Patty Duke

One of Duke's early acting roles was in the late 1950s on the soap opera The Brighter Day.[10] She also appeared in print ads and in television commercials. In 1959, at the age of 12, Duke appeared on The $64,000 Question and won $32,000; her category of expertise, according to her autobiography “Call Me Anna”, was popular music.[11] In 1962, it was revealed that the game show had been rigged, and she was called to testify before a panel of the United States Senate. Duke eventually testified before congressional investigators—and broke into tears when she admitted she'd been coached to speak falsely.[12]

Duke at the beginning of her long career

Also in 1959, Duke appeared in a television adaptation of Meet Me in St. Louis as Tootie Smith, the role that had been originated in the film version by Margaret O'Brien. Duke's first major starring role was Helen Keller, (with Anne Bancroft as Anne Sullivan), in the Broadway play The Miracle Worker, which ran from October 1959 to July 1961. Duke originated the role of Keller on Broadway.[13] During the run, Duke's name was elevated above the play's title on the theater's billboard, believed to be the first time this had been done for such a young star.[14] The play was subsequently made into a 1962 film for which Duke received the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress;[15] before the film started shooting, the actress and activist briefly met.[16] At 16, Duke was the youngest person at that time to have received an Academy Award in a competitive category.[15] Duke returned to television, this time starring with Laurence Olivier and George C. Scott in a television production of The Power and the Glory (1961).

Duke with Helen Keller, whom she portrayed in both the play and the film The Miracle Worker (1962)

Duke's own series, The Patty Duke Show, created by Sidney Sheldon especially for her, began airing in September 1963. At that time, it was not known that Duke had bipolar disorder, but Sheldon did notice that she had two distinct sides to her personality and thus developed the concept of identical cousins with contrasting personalities.[17] Duke portrayed both main characters: Patricia "Patty" Lane, a fun-loving American teenager who occasionally got into trouble at school and home, and her prim and proper "identical cousin" from Scotland, Catherine "Cathy" Lane. William Schallert portrayed Patty's father, Martin as well as his twin brother Kenneth- Cathy's father; Jean Byron played her mother, Natalie; Paul O'Keefe was her younger brother, Ross; and Eddie Applegate portrayed her boyfriend, Richard Harrison (though the actor was married and several years Duke's senior.)[14] The show also featured such high-profile guest stars as Sammy Davis, Jr., Peter Lawford, Paul Lynde, and Sal Mineo. The series lasted three seasons and earned Duke an Emmy Award nomination. In 1999, the program's characters were revisited and updated in The Patty Duke Show: Still Rockin' in Brooklyn Heights, with Cindy Williams taking on the villain role of Sue Ellen Turner when Kitty Sullivan was unable to reprise her role.

After the cancellation of The Patty Duke Show in 1966, Duke began her adult acting career by playing Neely O'Hara in Valley of the Dolls (1967).[15] The film was a box-office success, but audiences and critics had a difficult time accepting all-American-teenager Duke as an alcoholic, drug-addicted singing star. While the film has since become a camp classic—thanks in large part to Duke's over-the-top performance[18]—at the time it almost ruined her career. In 1969, Duke starred in Me, Natalie, in which she played an "ugly duckling" Brooklyn teenager struggling to make a life for herself in the Bohemian world of Greenwich Village. Duke won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress (Musical or Comedy) for the role.[19][20]

Duke as Patty Lane on The Patty Duke Show, 1965

Duke returned to television in 1970, starring in a made-for-TV movie, My Sweet Charlie. Her portrayal of a pregnant teenager on the run won Duke her first Emmy Award. Her acceptance speech was rambling and disjointed,[6] leading many in the industry to believe she was drunk or using drugs at the time. In fact, Duke was experiencing a manic phase of her bipolar disorder, which would remain undiagnosed until 1982.[4] She received her second Emmy in 1977 for the TV miniseries Captains and the Kings and her third in 1980 for a TV version of her 1979 stage revival of The Miracle Worker, this time playing Anne Sullivan to Melissa Gilbert's Helen Keller. Her turns in the made-for-TV movies The Women's Room (1980) and George Washington (1984) both garnered her Emmy nominations. In the 1980s, Duke was cast in a number of short-lived TV series: the ABC sitcom It Takes Two, from Soap and Benson creator Susan Harris, was cancelled after one season; Hail to the Chief, in which she appeared as the first female President of the United States;[14] and a comedy, Karen's Song, which aired on the fledgling Fox network.[21]

Duke's film roles in the 1980s included the Canadian film By Design (1981), which garnered her a Genie Award nomination for Best Foreign Actress, and the made-for-TV movie A Time to Triumph (1986), the true story of Concetta Hassan, a woman who struggles to support her family after her husband is injured but who eventually becomes a United States Army helicopter pilot. In 1990, Duke's autobiography, Call Me Anna, was adapted for television; she played herself from her mid thirties onward. In 1992, Duke portrayed the mother of Meg Ryan's character in the film adaptation of the play Prelude to a Kiss. Duke received an Emmy nomination in 1999 for her appearances in three episodes of Touched by an Angel.

In 1985, Duke became the second woman, after Kathleen Nolan, to be elected president of the Screen Actors Guild, a post she held until 1988.[15] Her tenure as president was marked by factional in-fighting and controversy; however, she gained respect for managing to maintain solidarity among the guild's members.[22] During her term, she led industrial actions and contract negotiations and oversaw the relocation of the guild's headquarters.[22]

Duke gradually reduced her work schedule in the 2000s but took occasional TV roles, including guest appearances on shows such as Glee[23] and the reboot of Hawaii Five-0. In 2011, she joined the cast of the drama The Protector.[24] She also returned to the stage on occasion — in 2002 as Aunt Eller in a revival of Oklahoma! on Broadway[25] and in 2009 as Madame Morrible in the San Francisco production of the musical Wicked.[26] In May 2011, Duke directed the stage version of The Miracle Worker at the now defunct Interplayers Theater in Spokane, Washington.[27] In 2010, she hosted a PBS TV special “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling: An Irish Parade Of Stars”. The special was part of the My Music series, and featured Irish and Irish-American folk music and sentimental standards.

Duke reprising her role as Cathy Lane in a series of U.S. Government Social Security promos for filing for Social Security online, 2011

In 2011, Duke appeared in public service announcements for the U.S. Government, promoting the social security website. In several, she appeared as Patty and Cathy using split-screen effects. In others, she appeared with George Takei wearing a Star Trek-like costume.[28] In 2015, Duke made her final TV appearance, guest-starring on Liv and Maddie as Grandma Janice and Great-aunt Hilary, a pair of identical twins.[29]

Like many teen stars of the era, and bolstered somewhat by her appearance in the musical Billie , Duke had a successful singing career, including two Top 40 hits in 1965, "Don't Just Stand There" (#8) and "Say Something Funny" (#22).[30] She also performed on TV shows such as The Ed Sullivan Show.[31]

In 1987, Duke revealed in her autobiography that she had been diagnosed with manic depression (now called bipolar disorder) in 1982, becoming one of the first public figures to speak out about personal experience of mental illness.[6] She also suffered from anorexia and during her teenage years weighed as little as 76 pounds.[32] She attempted suicide in 1967 and was again hospitalized for mental health problems in 1969, eventually being diagnosed as manic depressive in 1982.[33] Her treatment, which included the use of lithium as a medication and therapy, successfully stabilized her moods. She subsequently became an activist for mental health causes.[6] She lobbied the United States Congress and joined forces with the National Institute of Mental Health and the National Alliance on Mental Illness in order to increase awareness, funding and research for people with mental illness.[4] In 2007, Duke appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show, talking about her bipolar disorder.[34]

Duke wrote three books: her autobiography, Call Me Anna (ISBN 0-553-27205-5) in 1987 and Brilliant Madness: Living with Manic Depressive Illness (ISBN 0-553-56072-7) in 1992.[35] A third book, In The Presence of Greatness—My Sixty Year Journey as an Actress (ISBN 9781629332352) (with William J. Jankowski), is a collection of essays about the actress's experiences with other artists and celebrities. It was published posthumously in February 2018.