Broadway Star and 'Mockingbird's' Collin Wilcox Dies at 74

Actress Collin Wilcox, four-time Broadway star and cast member of the film 'To Kill a Mockingbird,' died of brain cancer at her home in Highlands, North Carolina last week.  She was 74-years old.

Wilcox made her professional debut in Chicago as part of the improvisational group, The Compass Players, which included Mike Nichols, Elaine May, and Shelley Berman. In 1958 Wilcox won the Clarence Derwent Award for her performance in The Day Money Stopped on Broadway. She additionall starred on Broadway in the 1961 play Look, We've Come Through with Burt Reynolds, 1963 revival of Eugene O'Neill's Strange Interlude, The Family Way in 1965.  

She is perhaps best known for her role in the film To Kill a Mockingbird, in which she played Mayella Violet Ewell, who accuses Tom Robinson (Brock Peters) of raping her. Her teary testimony on the witness stand during the cross-examination by Atticus Finch's (Gregory Peck) is considered by many to be one of the movie's most memorable scenes.

On screen, Wilcox also appeared in "Catch-22" (1970), "Jaws 2" (1978), "Marie" (1985) and the TV movie "The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman," broadcast on CBS in 1974. Her television credits include: "The Member of the Wedding," an adaptation of Carson McCullers's novel directed by 'Mockingbird's' Robert Mulligan;"Dr. Kildare," "The Fugitive," "Ironside," "The Waltons" and "Little House on the Prairie." 

She is survived by her husband, Scott Paxton.