Bio
Helen Wagner (3 September, 1918 – 1 May, 2010) was an American actress best known for her role as Nancy Hughes McClosky on the television soap opera As the World Turns, from 1956-2010.
She is acknowledged by the Guinness Book of Records for having the longest run in a single role on television and spoke the show's very first line, Good morning, dear, on 2 April, 1956.
After making her television debut in the role of a queen in a fairy tale that General Electric produced on its experimental station in Schenectady, New York, Wagner appeared in numerous dramatic television roles including live productions of Studio One, Philco Radio Television and Suspense.
Later, Charlie Ruggles selected her to play his daughter in the series The World of Mr. Sweeney, a role she played for five years.
Wagner's Broadway credits include the Sigmund Romberg/Oscar Hammerstein musical Sunny River, Rodgers and Hammerstein's Oklahoma!, The Bad Seed, My Name Is Acquilon with Jean Pierre Aumont and Lilli Palmer and Love of Four Colonels with Rex Harrison and Lilli Palmer.
She toured as Blanche in A Streetcar Named Desire with Lee Marvin, and appeared in regional theater in Illinois as Eleanor in The Lion in Winter and in all of the women's roles in Lovers and Other Strangers.
She performed in many Off-Broadway as well as summer stock productions, at hospital benefits and in Gilbert & Sullivan tours. She also sang with the St. Louis Municipal Opera.
Wagner studied at Monmouth College in Illinois, earning degrees in dramatics and music. In New York, she continued her voice and piano training, gaining experience as a soloist in various church choirs.
In 1988, her college alma mater awarded Wagner an honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters. Wagner chaired a national committee that raised more than one million dollars to build a new theatre at her college.
At the new theatre's opening night, Wagner reprised her role as Eleanor in The Lion in Winter in a production directed by her husband, Broadway producer Robert Willey.
Wagner received the prestigious Silver Circle Award from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in 2001. In 2002, Wagner was inducted into the Buddy Holly Walk of Fame in Lubbock, Texas.
In 2004, the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences honoured her with the Lifetime Achievement Award for her role on As The World Turns.
Wagner was married to Willey from 1954 until his death in 2009. They lived in a suburb north of New York City. Wagner was born in Lubbock, Texas.
Wagner died on 1 May, 2010, at the age of 91, from cancer. Her death came less than two months before As The World Turns taped its final episode.