Shout! Factory has released a highly impressive Blu-ray boxed set, "The Anne Bancroft Collection" containing key films from the Oscar-winner's career. Here is the official press release:
Los
Angeles, CA – Celebrate the extraordinary film career of actress/writer/director
Anne Bancroft in the first-ever collection of her most iconic performances, The Anne Bancroft Collection, on Blu-rayâ„¢
December 10th from Shout! Factory. From Annie Sullivan to Mrs.
Robinson, and from Helene Hanff to Anna Bronski, this Oscar®-winning
and profoundly versatile actress delivered some of the most poignant and
sharply comic characters in modern film.
Born in the Bronx as Anna Maria Louisa Italiano on
September 17, 1931, she had an early flair for entertaining a crowd. Taking the
stage name Anne Bancroft, she made her silver screen debut in 1952 alongside
Richard Widmark and Marilyn Monroe in Don’t
Bother To Knock, earning praise for her turn as a lounge singer.
In 1962, after playing Helen Keller’s beloved teacher
Annie Sullivan on stage, Bancroft reprised her role on film, winning the Oscar®
for Best Lead Actress. This was Bancroft’s first Oscar® nomination
out of five, and would be her only win, although she would also garner three
BAFTAs, two Tony Awards and two Emmys during her career.
It was around this time when Anne Bancroft met her future
husband Mel Brooks, whom she would marry in 1964. In 1967, at the age of 35, she appeared on the big screen as the sultry Mrs.
Robinson, across from Dustin Hoffman. The
Graduate was her first bona fide box office hit, and the now-iconic role
won Anne Bancroft a third Academy Award® nomination. She then
appeared in the Jack Clayton-directed The
Pumpkin Eater, in which she played a depressed housewife and earned the
film’s only Academy Award® nomination*.
In 1980, when female directors were very scarce, just 16
in the years between 1967 and 1980, Bancroft wrote and directed her first
feature film, Fatso. A heartwarming comedy about a man caught between his
health and his appetite, starring Dom DeLuise, Fatso was
produced by Brooksfilms, the production company owned by Mel Brooks, who had
been looking to produce movies that were a breed apart from his signature comedies.
After taking some time off to raise her young son, Max
Brooks, Bancroft decided to tackle a wide range of genres and characters. There
was the hilarious WWII themed To Be Or
Not To Be with Mel Brooks, Agnes Of
God in which she played a Mother Superior across from Jane Fonda and Meg
Tilly, and 84 Charing Cross Road, in
which Bancroft played Helene Hanff, a New York writer who becomes pen pals with
a London bookseller.
An overdue tribute to a trailblazing artist, The Anne Bancroft Collection houses all
of these films, paying homage to one of the greatest talents of her
generation.
The Anne Bancroft Collection Bonus Features
Don’t Bother to Knock
Isolated Music Score (DTS-HD Mono)
Theatrical Trailer
The Pumpkin Eater
“Jeremy Mortimer on Penelope Mortimerâ€
“Dinah and Fergusâ€
The Graduate
Audio Commentary From 2007 Featuring Director Mike
Nichols In Conversation With Filmmaker Steven Soderbergh
Audio Commentary From 1987 Featuring Film Scholar
Howard Suber
Interview From 2015 With Actor Dustin Hoffman
Conversation From 2015 Between Producer Lawrence Turman
And Screenwriter Buck Henry
Interview With Film Writer And Historian Bobbie O’Steen
About Editor Sam O’Steen’s Work On The Graduate
Students Of The Graduate, A Short Documentary
From 2007 On The Film’s Influence
The Graduate
At 25, A 1992 Featurette On The Making Of The Film Featuring Interviews
With Actors Dustin Hoffman And Katharine Ross, Producer Lawrence Turman,
And Screenwriter Buck Henry
Interview With Mike Nichols By Barbara Walters, From A
1966 Episode Of NBC’s Today Show
Excerpt From A 1970 Appearance By Singer-Songwriter
Paul Simon On The Dick Cavett Show
Screen Tests: Tony Bill And Jennifer Leak, Robert
Lipton And Cathy Carpenter, Dustin Hoffman And Katharine Ross
Trailer
Fatso
Looking Back On Fatso With Producers Stuart Cornfeld
And Mel Brooks
Interview With Film Historian Maya Montañez Smukler
Image Gallery
Press Kit
To Be Or Not To Be
“Brooks and Bancroft: A Perfect Pairâ€
“How Serious Can Mel Brooks Really Get?â€
Profiles
To Be Or Not To Be: That Is The Trivia!
Mel Brooks Trailers
Trailers
Isolated Score Track (DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1)
*1962: Best
Actress in a Leading Role, The Miracle
Worker; 1964: Best Actress in a Leading Role, The Pumpkin Eater (nominated); 1967: Best Actress in a Leading
Role, The Graduate (nominated); 1977:
Best Actress in a Leading Role, The
Turning Point (nominated); 1985: Best Actress in a Leading Role, Agnes Of God (nominated)