Sharaff Irene (1910–1993)

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Sharaff Irene (1910–1993)

American costume designer. Pronunciation: SHAR-eff. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1910; died in New York, NY, Aug 16, 1993; studied at New York School of Fine and Applied Arts, Art Students League, and Grande Chaumière in Paris; never married; no children.

Over the course of her 50-year career, worked on some of America's most significant musicals, often producing costumes for the stage and film productions of the same work, such as Flower Drum Song, Funny Girl, West Side Story and The King and I; also designed for non-musicals, among them the films The Sandpiper (1955), The Great White Hope (1970) and Mommie Dearest (1981); known for her stylish creations and her use of color, also worked in tv, ballet, nightclubs and fashion illustration; other films include Girl Crazy (1943), Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), Yolanda and the Thief (1945), The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (1947), An American in Paris (1951), Call Me Madam (1953), A Star Is Born (1954), Brigadoon (1954), Guys and Dolls (1955), Les Girls (1957), Porgy and Bess (1959), Can-Can (1960), Cleopatra (1963), Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966), The Taming of the Shrew (1967) and Hello Dolly!(1969).

See also Women in World History.