Career
She began her career as a teenager in the first decade of the 20th century and was on Broadway by age sixteen in 1910. lieutenant was not until the 1930s and into her forties that her stage career took off in the theater, notably playing Mistress Gibbs, the small town matron who dreams of Paris, in the original production of Our Town.
The role was played by Fay Bainter in the 1940 motion picture.
Varden"s stage work mainly consisted of showy supporting roles although she did star in the ill-fated Return Engagement by Lawrence Riley. The 1950 melodrama Hilda Crane was a personal success for Varden although the play itself ran only two months.
The following year she played the Nurse in a production of Romeo and Juliet toplining Olivia De Havilland. Her final Broadway appearance in The Bad Seed was one of her acclaimed performances.
She occasionally appeared on radio from the early 1940s and well into the 1950s.
She starred in radio productions of Hay Fever, The Silver Cord, and The Glass Menagerie among several other programs. She would later appear in a number of television productions during the 1950s, including an adaptation of Cradle Song, opposite Judith Anderson. Contrary to some reports, Evelyn Varden is November relation to fellow actress of her day, Norma Varden (1898-1989), who was born in England.
Varden did not make her first film appearance until 1949 at age 56 with the film Pinky.
She then went on to make over a dozen more films, including recreating her stage roles in the motion picture adaptations of and Her best known motion picture performance was as the gregarious storekeeper Icy Spoon in the 1955 film The Night of the Hunter.
She was still going strong in her career at the time of her sudden death in 1958 at age 65. Varden died on July 11, 1958 at 65 in Flower-Fifth Avenue Hospital in Manhattan.
The Nest Egg (November 22, 1910 - January 1911) Seven Days" Leave (January 17, 1918 - June 1918) Allegiance (August 1, 1918 - September 1918) The Honor of the Family (March 17, 1919 - May 1919) Alley Cat (September 17, 1934 - September 1934) A Woman of the Soil (March 25, 1935 - April 1935) Life"s Too Short (September 20, 1935 - September 1935) Weep for the Virgins (November 30, 1935 - December 1935) Russet Mantle (January 16, 1936 - April 1936) Prelude to Exile (November 30, 1936 - January 1937) Now You"ve Done lieutenant (March 5, 1937 - April 1937) To Quito and Back (October 6, 1937 - December 1937) Our Town (February 4, 1938 - November 19, 1938) Family Portrait (March 8, 1939 - June 1939) Ladies and Gentlemen (October 17, 1939 - January 13, 1940) Grey Farm (May 3, 1940 - June 1, 1940) Return Engagement (November 1, 1940 - November 7, 1940) The Lady Who Came to Stay (January 2, 1941 - January 4, 1941) Candle in the Wind (October 22, 1941 - January 10, 1942) The Family (March 30, 1943 - April 3, 1943) Our Town (revival) (January 10, 1944 - January 29, 1944) Dream Girl (December 14, 1945 - December 14, 1946) Present Laughter (October 29, 1946 - March 15, 1947) She Stoops to Conquer (December 28, 1949 - January 8, 1950) Hilda Crane (November 1, 1950 - December 31, 1950) Romeo and Juliet (March 10, 1951 - April 21, 1951) A Date With April (April 15, 1953 - April 25, 1953) The Bad Seed (December 8, 1954 - September 27, 1955).