Alma Kruger

Alma Kruger (September 13, 1871 – April 5, 1960) was an American actress born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She built an extensive stage career spanning nearly three decades before transitioning to film and radio work later in life.

Kruger performed on Broadway from 1907 to 1935, appearing in a range of productions that included Shakespearean roles alongside contemporary plays. Her classical stage work encompassed the role of Gertrude in Hamlet, Olivia in Twelfth Night, the Widow in The Taming of the Shrew, and Nerissa in The Merchant of Venice. Her Broadway credits also included the plays Pride and Prejudice, Few Are Chosen, Field of Ermine, John Brown's Body, and Men Must Fight.

Samuel Goldwyn brought Kruger to Hollywood, where she made her film debut in These Three in 1936, at which point she was already in her sixties. Over the following decade she appeared in more than 40 films. She became particularly associated with the Dr. Kildare and Dr. Gillespie film series, in which she played Nurse Molly Byrd, the superintendent of nurses, appearing in all but the first two of the 16 pictures in that series. Among her other notable film roles, she portrayed Empress Maria Theresa of Austria in Marie Antoinette (1938), appeared opposite Rosalind Russell in both Craig's Wife and His Girl Friday (1940), and played the subversive society matron Henrietta Sutton in Alfred Hitchcock's Saboteur (1942). Her final film appearance came in Forever Amber (1947).

On radio, Kruger played Emily Mayfield on Those We Love and the captain's wife on Show Boat. She died of natural causes on April 5, 1960, in a nursing home in Seattle, Washington, at approximately 88 years of age.