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Patty Duke

Patty Duke

Bridget

Patty Duke skyrocketed from bit player to Broadway star when, at the age of 14, she was honored with the Theater World Award as Most Promising Newcomer for her performance as Helen Keller in the Tony® Award-winning play The Miracle Worker. Reprising her role in the feature film version, Duke won a Golden Globe Award as the Most Promising Newcomer and the Academy Award® as Best Supporting Actress. At 16, it made her the youngest person at that time to win the award.

Soon after, "The Patty Duke Show" debuted, becoming a hit and earning Duke her first Emmy® Award nomination. Duke's other Emmy nominations were for her work in "Having Babies," "A Family Upside Down," "Girl on the Edge of Town," "The Women's Room," "George Washington" and "Touched By an Angel." She is the winner of three Emmy Awards for her roles in "My Sweet Charlie," "Captains and The Kings" and "The Miracle Worker," in which she played the role of Annie Sullivan. Among Duke's additional feature film credits are "Billie," "Valley of the Dolls," "Me, Natalie," "Prelude to a Kiss" and "Harvest of Fire."

In 1982, Duke was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder. At last, the demon that had plagued and mystified her for a lifetime finally had a name. Duke began taking Lithium to keep her symptoms under control and, in 1987, penned her best-selling autobiography, Call Me Anna. Five years later, she and medical reporter Gloria Hochman co-authored A Brilliant Madness: Living with Manic Depressive Illness.

Duke was first recipient of the Eleanor Roosevelt Award for Democratic Action and only the third woman in history to be elected president of the Screen Actors Guild.

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