Hollywood East: New Canaan’s Film Connections

With their proximity to New York City, many suburban communities in Fairfield County can stake a claim to Hollywood—sometimes tenuous connections of actors passing through or keeping residences, or big screen scenes shot in town. That said, perhaps no town in our area has as many legitimate ties to Tinseltown as New Canaan. And perhaps no resident embodied these ties better—or longer— than Academy Award winning actress Eileen Heckart. Heckart—a New Canaan resident for 40-plus years, from 1960 until her death in 2001—was a celebrated star of stage, screen and television. With an acting career that spanned more than a half-century, Heckart starred opposite screen icons such as Paul Newman, Marilyn Monroe and Sophia Loren.