Deaths on February 18

Maggie McNamara, American actress (b. 1928)

Marguerite "Maggie" McNamara (June 18, 1928 – February 18, 1978) was a stage, film, and television actress and model from the United States. McNamara began her career as a teenage fashion model. She first came to public attention as Patty O'Neill in the 1951 national tour of F. Hugh Herbert's The Moon Is Blue which ran concurrently with the original Broadway production. In 1952 she succeeded Barbara Bel Geddes in that role in the Broadway production. Both productions were directed by Otto Preminger, and Preminger also directed McNamara in that role in the controversial 1953 film adaptation of that work. She earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress for her role in the film.

She appeared in only three films after The Moon Is Blue and made her final film in 1963. After five guest-starring roles in television series in the early 1960s, she retired from acting. For the remainder of her life, she worked as a typist in New York City. On February 18, 1978, McNamara died of a barbiturate overdose at the age of 49.