 She appeared in adaptations of Noël Coward, Eugene O'Neill and William Shakespeare, and was the first person to be nominated five times for an Academy Award for acting, winning Best Actress for her performance in "The Divorcee" (1930).Reviewing Shearer's work, Mick LaSalle called her "the exemplar of sophisticated 1930s womanhood ... exploring love and sex with an honesty that would be considered frank by modern standards".As a result, Shearer is celebrated as a feminist pioneer, "the first American film actress to make it chic and acceptable to be single and not a virgin on screen".