name	Gilbert Roland
birth name	Luis Antonio Dámaso de Alonso
birth date	December 11, 1905
birth place	Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico
death date	May 15, 1994
death place	Beverly Hills, California,United States
spouse	Constance Bennett (1941–45) (divorced) 2 childrenGuillermina Cantu (1954–94) (his death)
yearsactive	1923–82
occupation	Actor }}

Gilbert Roland (December 11, 1905May 15, 1994) was a Mexican-born American film actor.

Biography

He was born Luis Antonio Dámaso de Alonso in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico and originally intended to become a bullfighter like his father. When the family moved to the United States, however, he became interested in acting when he was picked at random for a role as an extra. He chose his screen name by combining the names of his favorite actors, John Gilbert and Ruth Roland. He was often cast in the typical "''Latin Lover''" role.

Roland's first major role was in the collegiate comedy ''The Plastic Age'' (1925) together with Clara Bow, to whom he became engaged. In 1927, he played Armand in ''Camille'' opposite Norma Talmadge, whom he was romantically involved with, and they starred together in several productions. Roland later appeared in Spanish language adaptations of American films, in romantic lead roles.

Beginning in the 1940s, critics began to take notice of his acting and he was praised for his supporting roles in John Huston's ''We Were Strangers'' (1949), ''The Bad and the Beautiful'' (1952), ''Thunder Bay'' (1953), and ''Cheyenne Autumn'' (1964). He also appeared in a series of films in the mid 1940s as the popular character "''The Cisco Kid''". He played Hugo, the agnostic (and totally fictional) friend of the three shepherd children in ''The Miracle of Our Lady of Fatima'', based on the apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima in 1917. In 1953 he starred in the epic ''Beneath the 12-Mile Reef'' as Greek-American sponge diver Mike Petrakis. His last film appearance was in the 1982 western ''Barbarosa''.

Personal life

Roland was married to actress Constance Bennett from 1941 to 1946. His second marriage, to Guillermina Cantú in 1954, lasted until his death forty years later.

Death

Gilbert Roland died of cancer in Beverly Hills, California in 1994, aged 88. His remains were cremated and his ashes scattered at sea.

Award nominations

Roland was nominated twice for a Golden Globe Award - for his roles in ''The Bad and the Beautiful'' (1952) and ''Cheyenne Autumn'' (1964). For his contributions to the motion picture industry, Gilbert Roland has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6730 Hollywood Boulevard.

Filmography

Features:

''The Hunchback of Notre Dame'' (1923)

''The Lost World'' (1925)

''The Lady Who Lied'' (1925)

''The Midshipman'' (1925)

''The Lawful Cheater'' (1925)

''The Plastic Age'' (1925)

''The Campus Flirt'' (1926)

''The Blonde Saint'' (1926)

''Camille'' (1926)

''Rose of the Golden West'' (1927)

''The Love Mart'' (1927)

''The Dove'' (1927)

''The Woman Disputed'' (1928)

''La Possession'' (1929)

''New York Nights'' (1929)

''Méphisto'' (1930)

''Men of the North'' (1930) (Spanish and French version also filmed)

''Resurrección'' (1931) (Spanish version of ''Resurrection'')

''The Passionate Plumber'' (1932)

''Hombres de mi vida'' (1932) (Spanish version of ''Men in Her Life'')

''The Woman in Room 13'' (1932)

''Life Begins'' (1932)

''No Living Witness'' (1932)

''A Parisian Romance'' (1932)

''Call Her Savage'' (1932)

''She Done Him Wrong'' (1933)

''Our Betters'' (1933)

''The Romantic Widow'' (1933)

''Gigolettes of Paris'' (1933)

''Tarnished Youth'' (1933) (UK version of ''Gigolettes of Paris'')

''After Tonight'' (1933)

''Una Viuda Romantica'' (1933)

''Yo, tú y ella'' (1933)

''Elinor Norton'' (1934)

''Mystery Woman'' (1935)

''Juliet Buys a Baby'' (1935)

''Ladies Love Danger'' (1935)

''La Vida Bohemia'' (1937)

''Midnight Taxi'' (1937)

''The Last Train from Madrid'' (1937)

''Thunder Trail'' (1937)

''Gateway'' (1938)

''Juarez'' (1939)

''Isle of Destiny'' (1940)

''Gambling on the High Seas'' (1940)

''The Sea Hawk'' (1940)

''Rangers of Fortune'' (1940)

''Angels with Broken Wings'' (1941)

''My Life with Caroline'' (1941)

''Enemy Agents Meet Ellery Queen'' (1942)

''Isle of Missing Men'' (1942)

''The Desert Hawk'' (1944)

''Captain Kidd'' (1945)

''The Gay Cavalier'' (1946)

''South of Monterey'' (1946)

''Beauty and the Bandit'' (1946)

''Riding the California Trail'' (1947)

''The Other Love'' (1947)

''High Conquest'' (1947)

''Robin Hood of Monterey'' (1947)

''King of the Bandits'' (1947)

''Pirates of Monterey'' (1947)

''The Dude Goes West'' (1948)

''The Rebellion of the Ghosts'' (1949)

''We Were Strangers'' (1949)

''Malaya'' (1949)

''The Torch'' (1950)

''Crisis'' (1950)

''The Furies'' (1950)

''The Bullfighter and the Lady'' (1951)

''Mark of the Renegade'' (1951)

''Ten Tall Men'' (1951)

''My Six Convicts'' (1952)

''Glory Alley'' (1952)

''The Miracle of Our Lady of Fatima'' (1952)

''Apache War Smoke'' (1952)

''The Bad and the Beautiful'' (1952)

''Thunder Bay'' (1953)

''The Diamond Queen'' (1953)

''Beneath the 12-Mile Reef'' (1953)

''The French Line'' (1954)

''The Racers'' (1955)

''Underwater!'' (1955)

''That Lady'' (1955)

''The Treasure of Pancho Villa'' (1955)

''Bandido'' (1956)

''Around the World in 80 Days'' (1956)

''Three Violent People'' (1957)

''The Midnight Story'' (1957)

''The Last of the Fast Guns'' (1958)

''Catch Me If You Can'' (1959) (unreleased)

''The Wild and the Innocent'' (1959)

''The Big Circus'' (1959)

''Guns of the Timberland'' (1960)

''Samar'' (1962)

''Cheyenne Autumn'' (1964)

''The Reward'' (1965)

''The Poppy Is Also a Flower'' (1966)

''Any Gun Can Play'' (1967)

''The Ruthless Four'' (1968)

''God Was in the West, Too, at One Time'' (1968)

''Johnny Hamlet'' (1968)

''Sonora'' (1969)

''The Christian Licorice Store'' (1971)

''Running Wild'' (1973)

''Treasure of Tayopa'' (1974)

''The Pacific Connection'' (1974)

''Islands in the Stream'' (1977)

''The Black Pearl'' (1977)

''The Sacketts (Don Luis)'' (1979 TV Movie)

''Caboblanco'' (1980)

''Barbarosa'' (1982)

Short subjects:

''La Fiesta de Santa Barbara'' (1935)

''Screen Snapshots Series 15, No. 8'' (1936)

''Picture People No. 2: Hollywood Sports'' (1941)

''Wings Up'' (1943)

References

Monush, Barry. ''The Encyclopedia of Film Actors From The Silent Era to 1965''. New York: Applause Theatre & Cinema Books, 2003.

External links

Original letter from Greta Garbo to Gilbert Roland (1943)

Photographs and literature

Category:1905 births Category:1994 deaths Category:American actors Category:American film actors Category:American silent film actors Category:Mexican emigrants to the United States Category:Naturalized citizens of the United States Category:People from Chihuahua, Chihuahua Category:Cancer deaths in California Category:Mexican film actors

de:Gilbert Roland es:Gilbert Roland fr:Gilbert Roland it:Gilbert Roland pl:Gilbert Roland pt:Gilbert Roland sh:Gilbert Roland sv:Gilbert Roland

name	Clara Bow
birth name	Clara Gordon Bow
birth date	July 29, 1905
birth place	Brooklyn, New York, U.S.
death date	September 27, 1965
death place	West Los Angeles, California, U.S.
spouse	(his death)
children	Tony Beldam (1934-2011)George Beldam, Jr. (b. 1938)
years active	1921–1933
occupation	Actress }}

Clara Gordon Bow (July 29, 1905 – September 27, 1965) was an American actress who rose to stardom in the silent film era of the 1920s. It was her appearance as a spunky shopgirl in the film ''It'' that brought her global fame and the nickname "The It Girl." Bow came to personify the roaring twenties and is described as its leading sex symbol. She appeared in 46 silent films and 11 talkies, including hits such as ''Mantrap'' (1926), ''It'' (1927) and ''Wings'' (1927). She was named first box-office draw in 1928 and 1929 and second box-office draw in 1927 and 1930. Her presence in a motion picture was said to have ensured investors, by odds of almost 2-to-1, a "safe return". In January 1929, at the apex of her stardom, she received more than 45,000 fan letters. After marrying actor Rex Bell in 1931, Bow ended her career in 1933 with the film ''Hoop-La'', becoming a rancher in Nevada.

Early life

Clara Bow was born in 1905 in a slum tenement in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, New York, where she was also raised. Bow was the third child; the first two, also daughters, born in 1903 and 1904, died in infancy. Her mother, Sarah Bow (née Gordon, 1880–1923), was told by a doctor not to become pregnant again for fear the next baby might die as well. Despite the her doctor's warning, Sarah Bow became pregnant with Clara in the fall of 1904. In addition to the risky pregnancy, a heat wave besieged New York in July 1905 and temperatures peaked around 100 °F; the infant mortality rate rose to 80%. "I don't suppose two people ever looked death in the face more clearly than my mother and I the morning I was born. We were both given up, but somehow we struggled back to life".

Bow's parents were descended from English and Scotch-Irish immigrants who had come to America the generation before. Bow said that her father, Robert (1874–1959), "had a quick, keen mind ... all the natural qualifications to make something of himself, but didn't". Others, however, characterized him as unintelligent, ugly, and physically puny. Robert seldom managed to hold on to a job and the family income varied drastically as a result. Between 1905 and 1923, the family lived at 14 different addresses; among them 160 Sands Street and 697 Bergen St., where Bow was born. Robert was often absent, leaving his family without means to survive. "I do not think my mother ever loved my father. He knew it. And it made him very unhappy, for he worshiped her, always". }}

Clara's maternal grandfather, a heavy drinker who was regularly physically abusive towards his wife, went insane. Although Clara's mother Sarah was considered very attractive, her family situation limited her marriage prospects considerably. In addition, at sixteen, Sarah fell from a second-story window and suffered a severe head injury. She was later diagnosed with "psychosis due to epilepsy", a condition apart from the seizures that is known to cause disordered thinking, delusional ideation, paranoia, and aggressive behavior.

From her earliest years, Bow learned how to care for her mother during the seizures as well as how to deal with the psychotic and hostile episodes. She said her mother could be "mean" to her, but "didn't mean to ... she couldn't help it". Still, Bow felt deprived of her childhood; "As a kid I took care of my mother, she didn't take care of me". Sarah worsened gradually, and when she realized her daughter was set for a movie career, Bow's mother told her she "would be much better off dead". One night in February 1922, Bow awoke to a butcher knife held against her throat by her mother. Bow was able to fend off the attack and locked her mother up. In the morning, Sarah had no recollection of the episode and was later committed to a charity hospital.

Sarah Bow died on January 5, 1923. When relatives gathered for the funeral, Bow accused them of not being supportive in the past. Reportedly, her anger led her to attempt jumping into her mother's open grave.

Bow attended both PS 111 and PS 9. As Bow grew up she felt shy among other girls, who teased her for her worn-out clothes and "carrot-top" hair. From first grade, Bow preferred the company of boys her age, stating, "I could lick any boy my size. My right arm was quite famous. My right arm was developed from pitching so much ... Once I hopped a ride on behind a big fire engine. I got a lot of credit from the gang for that". Her best friend, a younger boy named Johnny who lived in her building, burned to death in her presence after an accident. Bow's athletic ability led her to becoming a track champion in high-school. Of her purported arm strength, Louella Parsons noted, "... curiously enough, she has muscles on her arms that stand out like whip-cord". Bow left school at 13 and didn't return, working at Nathan's in Coney Island after the family had moved briefly to Sheepshead Bay in 1918 before returning to Prospect Heights the next year.

Motion pictures

In the early 1920s, roughly 50 million Americans—half the population at that time—attended the movies every week. Bow discovered that as she grew into womanhood, her stature as a "boy" in her old gang would be "impossible". As well, she didn't have any girlfriends, school was a "heartache" and home "miserable". On the silver screen, however, she found consolation; "For the first time in my life I knew there was beauty in the world. For the first time I saw distant lands, serene, lovely homes, romance, nobility, glamor". And further; "I always had a queer feeling about actors and actresses on the screen ... I knew I would have done it differently. I couldn't analyze it, but I could always feel it". "I'd go home and be a one girl circus, taking the parts of everyone I'd seen, living them before the glass." At sixteen Bow "knew" she wanted to be a motion pictures actress, even if she was a "square, awkward, funny-faced kid".

The New York starlet (1921-1923)

The ''Fame and Fortune'' contest

Against her mother's wishes but with her father's support, Bow competed in Brewster publications' magazine's annual nationwide acting contest, Fame and Fortune in 1921. In previous years, several of the contest's winners had found work in movies after winning. In the contest's final screen test Bow was up against an already scene-experienced woman who did "a beautiful piece of acting". A set member later stated that when Bow did the scene she actually became her character and "lived it". In the January issues 1922 of ''Motion Picture Classics'' the contest jury, Howard Chandler Christy, Neysa Mcmein, and Harrison Fisher, concluded:

''Beyond the Rainbow'' (1922)

Bow won an evening gown and a silver trophy and the publisher committed to help her "gain a role in films". But nothing happened. Bow's father told her to "haunt" Brewster's office (located in Brooklyn) until they came up with something. "To get rid of me, or maybe they really meant to (give me) all the time and were just busy", Bow was introduced to director Christy Cabanne who cast her in ''Beyond the Rainbow'', produced late 1921 in New York City and released February 19, 1922. Bow did five scenes, impressed Cabanne with true theatrical tears, but was eventually cut from the print. Bow wasn't told, but found out when she saw the movie at a theater in Brooklyn. "I was sick to my stomach", she recalled and thought her mother was right about the movie business. Bow, who dropped out of school after she was notified about winning the contest, possibly in October 1921, got an ordinary office job. However, movie ads and newspaper editorial comments from 1922–1923 suggest that Bow was not cut from ''Beyond the Rainbow''. Her name is on the cast list among the other stars, usually tagged "Brewster magazine beauty contest winner" and sometimes even with a picture.

''Down to the Sea in Ships'' (1923)

Encouraged by her father, Bow started to run around studio agencies asking for parts. "But there was always something. I was too young, or too little, or too fat. Usually I was too fat." Eventually director Elmer Clifton needed a tomboy for his movie ''Down to the Sea in Ships'', saw Bow in ''Motion Picture Classic'' magazine and sent for her. In an attempt to overcome her youthful looks, Bow put her hair up and arrived in a dress she 'sneaked' from her mother. Clifton said she was too old, but broke into laughter as the stammering Bow made him believe she was the girl in the magazine. Clifton decided to bring Bow with him and offered her $50 a week, but added he couldn't say whether or not she would "fit the part".

''Down to the Sea in Ships'' was shot on location in New Bedford, Massachusetts, produced by Independent 'The Whaling Film Corporation', and documented the life, love and work in the whale-hunter community. The production relied on a few less known actors and local talents. It premiered at 'Olympia', New Bedford, on September 25, and went on general distribution on March 4, 1923.

Bow was billed 10th, but shined through and critics sang her praise: "Miss Bow will undoubtedly gain fame as a screen comedienne". "She scored a tremendous hit in ''Down to the Sea in Ships''..(and)..has reached the front rank of motion picture principal players". "With her beauty, her brains, her personality and her genuine acting ability it should not be many moons before she enjoys stardom in the fullest sense of the word. You must see 'Down to the Sea in Ships'". "In movie parlance, she 'stole' the picture ... ".

WAMPAS Baby Star (1924)

Bow found herself walking time after time by a Broadway movie theater, staring at her name in shimmering electric light above the entrance. "I can never tell you what happiness I felt, life had been so terrible hard and it seemed to me that now all my troubles were to be in the past". By mid December 1923, primarily due to her merits in ''Down to the Sea in Ships'', Bow was chosen the most successful of the 1924 WAMPAS Baby Stars.

''Grit'' (1924)

Three months before ''Down to the Sea in Ships'' was released, Bow danced half nude, on a table, unaccredited in ''Enemies of Women'' (1923). In spring she got a part in ''The Daring Years (1923)'', where she befriended actress Mary Carr, who taught her how to use make-up.

In the summer, she got a "tomboy" part in ''Grit'', a story, which dealt with juvenile crime and was written by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Bow met her first boyfriend, cameraman Arthur Jacobson, and she got to know director Frank Tuttle, with whom she worked in five later productions. Tuttle remembered: ''Grit'' was released on January 7, 1924. ''Variety'' reviewed; "... Clara Bow lingers in the eye, long after the picture has gone."

While shooting ''Grit'' at Pyramid Studios, in Astoria, New York, Bow was approached by Jack Bachman of independent Hollywood studio Preferred Pictures. He wanted to contract her for a three months trial, fare paid and $50 a week. "It can't do any harm", he tried. "Why can't I stay in New York and make movies?", Bow asked her father, but he told her not to worry.

On July 21, 1923 she befriended Louella Parsons, who interviewed her for ''The New York Morning Telegraph''. In 1931 when Bow came under tabloid scrutiny, Parsons defended her and stuck to her first opinion on Bow:

The interview also revealed that Bow already was cast in ''Maytime'' and in great favor of Chinese cuisine.

Hollywood (1923-1933)

Preferred Pictures (1923-1925)

July 22, 1923, Bow left New York, her father and her boyfriend behind for Hollywood. As chaperon for the journey and her subsequent southern California stay, the studio appointed writer/agent Maxine Alton, whom Bow later branded a liar. In late July Bow entered studio chief B. P. Schulberg's office wearing a simple high-school uniform in which she "had won several gold medals on the cinder track". She was tested and a press-release from early August says Bow had become a member of Preferred Picture's "permanent stock". She and Alton rented an apartment at The Hillview near Hollywood Boulevard. Preferred Pictures was run by Schulberg who started as a publicity manager at Famous Players-Lasky, but in the aftermath of the power struggle around the formation of United Artists ended up on the losing side and lost his job. In 1919, at age 27, he founded 'Preferred'.

1923

''Maytime''

Bow's first Hollywood picture was an adaptation of the popular operetta ''Maytime'', in which she essayed "Alice Tremaine". Before ''Maytime'' was finished, Schulberg announced that Bow was given the lead in the studio's biggest seasonal assessment, ''Poisoned Paradise'', but first she was lent to First National Pictures to co-star in the adaptation of Gertrude Atherton's 1923 bestseller ''Black Oxen'', shot in October, and to co-star with Colleen Moore in ''Painted People'', shot in November.

''Black Oxen''

Director Frank Lloyd was casting for the part of high society flapper Janet Oglethorpe, and more than fifty women, most with previous screen experience, auditioned. Bow reminisced; "He had not found exactly what he wanted and finally somebody suggested me to him. When I came into his office a big smile came over his face and he looked just tickled to death". Lloyd told the press; "Bow is the personification of the ideal aristocratic flapper, mischievous, pretty, aggressive, quick-tempered and deeply sentimental". It was released on January 4, 1924.

New York Times: "The flapper, impersonated by a young actress, Clara Bow, had five speaking titles, and every one of them was so entirely in accord with the character and the mood of the scene that it drew a laugh from what, in film circles, is termed a "hard-boiled" audience"

Los Angeles Times: "Clara Bow, the prize vulgarian of the lot...was amusing and spirited...but didn't belong in the picture".

Variety: "...the horrid little flapper is adorably played...".

''Painted People'' controversy

Colleen Moore made her flapper debut in a successful adaptation of the daring novel ''Flaming Youth'', released November 12, 1923, six weeks before ''Black Oxen''. Both films were produced by First National Pictures, and while ''Black Oxen'' was still being edited and ''Flaming Youth'' not yet released, Bow was requested to co-star Moore as her kid sister in ''Painted People'' (AKA ''The Swamp Angel'').

Moore essayed the baseball-playing tomboy and Bow, according to Moore, said "I don't like my part, I wanna play yours". Moore, a well-established star earning $1200 a week — Bow got $200 — took offense and blocked the director from doing a close-up on Bow. Moore was married to a studio executive and Bow's protests fell short. "I'll get that bitch", she told her boyfriend Jacobson, who had arrived from New York. Bow had sinus problems and decided to have them attended to immediately. A bandaged Bow left the studio with no options but to recast her part.

1924

''The Perfect Flapper''

During 1924 Bow's "horrid" flapper raced against Moore's "whimsical". In May Moore renewed her efforts in ''The Perfect Flapper'', produced by her husband, but despite good reviews she suddenly withdrew. "No more flappers ... they have served their purpose ... people are tired of soda-pop love affairs", she told the ''Los Angeles Times'', In November 1933, Bow described the Hollywood years as a French Revolution picture, where "women are hollering and waving pitchforks twice as violently as any of the guys ... the only ladies in sight are the ones getting their heads cut off".

"If that's what my baby wants, that's what my baby does"

By New Year 1924, Bow defied the possessive Maxine Alton and brought her father to Hollywood. Bow remembered their reunion; "I didn't care a rap, for (Maxine Alton), or B. P. Schulberg, or my motion picture career, or Clara Bow, I just threw myself into his arms and kissed and kissed him, and we both cried like a couple of fool kids. Oh, it was wonderful". Bow felt Alton had misused her trust; "She wanted to keep a hold on me so she made me think I wasn't getting over and that nothing but her clever management kept me going". Bow and her father moved in at 1714 North Kingsley Drive in Hollywood, together with Jacobson, who by then also worked for Preferred. When Schulberg learned of this arrangement, he fired Jacobson for potentially getting "his big star" into a scandal. When Bow found out, "She tore up her contract and threw it in his face and told him he couldn't run her private life". Jacobson concluded, "[Clara] was the sweetest girl in the world, but you didn't cross her and you didn't do her wrong". On September 7, 1924, ''The Los Angeles Times'', in a significant article "A dangerous little devil is Clara, impish, appealing, but oh, how she can act!", her father is titled "business manager" and Jacobson referred to as her brother.

Bow appeared in eight releases in 1924. In ''Poisoned Paradise'', released on February 29, 1924, Bow got her first lead. "... the clever little newcomer whose work wins fresh recommendations with every new picture in which she appears". In a scene, described as "original", Bow adds "devices", to "the modern flapper"; she fights a villain, using her fists, and significantly, does not "shrink back in fear". In ''Daughters of Pleasure'', also released on February 29, 1924, Bow and Marie Prevost, "flapped unhampered as flappers De luxe ... I wish somebody could star Clara Bow. I'm sure her 'infinite variety' would keep her from wearying us no matter how many scenes she was in".

''Wine''

As an out-loan to Universal-Jewel, Bow top-starred, for the first time, in the prohibition, bootleg drama/comedy ''Wine'', released on August 20, 1924. The picture exposes the widespread liquor traffic in the upper-classes, and Bow portrays an innocent girl who develops into a wild "redhot mama". "If not taken as information, it is cracking good entertainment", Carl Sandburg reviewed September 29. "Don't miss ''Wine''. It's a thoroughly refreshing draught ... there are only about five actresses who give me a real thrill on the screen — and Clara is nearly five of them".

Alma Whitaker of ''The Los Angeles Times'' observed on September 7, 1924: Bow remembered: "All this time I was "running wild", I guess, in the sense of trying to have a good time ... maybe this was a good thing, because I suppose a lot of that excitement, that joy of life, got onto the screen".

1925

1925 Bow appeared in fourteen productions: six for her contract owner, Preferred Pictures, and eight as an "out-loan". "Clara Bow ... shows alarming symptoms of becoming the sensation of the year ... ", Motion Picture Classic Magazine wrote in June, and featured her on the cover. Preferred Pictures rented Bow to producers "for sums ranging from $1500 to $2000 a week". The studio like any other independent studio or theater at that time, was under attack from "The Big Three", MPAA, who had formed a trust to block out Independents and enforce the monopolistic studio system. On October 21, 1925, Schulberg filled Preferred Pictures for bankruptcy, with debts at $820,774 and assets $1,420. Three days later, it was announced that Schulberg would join with Adolph Zukor to become associate producer of Paramount Pictures, "...catapulted into this position because he had Clara Bow under personal contract".

Adolph Zukor, Paramount Picture CEO in his memoirs: "All the skill of directors and all the booming of press-agent drums will not make a star. Only the audiences can do it. We study audience reactions with great care". Adela Rogers St. Johns had a different take, in 1950 she wrote: "If ever a star was made by public demand, it was Clara Bow". And Louise Brooks from 1980: "(Bow) became a star without nobody's help ... ".

''The Plastic Age''

''The Plastic Age'' was Bow's final effort for Preferred Pictures and her biggest hit so far. Bow starred as the good-bad college-girl, Cynthia Day against Donald Keith. It was shot on location, at Pomona College, in the summer of 1925, and released on December 15, but due to block booking, not shown in New York until July 21, 1926. ''Photoplay'' was displeased: "The college atmosphere is implausible and Clara Bow is not our idea of a college girl". Theater owners however, were happy: "The picture is the biggest sensation we ever had in our theater ... It is 100 per cent at the box-office". Some critics felt Bow conquered new territory: "(Bow) presents a whimsical touch to her work that adds greater laurels to her fast ascending star of screen popularity". ''Time'' singled out Bow: "Only the amusing and facile acting of Clara Bow rescues the picture from the limbo of the impossible". Bow began to date her co-star Gilbert Roland, who became her first fiancee. In June 1925, Bow was credited for being the first to wear hand-painted legs in public and was reported to have many followers at the Californian beaches.

Paramount Pictures (1925-1931)

The free-wheeling actress

"Rehearsals sap my pep", Bow explained in November, 1929 and from the beginning of her career she relied on immediate direction: "Tell me what I have to do and I'll do it". Bow was keen on poetry and music but according to Rogers St. Johns, her attention-span didn't allow her to appreciate novels. Bow's focal point was the scene and her creativity made directors call in extra cameras to cover her spontaneous actions, rather than holding her down. Years after Bow left Hollywood, director Victor Fleming compared Bow to a Stradivarius violin: "Touch her and she responded with genius". Director William Wellman was less poetic: "Movie stardom isn't acting ability — it's personality and temperament ... I once directed Clara Bow (''Wings''). She was mad and crazy but WHAT a personality!". In 1981, Budd Schulberg described Bow as "a easy winner of the dumbbell award" who "couldn't act" and compared her to a puppy who his father B.P. Schulberg, "trained to become Lassie".

1926

In 1926 Bow appeared in eight releases: five for Paramount, including the film version of the musical ''Kid Boots'' with Eddie Cantor, and three others as an "out-loan", shot in 1925.

''Dancing Mothers''

In late 1925, Bow returns to New York to co-star in the Ibsenesque drama ''Dancing Mothers'', as the good/bad "flapperish" upper-class daughter "Kittens". Alice Joyce starred as her "dancing mother" with Conway Tearle as "bad-boy" Naughton. The picture was released on March 1, 1926. "Clara Bow known as the screen's perfect flapper, does her stuff as the child, and does it well". "... her remarkable performance in Dancing Mothers ... ". Louise Brooks remembered: "She was absolutely sensational in the United States ... in ''Dancing Mothers'' ... she just swept the country ... I know I saw her ... and I thought ... wonderful".

On April 12, 1926, Bow signs her first contract with Paramount: "...to retain your services as an actress for the period of six months from June 6th, 1926 to December 6th, 1926, at a salary of $750.00 per week...".

''Mantrap''

In Victor Fleming's comedy-triangle ''Mantrap'' Bow, as Alverna the manicurist, cures lonely hearts Joe Easter (Ernest Torrence), of the great northern, as well as pill-popping New York divorcee attorney runaway Ralph Prescott (Percy Marmont). Bow commented: "(Alverna)...was bad in the book, but - darn it! - of course, they couldn't make her that way in the picture. So I played her as a flirt".

The film was released on July 24, 1926.

Variety: "Clara Bow just walks away with the picture from the moment she walks into camera range". Photoplay: "When she is on the screen nothing else matters. When she is off, the same is true". Carl Sandburg: "The smartest and swiftest work as yet seen from Miss Clara Bow". The Reel Journal: "Clara Bow is taking the place of Gloria Swanson...(and)...filling a long need for a popular taste movie actress".

On August 16, 1926, Bow's agreement with Paramount was renewed into a five-year deal: "Her salary will start at $1700 a week and advance yearly to $4000 a week for the last year".

Notably, Bow added that she intended to leave the motion picture business at the expiration of the contract, i.e. 1931.

1927

In 1927 Bow appeared in six Paramount releases: ''It'', ''Children of Divorce'', ''Rough House Rosie'', ''Wings'', ''Hula'' and ''Get Your Man''.

''It''

In the Cinderella story ''It'', the poor shop-girl Betty Lou Spence (Bow) conquers the heart of her employer Cyrus Waltham (Antonio Moreno). The personal quality ''It'', provides the magic to make it happen. The film gave Bow her nickname "The It Girl." It was first shown in New York on February 5, 1927. New York Times: "(Bow)...is vivacious and, as Betty Lou, saucy, which perhaps is one of the ingredients of 'It'". The Film Daily: "Clara Bow gets a real chance and carries it off with honors...(and)...she is really the whole show". Carl Sandburg: "'It' is smart, funny and real. It makes a full-sized star of Clara Bow". Variety: "You can't get away from this Clara Bow girl. She certainly has that certain 'It'...and she just runs away with the film". Dorothy Parker: "It, hell: She had Those".

''Wings''

In 1927, Bow starred in ''Wings,'' a war picture rewritten to accommodate her, as she was Paramount's biggest star, but wasn't happy about her part: "(Wings is)..a man's picture and I'm just the whipped cream on top of the pie". The film went on to win the first Academy Award for Best Picture at the first annual AMPAS award ceremony on May 16, 1929. Douglas Fairbanks presented Bow with the statuette, not yet known as the "Oscar", on behalf of the producers; Adolph Zukor and B.P. Schulberg. On January 24, 2012, Paramount released a "Meticulously restored" version of Wings in DVD, as well as in Blu-Ray format.

1928

In 1928 Bow appeared in four Paramount releases: ''Red Hair'', ''Ladies of the Mob'', ''The Fleet's In (1928)'' and ''Three Weekends (1928)'', all of which are lost.

"I'm a big freak, because I'm myself!"

A famous scenario writer, who had done a number of pictures with Bow said:

Bow's bohemian lifestyle and "dreadful" manners were considered reminders of the Hollywood Elite's uneasy position in high society. Bow fumed: "They yell at me to be dignified. But what are the dignified people like? The people who are held up as examples of me? They are snobs. Frightful snobs ... I'm a curiosity in Hollywood. I'm a big freak, because I'm myself!"

MGM executive Paul Bern said Bow was "the greatest emotional actress on the screen", "sentimental, simple, childish and sweet", and considered her "hard-boiled attitude" a "defense mechanism".

1929

Talkies

With "talkies" ''The Wild Party'', ''Dangerous Curves'', and ''The Saturday Night Kid'', Bow kept her position as the top box-office draw and queen of Hollywood.

The quality of Bow's voice, her Brooklyn accent, was not an issue to Bow, her fans or Paramount. However, Bow, like Charlie Chaplin, Louise Brooks and most other silent film-stars didn't embrace the novelty: "I hate talkies", she said, "they're stiff and limiting. You lose a lot of your cuteness, because there's no chance for action, and action is the most important thing to me". The inventor of the motion picture camera, Thomas Edison himself, was so annoyed by the stiffness of the early "talkies" that he refused to see them and returned to his favorite "silents" with Bow and Mary Pickford. A visibly nervous Bow had to do a number of retakes in ''The Wild Party'' because her eyes kept wandering up to the microphone overhead. "I can't buck progress", Bow resigned, "I have to do the best I can".

In October 1929 Bow describes her nerves as "all shot", that she has reached "the breaking point" and Photoplay reports of "rows of bottles of sedatives" by her bed.

1930

According to census 1930, Bow lived at 512 Bedford Drive, together with her secretary and hair-dresser, Daisy DeBoe (later DeVoe), in a house valued $25,000 with neighbors titled "Horse-keeper", "Physician", "Builder". Bow states she is 23 years old, i.e. born 1906, contradicting Census of 1910 and 1920.

"Now they're having me sing. I sort of half-sing, half-talk, with hips-and-eye stuff. You know what I mean — like Maurice Chevalier. I used to sing at home and people would say, 'Pipe down! You're terrible!' But the studio thinks my voice is great". With ''Paramount on Parade'', ''True to the Navy'', ''Love Among the Millionaires'', and ''Her Wedding Night'', Bow was second at the box-office only to her chum, Joan Crawford, in 1930.

1931-1933

With ''No Limit'' and ''Kick In'', Bow held the position as fifth at box-office in 1931. But the pressures of fame, public scandals, overwork and a damaging court trial with her secretary, Daisy DeVoe, took their toll on Bow's fragile emotional health. As she slipped closer to a major breakdown, her manager B.P. Schulberg began referring to her as "Crisis-a-day-Clara". In April Bow was brought to a sanatorium, and at her request, Paramount released her from her final undertaking: ''City Streets''.

B.P. Schulberg tried to replace Bow with his girlfriend Sylvia Sidney, but Paramount lost its position as the biggest studio to MGM and B.P. Schulberg got fired. David Selznick explained:

Bow left Hollywood for Rex Bell's ranch in Nevada, her "desert paradise", in June and married him in then small-town Las Vegas in December In an interview on December 17, Bow detailed her way back to health: Sleep, exercise and food, and the day after she returned to Hollywood "..for the sole purpose of making enough money to be able to stay out of it".

Soon every studio in Hollywood (except for Paramount) and even overseas. wanted her services. Mary Pickford stated that Bow "was a very great actress" and wanted her to play her sister in ''Secrets''.

On April 28, 1932, Bow signed a two-picture deal with Fox Film Corporation; ''Call Her Savage'' (1932) and ''Hoop-La'' (1933). Both successful, ''Variety'' favored the latter: "A more mature performance...she looks and photographs extremely well". Bow commented on her revealing costume in ''Hoop-La'': "Rex accused me of enjoying showing myself off. Then I got a little sore. He knew darn well I was doing it because we could use a little money these days. Who can't?". Bow concluded her career:

Later life

Bow and cowboy actor Rex Bell, later a Lieutenant governor of Nevada, had two sons, Tony Beldam (born 1934, changed name to Rex Anthony Bell, Jr., died July 2011) and George Beldam, Jr. (born 1938). Bow retired from acting in 1933. In September 1937, she and Bell opened The 'It' Cafe on Vine Street near Hollywood Blvd. in Los Angeles. It was closed shortly thereafter. Her last public exposure, albeit fleeting, was a guest appearance on the radio show ''Truth or Consequences'' in March 1948; Bow provided the voice of "Mrs. Hush".

Health issues

In 1944, while Bell was running for the U.S. House of Representatives, Bow tried to commit suicide.

A note was found in which Bow stated she preferred death to a public life.

In 1949 she checked into The Institute of Living to be treated for her chronic insomnia and diffuse abdominal pains. Shock treatment was tried and numerous psychological tests performed. Bow's IQ was measured "bright normal" (pp. 111–119), while others claimed she was unable to reason, had poor judgment and displayed inappropriate or even bizarre behavior. Her pains were considered delusional and she was diagnosed with schizophrenia, despite experiencing neither sound nor vision hallucinations or psychosis. The illness debut, or "onset", as well as her insomnia, the analysts tied to the "butcher knife episode" back in 1922, but Bow rejected psychological explanations and left the Institute.

In the permanent exhibition, "Myths, Minds and Medicine", the Institute addresses malpractice issues of the past, including lobotomy, which peaked in 1949, and "crude electroconvulsive therapy".

Later years

Bow spent her last years in Culver City, Los Angeles under the constant care of a nurse, living off an estate worth about $500,000 at the time of her death. She died of a heart attack on September 27, 1965 at the age of 60. An autopsy revealed that she suffered from atherosclerosis, a disease of the heart that can begin in early adolescence. Bow's heart showed scarring from an earlier undetected heart attack. She was interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California. Her pallbearers were Harry Richman, Richard Arlen, Jack Oakie, Maxie Rosenbloom, Jack Dempsey, and Buddy Rogers.

Legacy

In 1999 film historian Leonard Maltin said, "You think of Greta Garbo, Lillian Gish, all these great names, great actresses, Clara Bow was more popular in terms of box-office dollars, in terms of consistently bringing audiences into the theaters, she was right on top." In 1999 the American Film Institute left Bow outside its "100 Years 100 Stars" list and film historian Kevin Brownlow doesn't even mention her name in his book on silent films, ''The Parade's Gone By'' (1968). Louise Brooks, who rated an entire chapter in the book, was less impressed: "You brush off Clara Bow," she wrote to Brownlow, "for some old nothing like Brooks. Clara made three pictures that will never be surpassed: ''Dancing Mothers, Mantrap'' and ''It''".

Honors

For her contributions to the motion picture industry, Bow was given a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

In 1994, she was honored with an image on a United States postage stamp designed by caricaturist Al Hirschfeld.

Bow is a recipient of the George Eastman Award, given by George Eastman House for distinguished contribution to the art of film.

Urban myths

The book ''Hollywood Babylon'' spread the contemporary legend that Bow's friendship with members of the 1927 University of Southern California football team included group sex with the entire team. In the 1980s Morley Drury commented that his team was "too damn innocent" to be anything else.

During her lifetime, Bow was the subject of wild rumors regarding her sex life; most of them were untrue. A tabloid called ''The Coast Reporter'' published lurid allegations about her in 1931, accusing her of exhibitionism, incest, lesbianism, bestiality, drug addiction, alcoholism, and having contracted venereal disease. The publisher of the tabloid then tried to blackmail Bow, offering to cease printing the stories for $25,000, which led to his arrest by federal agents and, later, an eight-year prison sentence.

In popular culture

Max Fleischer's cartoon character Betty Boop was modeled after Bow and entertainer Helen Kane (the "boop-boop-a-doop-girl"). Bow's mass of tangled red hair was one of her most famous features. When fans of the new star found out she put henna in her hair, sales of the dye tripled. An autographed picture of Bow is offered as a consolation prize of a beauty contest in the 1931 George Gershwin musical ''Of Thee I Sing''. The lead character of Peppy Miller from the 2012 film ''The Artist'' was inspired principally by Clara Bow, and in playing the part actress Bérénice Bejo invoked many of Bow's screen mannerisms.

Filmography

+ Film
! Year	! Title	! Role	Notes
1922	''Beyond the Rainbow''	Virginia Gardener
1922	''Down to the Sea in Ships''	Dot Morgan	Extant
1923	''Enemies of Women''	Girl dancing on table	Extant (incomplete)
1923	''''	Mary	Lost film
1923		Alice Tremaine	Extant
1923	''Black Oxen''	Janet Ogelthorpe	Extant
1924	''Grit''	Orchid McGonigle	Lost film
1924	''Poisoned Paradise''	Margot LeBlanc	Extant
1924	''Daughters of Pleasure''	Lila Millas	Extant
1924		Angela Warriner	Lost film
1924	''Empty Hearts''	Rosalie	Extant
1924		Alice Mayton	Extant
1924	''This Woman''	Aline Sturdevant	Lost film
1924	''Black Lightning''	Martha Larned	Extant
1925	''Capital Punishment''	Delia Tate	Extant
1925	''''	The Girl	Lost film
1925	''Eve's Lover''	Rena D'Arcy	Lost film
1925	''''	Molly Burns	Lost film
1925	''''	Miriam	Lost film (trailer survives)
1925	''My Lady's Lips''	Lola Lombard	Extant
1925	''Parisian Love''	Marie	Extant
1925		Grizette	Lost film
1925	''''	Lolly Cameron	Lost film (trailer exists)
1925	''''	Marilyn Merrill	Extant (incomplete)
1925	''Free to Love''	Marie Anthony	Extant
1925	''''	Peggy Swain	Extant
1925	''''	Cynthia Day	Extant
1925	''''	Doris	Lost film
1925	''My Lady of Whims''	Prudence Severn	Extant
1926		Mary Brophy	Lost film
1926	''Two Can Play''	Dorothy Hammis	Lost film
1926	''Dancing Mothers''	Kittens Westcourt	Extant
1926	''Fascinating Youth''	Clara Bow	Lost film
1926	''''	Cynthia Meade	Lost film
1926		Alverna	Extant
1926	''Kid Boots''	Clara McCoy	Extant
1927		Betty Lou Spence	Extant
1927	''Children of Divorce''	Kitty Flanders	Extant
1927	''Rough House Rosie''	Rosie O'Reilly	Lost film (trailer exists)
1927		Mary Preston	Extant
1927		Hula Calhoun	Extant
1927	''Get Your Man''	Nancy Worthington	Extant but incomplete (missing at least 2 reels)
1928		Bubbles McCoy	Lost film (fragments exist, including the only known color footage of Bow)
1928	''Ladies of the Mob''	Yvonne	Lost film
1928	''''	Trixie Deane	Lost film
1928	''Three Weekends''	Gladys O'Brien	Lost film (fragments survives)
1929	''''	Stella Ames	Extant
1929		Pat Delaney	Extant
1929	''''	Mayme	Alternative title: ''Love 'Em and Leave 'Em''; Extant
1930	''Paramount on Parade''	herself	Extant
1930	''True to the Navy''	Ruby Nolan	Extant
1930	''Love Among the Millionaires''	Pepper Whipple	Extant
1930	''Her Wedding Night''	Norma Martin	Extant
1931		Helen "Bunny" O'Day	Extant
1931		Molly Hewes	Extant
1932	''Call Her Savage''	Nasa Springer	Extant
1933	''Hoop-La''	Lou	Extant
1949	''Screen Snapshots 1860: Howdy, Podner''	Clara Bow – Resort Guest	Short subject

References

Bibliography

"The 'It' girl" by Joe Morella and Edward Z Epstein, 1976, Dell pub, Co, Inc, ISBN 0-440-14068-4.

"Clara Bow: Runnin' Wild" by David Stenn, 1988, Doubleday, ISBN 0-385-24125-9.

TCM Film Guide, "Leading Ladies: The 50 Most Unforgettable Actresses of the Studio Era", Chronicle Books, San Francisco, California, 2006.

Vieira, Mark A. ''Sin in Soft Focus: Pre-Code Hollywood''. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc. 1999. ISBN 0-8109-8228-5

External links

Photographs and bibliography

Clara Bow My Life Story

Clara Bow attends a premiere with Mae Murray

Category:Actors from New York City Category:American film actors Category:American silent film actors Category:Burials at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Glendale) Category:Cardiovascular disease deaths in California Category:Deaths from myocardial infarction Category:People from Brooklyn Category:1905 births Category:1965 deaths

ar:كلارا بوو an:Clara Bow zh-min-nan:Clara Bow da:Clara Bow de:Clara Bow es:Clara Bow fr:Clara Bow fy:Clara Bow id:Clara Bow it:Clara Bow he:קלרה בואו nl:Clara Bow ja:クララ・ボウ no:Clara Bow pl:Clara Bow pt:Clara Bow ro:Clara Bow ru:Боу, Клара simple:Clara Bow sh:Clara Bow fi:Clara Bow sv:Clara Bow tl:Clara Bow uk:Клара Боу

name	Gilbert Roland
birth name	Luis Antonio Dámaso de Alonso
birth date	December 11, 1905
birth place	Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico
death date	May 15, 1994
death place	Beverly Hills, California,United States
spouse	Constance Bennett (1941–45) (divorced) 2 childrenGuillermina Cantu (1954–94) (his death)
yearsactive	1923–82
occupation	Actor }}

Gilbert Roland (December 11, 1905May 15, 1994) was a Mexican-born American film actor.

Biography

He was born Luis Antonio Dámaso de Alonso in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico and originally intended to become a bullfighter like his father. When the family moved to the United States, however, he became interested in acting when he was picked at random for a role as an extra. He chose his screen name by combining the names of his favorite actors, John Gilbert and Ruth Roland. He was often cast in the typical "''Latin Lover''" role.

Roland's first major role was in the collegiate comedy ''The Plastic Age'' (1925) together with Clara Bow, to whom he became engaged. In 1927, he played Armand in ''Camille'' opposite Norma Talmadge, whom he was romantically involved with, and they starred together in several productions. Roland later appeared in Spanish language adaptations of American films, in romantic lead roles.

Beginning in the 1940s, critics began to take notice of his acting and he was praised for his supporting roles in John Huston's ''We Were Strangers'' (1949), ''The Bad and the Beautiful'' (1952), ''Thunder Bay'' (1953), and ''Cheyenne Autumn'' (1964). He also appeared in a series of films in the mid 1940s as the popular character "''The Cisco Kid''". He played Hugo, the agnostic (and totally fictional) friend of the three shepherd children in ''The Miracle of Our Lady of Fatima'', based on the apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima in 1917. In 1953 he starred in the epic ''Beneath the 12-Mile Reef'' as Greek-American sponge diver Mike Petrakis. His last film appearance was in the 1982 western ''Barbarosa''.

Personal life

Roland was married to actress Constance Bennett from 1941 to 1946. His second marriage, to Guillermina Cantú in 1954, lasted until his death forty years later.

Death

Gilbert Roland died of cancer in Beverly Hills, California in 1994, aged 88. His remains were cremated and his ashes scattered at sea.

Award nominations

Roland was nominated twice for a Golden Globe Award - for his roles in ''The Bad and the Beautiful'' (1952) and ''Cheyenne Autumn'' (1964). For his contributions to the motion picture industry, Gilbert Roland has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6730 Hollywood Boulevard.

Filmography

Features:

''The Hunchback of Notre Dame'' (1923)

''The Lost World'' (1925)

''The Lady Who Lied'' (1925)

''The Midshipman'' (1925)

''The Lawful Cheater'' (1925)

''The Plastic Age'' (1925)

''The Campus Flirt'' (1926)

''The Blonde Saint'' (1926)

''Camille'' (1926)

''Rose of the Golden West'' (1927)

''The Love Mart'' (1927)

''The Dove'' (1927)

''The Woman Disputed'' (1928)

''La Possession'' (1929)

''New York Nights'' (1929)

''Méphisto'' (1930)

''Men of the North'' (1930) (Spanish and French version also filmed)

''Resurrección'' (1931) (Spanish version of ''Resurrection'')

''The Passionate Plumber'' (1932)

''Hombres de mi vida'' (1932) (Spanish version of ''Men in Her Life'')

''The Woman in Room 13'' (1932)

''Life Begins'' (1932)

''No Living Witness'' (1932)

''A Parisian Romance'' (1932)

''Call Her Savage'' (1932)

''She Done Him Wrong'' (1933)

''Our Betters'' (1933)

''The Romantic Widow'' (1933)

''Gigolettes of Paris'' (1933)

''Tarnished Youth'' (1933) (UK version of ''Gigolettes of Paris'')

''After Tonight'' (1933)

''Una Viuda Romantica'' (1933)

''Yo, tú y ella'' (1933)

''Elinor Norton'' (1934)

''Mystery Woman'' (1935)

''Juliet Buys a Baby'' (1935)

''Ladies Love Danger'' (1935)

''La Vida Bohemia'' (1937)

''Midnight Taxi'' (1937)

''The Last Train from Madrid'' (1937)

''Thunder Trail'' (1937)

''Gateway'' (1938)

''Juarez'' (1939)

''Isle of Destiny'' (1940)

''Gambling on the High Seas'' (1940)

''The Sea Hawk'' (1940)

''Rangers of Fortune'' (1940)

''Angels with Broken Wings'' (1941)

''My Life with Caroline'' (1941)

''Enemy Agents Meet Ellery Queen'' (1942)

''Isle of Missing Men'' (1942)

''The Desert Hawk'' (1944)

''Captain Kidd'' (1945)

''The Gay Cavalier'' (1946)

''South of Monterey'' (1946)

''Beauty and the Bandit'' (1946)

''Riding the California Trail'' (1947)

''The Other Love'' (1947)

''High Conquest'' (1947)

''Robin Hood of Monterey'' (1947)

''King of the Bandits'' (1947)

''Pirates of Monterey'' (1947)

''The Dude Goes West'' (1948)

''The Rebellion of the Ghosts'' (1949)

''We Were Strangers'' (1949)

''Malaya'' (1949)

''The Torch'' (1950)

''Crisis'' (1950)

''The Furies'' (1950)

''The Bullfighter and the Lady'' (1951)

''Mark of the Renegade'' (1951)

''Ten Tall Men'' (1951)

''My Six Convicts'' (1952)

''Glory Alley'' (1952)

''The Miracle of Our Lady of Fatima'' (1952)

''Apache War Smoke'' (1952)

''The Bad and the Beautiful'' (1952)

''Thunder Bay'' (1953)

''The Diamond Queen'' (1953)

''Beneath the 12-Mile Reef'' (1953)

''The French Line'' (1954)

''The Racers'' (1955)

''Underwater!'' (1955)

''That Lady'' (1955)

''The Treasure of Pancho Villa'' (1955)

''Bandido'' (1956)

''Around the World in 80 Days'' (1956)

''Three Violent People'' (1957)

''The Midnight Story'' (1957)

''The Last of the Fast Guns'' (1958)

''Catch Me If You Can'' (1959) (unreleased)

''The Wild and the Innocent'' (1959)

''The Big Circus'' (1959)

''Guns of the Timberland'' (1960)

''Samar'' (1962)

''Cheyenne Autumn'' (1964)

''The Reward'' (1965)

''The Poppy Is Also a Flower'' (1966)

''Any Gun Can Play'' (1967)

''The Ruthless Four'' (1968)

''God Was in the West, Too, at One Time'' (1968)

''Johnny Hamlet'' (1968)

''Sonora'' (1969)

''The Christian Licorice Store'' (1971)

''Running Wild'' (1973)

''Treasure of Tayopa'' (1974)

''The Pacific Connection'' (1974)

''Islands in the Stream'' (1977)

''The Black Pearl'' (1977)

''The Sacketts (Don Luis)'' (1979 TV Movie)

''Caboblanco'' (1980)

''Barbarosa'' (1982)

Short subjects:

''La Fiesta de Santa Barbara'' (1935)

''Screen Snapshots Series 15, No. 8'' (1936)

''Picture People No. 2: Hollywood Sports'' (1941)

''Wings Up'' (1943)

References

Monush, Barry. ''The Encyclopedia of Film Actors From The Silent Era to 1965''. New York: Applause Theatre & Cinema Books, 2003.

External links

Original letter from Greta Garbo to Gilbert Roland (1943)

Photographs and literature

Category:1905 births Category:1994 deaths Category:American actors Category:American film actors Category:American silent film actors Category:Mexican emigrants to the United States Category:Naturalized citizens of the United States Category:People from Chihuahua, Chihuahua Category:Cancer deaths in California Category:Mexican film actors

de:Gilbert Roland es:Gilbert Roland fr:Gilbert Roland it:Gilbert Roland pl:Gilbert Roland pt:Gilbert Roland sh:Gilbert Roland sv:Gilbert Roland

name	Thelma Todd
birth name	Thelma Alice Todd
birth date	July 29, 1906
birth place	Lawrence, Massachusetts
death date	December 16, 1935
death place	Pacific Palisades, California
death cause	accidental carbon monoxide poisoning
other names	Alison Loyd
occupation	Actress
years active	1926-1935
spouse	Pat DiCicco (m.1932-1934; divorced) }}

Thelma Alice Todd (July 29, 1906 - December 16, 1935) was an American actress. Appearing in about 120 pictures between 1926 and 1935, she is best remembered for her comedic roles in films like Marx Brothers' ''Monkey Business'' and ''Horse Feathers'', a number of Charley Chase's short comedies, and co-starring with Buster Keaton and Jimmy Durante in ''Speak Easily''. She also had roles in Wheeler and Woolsey farces, several Laurel and Hardy films, the last of which (''The Bohemian Girl'') featured her in a part that was truncated by her death.

Early life

Todd was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts to Jim and Bertha Todd, and was a bright student who achieved good academic results. She intended to become a school teacher. However, in her late teens, she began entering beauty pageants, winning the title of Miss Massachusetts in 1925. While representing her home state, she was spotted by a Hollywood talent scout and began her career in film.

Career

During the silent era, Todd appeared in numerous supporting roles that made full use of her beauty but gave her little chance to act. With the advent of the talkies, Todd was given opportunity to expand her roles when producer Hal Roach signed her to appear with such comedy stars as Harry Langdon, Charley Chase, and Laurel and Hardy. In 1931 she was given her own series, teaming with ZaSu Pitts (pronounced "Zay-soo," also her character's name) for slapstick comedies. This was Roach's attempt to create a female version of Laurel and Hardy. When Pitts left Roach in 1933, she was replaced by Patsy Kelly. The Todd shorts often cast her as a working girl having all sorts of problems, and trying her best to remain poised and charming despite the embarrassing antics of her sidekick.

In 1931, Todd became romantically involved with director Roland West, and starred in his film ''Corsair''.

Thelma Todd became highly regarded as a capable film comedian, and Roach loaned her out to other studios to play opposite Wheeler & Woolsey, Buster Keaton, Joe E. Brown, and the Marx Brothers. She also appeared successfully in such dramas as the original 1931 film version of ''The Maltese Falcon'' starring Ricardo Cortez as Sam Spade, in which she played Miles Archer's treacherous widow. During her career she appeared in 119 films although many of these were short films, and was sometimes publicized as "The Ice Cream Blonde."

In August 1934, she opened a successful cafe at Pacific Palisades, called Thelma Todd's Sidewalk Cafe, attracting a diverse clientele of Hollywood celebrities as well as many tourists.

Todd continued her short-subject series through 1935, and was featured in the full-length Laurel and Hardy comedy ''The Bohemian Girl''. This was her last film; she died after completing all of her scenes, but most of them were re-shot. Producer Roach deleted all of Todd's dialogue and limited her appearance to one musical number.

Death

On the morning of Monday, December 16, 1935, Thelma Todd was found dead in her car inside the garage of Jewel Carmen, a former actress and former wife of Todd's lover and business partner, Roland West. Carmen's house was approximately a block from the topmost side of Todd's restaurant. Her death was determined to have been caused by carbon monoxide poisoning. Todd had a wide circle of friends and associates as well as a busy social life; police investigations revealed that she had spent the last night of her life at the Trocadero, a popular Hollywood restaurant, at a party hosted by entertainer Stanley Lupino and his actress daughter, Ida. At the restaurant, she had had a brief but unpleasant exchange with her ex-husband, Pat DeCicco. However, her friends stated that she was in good spirits, and were aware of nothing unusual in her life that could suggest a reason for committing suicide.

The detectives of the LAPD concluded at first that Todd's death was accidental, the result of her either warming up the car to drive it or using the heater to keep herself warm. Other evidence, however, pointed to foul play. The Grand Jury ruled her death as suicide. Since her body was cremated, a second, more thorough autopsy could not be carried out. It was believed that she was the target of extortion, but refused to pay. It is also possible that she was locked in the garage by her assailant after she started the car. Blood from a wound was found on her face and dress, leading some to believe that she was knocked unconscious and placed in the car so that she would succumb to carbon monoxide poisoning.

Todd's death certificate states her cause of death as accidental carbon monoxide poisoning. She was cremated; after her mother's death, her remains were placed in her mother's casket and buried in Bellevue Cemetery in her home town of Lawrence, Massachusetts.

Complicating matters, there was an apparent murder two years later involving Todd's ex-husband Pat DiCicco and another movie actor as the victim. According to E.J. Fleming's book ''The Fixers'' (about MGM's legendary "fixers" Eddie Mannix and Howard Strickling), Wallace Beery (one of MGM's top stars), gangster Pat DiCicco, and Albert R. "Cubby" Broccoli (who was also DiCicco's cousin and eventual producer of the James Bond films) allegedly beat comedian and movie actor Ted Healy to death in the parking lot of the Trocadero nightclub on December 21, 1937. The book claims that Beery was sent to Europe by the studio for a few months, while a story was concocted that three college students had killed Healy. Immigration records confirm a four-month-long trip to Europe on Beery's part immediately after Healy's death, ending April 17, 1938. A pencil drawing of Beery survives that was done on a film set by Healy, an amateur artist as well as the organizer and original leader of the Three Stooges.

Legacy

For her contribution to the motion picture industry, Thelma Todd has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6262 Hollywood Blvd.

Selected filmography

+ Film
! Year	! Title	! Role	Notes
1926	''Fascinating Youth''	Lorraine Lane
1927	''Rubber Heels''	Princess Anne
1927	''Fireman, Save My Child''		Uncredited
1928	''''	Phyllis
1928
1929	''Seven Footprints to Satan''	Eve
1929	''Unaccustomed As We Are''	Mrs. Kennedy	Short film
1930	''Her Man''	Nelly
1930	''Another Fine Mess''	Lady Plumtree	Short film
1931	''Chickens Come Home''	Mrs. Hardy	Short film
1931		Betty Royce
1931	''''	Iva Archer	Alternative title: ''Dangerous Female''
1931		Alison Corning
1931		Lucille Briggs
1931		Thelma	Short subject
1931	''Broadminded''	Gertie Gardner
1932	''''	Kay Mitchell
1932		Claire
1932	''Horse Feathers''	Connie Bailey
1932	''Speak Easily''	Eleanor Espere
1932	''Call Her Savage''	Sunny De Lane
1933		Pamela Berne
1933		Lady Pamela Rocburg	Alternative titles: ''Bogus Bandits''''The Devil's Brother''
1933		Gloria Duval
1933		Mrs. Carleton
1933	''Counsellor at Law''	Lillian La Rue
1934		Trixie	Alternative titles: ''Joe Palooka''''The Great Schnozzle''
1934	''Hips, Hips, Hooray!''	Amelia Frisby
1935	''Two for Tonight''	Lilly
1936	''''	Gypsy queen's daughter

See also

Pitts and Todd

References

Further reading

External links

Thelma Todd Photo Gallery

Paulist Productions Page For Todd Building Contains pic and brief text concerning her death and the building her cafe was located in, still standing today.

The Mysterious Death of Thelma Todd. Los Angeles: Past, Present and Future Project, USC.

Photographs and literature

The Death of Thelma Todd

Thelma Todd's ex-husband and Ted Healy's death

Thelma Todd's ex-husband Pat DiCicco

Thelma Todd and Pat DiCicco photos

Category:Actors from Massachusetts Category:Accidental deaths in California Category:American film actors Category:American silent film actors Category:Deaths from carbon monoxide poisoning Category:Hal Roach Studios actors Category:Hal Roach Studios short film series Category:People from Lawrence, Massachusetts Category:1906 births Category:1935 deaths

de:Thelma Todd es:Thelma Todd fr:Thelma Todd it:Thelma Todd nl:Thelma Todd ru:Тодд, Телма fi:Thelma Todd sv:Thelma Todd

C. Todd Gilbert (born October 19, 1970, in Newton, Texas) is an American politician of the Republican Party. Since 2006 he has been a member of the Virginia House of Delegates.

He represents the 15th district in the Shenandoah Valley and Blue Ridge Mountains, made up of Page, Rappahannock, and Shenandoah Counties, plus part of Rockingham County.

Education

Gilbert graduated Central High School of Woodstock (1989), where he served as student body president and played three varsity sports, the University of Virginia (1993), and the Southern Methodist University School of Law (J.D.; 1996), where he led the student body as president of the Student Bar Association.

Reaction to appointment of Omeish to Virginia commission

Virginia Governor Timothy M. Kaine had appointed Esam Omeish to the Virginia Commission on Immigration, which was examining whether Virginia should do more to restrict illegal immigration. In September 2007 Omeish resigned as a commission member after remarks he made were brought to the Governor's attention on a radio call-in show. Omeish appeared in one video telling a crowd of Washington-area Muslims: "you have learned the way, that you have known that the ''jihad'' way is the way to liberate your land." He appeared in another video screaming to a boisterous crowd: "We must prosecute those who are responsible for this war. Impeach Bush today! Let us cleanse our State Department, our Congress, our Pentagon of those who have driven America into this colossal mistake." After Omeish resigned, the office of House Speaker William J. Howell (R-Stafford) released a statement from Gilbert entitled "Kaine Appointee on Board of Directors of Radical 9-11 Mosque", referring to the Dar Al Hijrah mosque on whose Board Omeish sits.

Notes

References

External links

Category:1970 births Category:Living people Category:People from Newton, Texas Category:Baptists from the United States Category:Virginia Republicans Category:Members of the Virginia House of Delegates Category:Virginia lawyers Category:University of Virginia alumni Category:Southern Methodist University alumni Category:People from Shenandoah County, Virginia