blood, Sweat and Stanely Poole. There are two screenplays: The Tunnel of Love and The Way West; the teleplay is for Moviola: The Scarlett O'Hara War and the sides are from There Shall Be No Night (under the working title Revelation), The Russian People and Winged Victory. There are also a few souvenir programs and excerpts from a radio script of a 1941 interview in Memphis, with Elisabeth Fraser and Montgomery Clift promoting a production of There Shall Be No Night. This series also contains two editions of The Luntanne Tattler, a weekly newsletter of the Lunt-Fontanne Company that was touring There Shall Be No Night in 1940-41. There are also three editions of the Gremlin, a weekly newsletter put out by the cast of Moss Hart's Winged Victory.

  • Series III: Scrapbooks
    1920-1999
    2 scrapbooks

    The scrapbooks in the collection consist primarily of clippings and photographs. One scrapbook is a collection of photographs organized and arranged by her daughter, Liza McDonald. The photographs are arranged by type with occasional captions provided by Miss McDonald. They include publicity shots, production stills and family snapshots. There is also an index and separate sheets of biographical notes, written at different points during her career. The scrapbook of clippings also includes reviews, some photographs (mostly photocopies) and ephemera, with occasional comments pasted in after the fact by Miss Fraser.

Administrative information

Custodial history

The Elisabeth Fraser Papers were donated by her daughter, Liza McDonald, in 1999.

Source of acquisition

Gift, McDonald, Liza, 1999

Processing information

Processed by Mark C. Maniak.

Using the collection

Location

Billy Rose Theatre Division
New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center
40 Lincoln Center Plaza, New York, NY 10023-7498
Third Floor

Conditions Governing Use

For permission to publish, contact the Curator, Billy Rose Theatre Division.

Access restrictions

Photocopying prohibited.