June Squibb Biography

At the age of 84, actress June Squibb was nominated for an Oscar for her salty-tongued performance in the 2013 film Nebraska.

June Squibb is a longtime stage actress whose career took her from the American midwest to New York and beyond. She made her Broadway debut in 1960, playing the stripper Electra in the show Gypsy (with stage legend Ethel Merman). Squibb didn’t make her film debut until she was 55 years old — she had a bit part in Woody Allen‘s Alice (1990).

By that time, she was a bona fide little old lady with a certain screen presence, and she continued to get small roles in film and television, appearing in Scent of a Woman (1992, starring Al Pacino), In & Out (1997), About Schmidt (2002, briefly, as Jack Nicholson‘s departed wife) and Far From Heaven (2002, starring Julianne Moore). On television she made guest appearances on dozens of shows, including Modern Family, Grey’s Anatomy, The Big Bang Theory and Glee.

The critical acclaim for her turn as Bruce Dern’s wife in Alexander Payne‘s 2013 film Nebraska brought June Squibb into the spotlight in a new way. She earned her first Oscar nomination, as best supporting actress (although the Oscar was won by Lupita Nyong’o for her role in 12 Years a Slave.) In 2018, June Squibb returned to Broadway in the role of Josephine in the musical Waitress.