Coordinates	38°53′35.7″N77°1′29.9″N
name	Leon Errol
birthname	Leonce Errol Sims
birth date	July 03, 1881
birth place	Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
death date	October 12, 1951
death place	Los Angeles, California, United States
spouse	Stella Chatelaine (1906 - 1946) }}

Leon Errol (July 3, 1881 - October 12, 1951), was an Australian-born American comedian and actor, popular in the first half of the 20th century.

Biography

Born Leonce Errol Sims in Sydney, he managed a traveling vaudeville troupe and gave a young comedian named Roscoe Arbuckle his first professional opportunity. In America, Errol became a well-known vaudevillian who appeared in the ''Ziegfeld Follies'' on Broadway, and played skits with such notables as Bert Williams and W. C. Fields. Errol's sister, Leda Errol (née Sims), appeared with him in the ''Follies''.

Errol made a successful transition to films in a variety of comedy roles (over 150 films from 1923). His comic trademark was a wobbly, unsteady walk, moving as though his legs were made of rubber; this bit served him well in drunk routines such as the drunken valet in Morgy and Shoo's "Mama's Little Babies" as well as numerous RKO two-reelers.

Leon Errol is well remembered for his energetic performances in the ''Mexican Spitfire'' movies opposite Lupe Vélez (1939–43), in which Errol had the recurring dual role of affable Uncle Matt and foggy British nobleman Lord Epping. Monogram Pictures signed Errol to appear as fight manager Knobby Walsh in the "Joe Palooka" sports comedies (1946–50). Leon Errol's most famous non-series appearance is in the nonsensical comedy feature ''Never Give a Sucker an Even Break'' (1941), starring fellow vaudeville and Ziegfeld alumnus W. C. Fields.

Errol concurrently starred in a long string of two-reel comedy shorts, which began at Columbia Pictures in 1933. He also starred in two early three-strip Technicolor shorts made at Warner Brothers, ''Service With a Smile'' (released 28 July 1934) and ''Good Morning, Eve!'' (5 August), just beating ''La Cucaracha'' (31 August) as the first live action wholly Technicolor film (these films were preceded by several of Disney's Silly Symphony Technicolor cartoons and by Technicolor sequences in black and white features such as ''The Cat and the Fiddle'').

Moving to RKO Radio Pictures in 1934, he continued to make six shorts per year until his death in 1951. Most of these were marital farces in which Leon would get mixed up with a pretty girl or an involved business proposition, and face the wrath of his wife (usually Dorothy Granger). Errol's last film, ''Lord Epping Returns'', reprised his famous characterization (and some of the gags) from ''Mexican Spitfire''.

Footage from the Leon Errol short subjects was incorporated into RKO's compilation features ''Variety Time'', ''Make Mine Laughs'', ''Footlight Varieties,'' and ''Merry Mirthquakes''. RKO kept Leon Errol in the public eye by reissuing his older comedies through the mid-1950s. His RKO shorts soon became a staple of syndicated television.

Errol married Stella Chatelaine (born 1886) in Denver, Colorado in 1906. She died on November 7, 1946 in Los Angeles. Errol died there, five years later, on October 12, 1951, aged 70. They had no children.

External links

Category:1881 births Category:1951 deaths Category:American film actors Category:American silent film actors Category:Burlesque performers Category:Vaudeville performers Category:American people of Australian descent Category:People from Sydney

Coordinates	38°53′35.7″N77°1′29.9″N
name	Lupe Vélez
birth name	María Guadalupe Villalobos Vélez
birth date	July 18, 1908
birth place	San Luis Potosi, Mexico
death date	December 14, 1944
death place	Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, California, U.S.
other names	"Mexican Spitfire"
occupation	Actress
years active	1927–1944
nationality	Mexican
spouse	Johnny Weismuller (1933–1939) }}

Lupe Vélez (July 18, 1908 – December 14, 1944) was a Mexican film actress. Vélez began her career in Mexico as a dancer, before moving to the U.S. where she worked in vaudeville. She was seen by Fanny Brice who promoted her, and Vélez soon entered films, making her first appearance in 1924. By the end of the decade she had progressed to leading roles. With the advent of talking pictures Vélez acted in comedies, but she became disappointed with her film career, and moved to New York where she worked in Broadway productions.

Returning to Hollywood in 1939, she made a series of comedies. She also made some films in Mexico. Vélez's personal life was often difficult; a five year marriage to Johnny Weissmuller and a series of romances, were highly publicized. She is often associated with the nicknames "The Mexican Spitfire" and "The Hot Pepper".

Early life

Vélez was born María Guadalupe Villalobos Vélez in the city of San Luis Potosí in Mexico, the daughter of an army officer (Jacobo Villalobos Reyes) and his wife (Josefina Vélez), an opera singer, both from prominent families in the state of San Luis Potosí. Her father refused to let her use his last name in theater because at that time becoming an artist and coming from a well-to-do family was seen as embarrassing, , so she used her mother's surname. Lupe was educated at a convent school in Texas. From an early age, she had a strong temper and an explosive personality. She took dancing lessons and in 1924, made her performing debut at the ''Teatro Principal'' in Mexico City. In 1923 she moved to Texas, where she began dancing in vaudeville shows and finding work as a sales assistant. She moved to California, where she met the comedienne Fanny Brice, who promoted her career as a dancer. In 1926 she was cast in her first film by Hal Roach.

Film career

Vélez's first feature-length film was ''The Gaucho'' (1927) starring Douglas Fairbanks. The next year, she was named one of the WAMPAS Baby Stars, the young starlets deemed to be most promising for movie stardom. Most of her early films cast her in exotic or ethnic roles (Hispanic, Native American, French, Russian, even Asian). She worked under the direction of notable film directors like Victor Fleming in ''The Wolf Song'' (1929) opposite Gary Cooper; D.W Griffith in ''Lady of the Pavements'' (1928); Tod Browning in Where East is East opposite Lon Chaney and Cecil B. de Mille in ''The Squaw Man'' in 1931. By the end of the silent era the sparkling personality of Lupe rivalled that of the ''Flapper Girl'', Clara Bow.

Within a few years Vélez found her niche in comedies, playing beautiful but volatile foils to comedy stars. Her slapstick battle with Laurel and Hardy in ''Hollywood Party'' and her dynamic presence opposite Jimmy Durante in ''Palooka'' (both 1934) are typically enthusiastic Vélez performances. She was featured in the final Wheeler & Woolsey comedy, ''High Flyers'' (1937), doing impersonations of Simone Simon, Dolores del Río, and Shirley Temple.

In 1934, Velez was one of the victims of the "open season" of the "reds" in Hollywood. With Dolores del Río, Ramón Novarro and James Cagney, she was accused of promoting communism in California.

Vélez was now nearing 30 and had not become a major star. Disappointed, she left Hollywood for Broadway. In New York, she landed a role in ''You Never Know'', a short-lived Cole Porter musical. After the run of ''You Never Know'', Vélez looked for film work in other countries. Returning to Hollywood in 1939, she snared the lead in a B comedy for RKO Radio Pictures, ''The Girl from Mexico''. She established such a rapport with co-star Leon Errol that RKO made a quick sequel, ''Mexican Spitfire'', which became a very popular series. Vélez perfected her comic character, indulging in broken-English malaprops, troublemaking ideas, and sudden fits of temper bursting into torrents of Spanish invective. She occasionally sang in these films, and often displayed a talent for hectic, visual comedy. Vélez enjoyed making these films and can be seen openly breaking up at Leon Errol's comic ad libs.

The ''Spitfire'' films rejuvenated Lupe Vélez's career, and for the next few years she starred in musical and comedy features for RKO, Universal Pictures, and Columbia Pictures in addition to the Spitfire films. In one of her last films, Columbia's ''Redhead from Manhattan,'' she played a dual role: one in her exaggerated comic dialect, and the other in her actual speaking voice, which was surprisingly fluid and had only traces of a Mexican accent.

Lupe Vélez was very popular with Spanish-speaking audiences. In 1943, she returned to Mexico and starred in the movies ''La Zandunga'' (1938), and an adaptation of Émile Zola's novel ''Nana'' (1944), which was well received. Subsequently, she returned to Hollywood.

Romances

Emotionally generous, passionate, and high-spirited, Vélez had a number of highly publicized affairs, including a particularly emotionally draining one with Gary Cooper, before marrying Olympic athlete Johnny Weissmuller (of ''Tarzan'' fame) in 1933, and later, in 1938, Mexican actor Arturo de Córdova. In the early 1940s she was also linked romantically with Clayton Moore, later known for his television role as the Lone Ranger; Moore insists in his autobiography that he was only a social escort. About her romance with Cooper, Marlene Dietrich said "Gary was totally under the control of Lupe". The marriage with Weissmuller lasted five years; they repeatedly split and finally divorced in 1938. However, her love affair with Gary Cooper lasted until her death.

Death

In the mid-1940s, she had a relationship with the young actor Harald Maresch, and became pregnant with his child. However, other reliable accounts place Gary Cooper, with whom Lupe had had a romantic relationship for years and up to her death, as the father of her unborn child, either making her alleged suicide note bogus, or Maresch only a scapegoat. Unable to face the shame of giving birth to an illegitimate child, she decided to take her own life. Her alleged suicide note read, "To Harald: May God forgive you and forgive me, too; but I prefer to take my life away and our baby's, before I bring him with shame, or killing him. Lupe." She retired to bed after taking an overdose of sleeping pills. According to newspaper accounts, her body was found by her secretary and companion of ten years, Beulah Kinder, on her bed surrounded by flowers, as she had wished.

Andy Warhol's underground film, ''Lupe'' (1965), starring Edie Sedgwick as Lupe, is loosely based on this fateful night, suggesting that she was found with her head in the toilet due to nausea caused by the overdose. Another report says she tripped and fell head-first into the toilet, knocking herself unconscious and drowning.

In a poll of Mexican filmgoers, actresses like Marquita Rivera and Amalia Aguilar were chosen to star in a Hollywood film based on the life of the actress. However, due to the controversy over Vélez's suicide at that time, the film was never produced.

There is skepticism surrounding whether it was simply the shame of bearing an illegitimate child that led Vélez to end her life. Throughout her life she showed signs of extreme emotion, mania and depression. Consequently, it has been suggested that Vélez suffered from bipolar disorder, which, left untreated, ultimately led to her suicide. Rosa Linda Fregoso writes that Vélez was known for her defiance of contemporary moral convention, and it seems unlikely that she could not have reconciled an "illegitimate child."

Lupe Vélez was laid to rest in the Civil Cemetery of Sorrows (Panteón Civil de Dolores), in the Tacubaya section of Mexico City, in a walled section within the itself walled cemetery, reserved for artists and administered by the National Association of Actors (A.N.D.A.).

References in popular culture

The song "Lupe Vélez" by artist Jimmy Jazz appeared on the ''If It Moves...'' compilation ''Torture Tech Overdrive'' (which was later re-released by Cleopatra Records). The song deals with the absurdity of attempting to create a beautiful death in suicide.

In the first episode of the sitcom ''Frasier'', "The Good Son", Frasier Crane's producer Roz Doyle tries to improve Frasier's outlook on his life by telling him the story of Lupe Vélez, "last seen with her head in the toilet". Apparently according to Roz, the pills she had taken did not mix well with "the enchilada combo plate she sadly chose as her last meal." When Frasier asks how her story is supposed to make him feel better, Roz responds that sometimes things don't go the way we want them to, but can work out in the end, anyway. She adds, "All she wanted was to be remembered. Will you ever forget that story?".

She was mentioned in ''The Simpsons'' episode titled "Homer's Phobia". Guest star John Waters gave the Simpson family, sans Homer, a driving tour of Springfield's shopping district, where he pointed out the store where reportedly Vélez bought the toilet she drowned in.

In 2009, Mexican film director Martin Caballero made the short film ''Forever Lupe'' with Mexican actress Marieli Romo as Lupe Vélez.

In Robert Stone's novel ''Children of Light'', a troubled actress refers to a suicide-by-drowning scene she has just acted out as "Lupe Velez takes a dunk."

She is mentioned in the Michael Chabon novel ''The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay''.

Filmography

{|class="wikitable" style="font-size: 90%;" border="2" cellpadding="4" background: #f9f9f9; |- align="center" ! style="background:#B0C4DE;" | Year ! style="background:#B0C4DE;" | Film ! style="background:#B0C4DE;" | Role ! style="background:#B0C4DE;" | Notes |- |rowspan= 3|1927 |''What Women Did for Me'' |uncredited |short subject |- |''Sailors, Beware!'' |Baroness Behr (uncredited) |Laurel and Hardy silent short |- |''The Gaucho'' |The Mountain Girl |Douglas Fairbanks adventure. |- |1928 |''Stand and Deliver'' |Jania | |- |rowspan=5|1929 |''Hollywood Snapshots #11'' |Herself |short subject |- |''Lady of the Pavements'' |Nanon del Rayon |aka ''Lady of the Night'' (UK) |- |''The Wolf Song'' |Lola Salazar | |- |''Where East Is East'' |Toyo Haynes |With Lon Chaney |- |''Tiger Rose'' |Rose | |- |rowspan=3|1930 |''Hell Harbor'' |Anita Morgan | |- |''The Storm'' |Manette Fachard | |- |''East Is West'' |Ming Toy |Spanish language version wasfilmed, also starring Vélez |- |rowspan=4|1931 |''Resurrection'' |Katusha Maslova | |- |''Resurrección'' |Katyusha Maslova | |- |''The Squaw Man'' |Naturich | |- |''The Cuban Love Song'' |Nenita Lopez | |- |rowspan=5|1932 |''The Voice of Hollywood No. 13'' |Herself |short subject |- |''Men in Her Life'' |Julia Clark |Spanish language version of 1931 film |- |''The Broken Wing'' |Lolita | |- |''Kongo'' |Tula | |- |''The Half-Naked Truth'' |Teresita | |- |rowspan=2|1933 |''Hot Pepper'' |Pepper | |- |''Mr. Broadway'' |Herself |documentary |- |rowspan=4|1934 |''Palooka'' |Nina Madero |aka ''Joe Palooka'' |- |''Strictly Dynamite'' |Vera Mendez | |- |''Laughing Boy'' |Slim Girl | |- |''Hollywood Party'' |The Jaguar WomanJane in Schnarzan sequence |Laurel and Hardy have a cameo appearance |- |1935 |''The Morals of Marcus'' |Carlotta | |- |1936 |''Gypsy Melody'' |Mila | |- |rowspan=3|1937 |''High Flyers'' |Maria Juanita Rosita Anita Moreno del Valle | |- |''Stardust'' |Carla de Huelva |aka ''He Loved an Actress'' (USA) |- |''La Zandunga'' |Lupe |First Spanish-speaking movie in México |- |1939 |''The Girl from Mexico'' |Carmelita Fuentes | |- |rowspan=2|1940 |''Mexican Spitfire'' |Carmelita Lindsay | |- |''Mexican Spitfire Out West'' |Carmelita Lindsay | |- |rowspan=5|1941 |''Recordar es vivir'' | |short subject |- |''Six Lessons from Madame La Zonga'' |Madame La Zonga | |- |''Mexican Spitfire's Baby'' |Carmelita Lindsay | |- |''Honolulu Lu'' |Consuelo Cordoba | |- |''Playmates'' |Carmen del Toro |last film of John Barrymore |- |rowspan=3|1942 |''Mexican Spitfire at Sea'' |Carmelita Lindsay | |- |''Mexican Spitfire Sees a Ghost'' |Carmelita Lindsay | |- |''Mexican Spitfire's Elephant'' |Carmelita Lindsay | |- |rowspan=3|1943 |''Ladies' Day'' |Pepita Zorita | |- |''Redhead from Manhattan'' |Rita Manners/Elaine Manners | |- |''Mexican Spitfire's Blessed Event'' |Carmelita Lindsay | |- |1944 |''Nana'' |Nana | |- |}

References

Bibliography

External links

at the Cinema of Mexico site of the ITESM

This is the music video by the Italian group "Il Palco della Musica" performing "Lupe Vèlez", directed by Pier Bruno Scotto. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QHqlr1HplI

Straight Dope Staff Report: Did Lupe Vélez really drown in the toilet? at straightdope.com "Did Lupe Vélez Really Die On the Toilet?" at The Straight Dope

The fourth chapter of ''Tex(t)-Mex: Seductive Hallucination of the "Mexican" in America'' by William Nericcio, focuses on the life and death of Lupe Vélez and is entitled, ''Lupe Vélez Regurgitated or Jesus’s Kleenex: Cautionary, Indigestion-inspiring Ruminations on "Mexicans" in "American" Toilets''.

Lupe Vélez as an infant in 1908(University of Washington, Sayre Collection)

Category:20th-century actors Category:Mexican actors Category:Mexican film actors Category:Mexican silent film actors Category:American actors Category:American film actors Category:American silent film actors Category:Mexican stage actors Category:American people of Mexican descent Category:Drug-related suicides in California Category:Female suicides Category:Mexican expatriates in the United States Category:Actors who committed suicide Category:Women comedians Category:Mexican comedians Category:People from San Luis Potosí Category:1908 births Category:1944 deaths Category:Hispanic and Latino American people Category:Mexican Roman Catholics

de:Lupe Vélez es:Lupe Vélez fr:Lupe Vélez it:Lupe Vélez nl:Lupe Vélez pt:Lupe Vélez ru:Велес, Лупе sh:Lupe Vélez sv:Lupe Vélez

Coordinates	38°53′35.7″N77°1′29.9″N
birth name	Frank James Cooper
birth date	May 07, 1901
birth place	Helena, Montana, U.S.
spouse	(his death)
children	Maria Cooper Janis
death date	May 13, 1961
death place	Los Angeles, California, U.S.
occupation	Actor
years active	1925–1961 }}

Frank James Cooper, known professionally as Gary Cooper, (May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961) was an American film actor. He was renowned for his quiet, understated acting style and his stoic, but at times intense screen persona, which was particularly well suited to the many Westerns he made. His career spanned from 1925 until shortly before his death in 1961, and comprised more than one hundred films.

Cooper received five Academy Award nominations for Best Actor, winning twice for ''Sergeant York'' and ''High Noon''. He also received an Honorary Award in 1961 from the Academy.

Decades later, the American Film Institute named Cooper among the AFI's 100 Years... 100 Stars, ranking 11th among males from the Classical Hollywood cinema period. In 2003, his performances as Will Kane in ''High Noon'', Lou Gehrig in ''The Pride of the Yankees'', and Alvin York in ''Sergeant York'' made the AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains list, all of them as heroes.

Early life

Cooper was born in Helena, Montana, one of two sons of an English farmer from Bedfordshire, who later became an American lawyer and judge, Charles Henry Cooper (1865–1946), and Kent (England)-born Alice (née Brazier) Cooper (1873–1967). His mother hoped for their two sons to receive a better education than that available in Montana and arranged for the boys to attend Dunstable Grammar School in Bedfordshire, England between 1910 and 1913. Upon the outbreak of World War I, Cooper's mother brought her sons home and enrolled them in a Bozeman, Montana, high school.

When Cooper was 13, he injured his hip in a car accident. He returned to his parents' ranch near Helena to recuperate by horseback riding at the recommendation of his doctor. Cooper studied at Iowa's Grinnell College until the spring of 1924, but did not graduate. He had tried out, unsuccessfully, for the college's drama club. He returned to Helena, managing the ranch and contributing cartoons to the local newspaper. In 1924, Cooper's father left the Montana Supreme Court bench and moved with his wife to Los Angeles. Their son, unable to make a living as an editorial cartoonist in Helena, joined them, moving there that same year, reasoning that he "would rather starve where it was warm, than to starve and freeze too."

Career

Failing as a salesman of electric signs and theatrical curtains, as a promoter for a local photographer and as an applicant for newspaper work in Los Angeles, Cooper found work as an actor in 1925. He earned money as an "extra" in the motion picture industry, usually cast as a cowboy. He is known to have had an uncredited role in the 1925 Tom Mix Western, ''Dick Turpin''. The following year, he had screen credit in a two-reeler, ''Lightnin' Wins'', with actress Eileen Sedgwick as his leading lady.

After the release of this short film, Cooper accepted a long-term contract with Paramount Pictures. He changed his name to Gary in 1925, following the advice of casting director Nan Collins, who felt it evoked the "rough, tough" nature of her native Gary, Indiana.

"Coop," as he was called by his peers, went on to appear in over 100 films. Cooper broke through in a supporting role in ''Wings'' (1927), the only silent film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture, following that with ''Nevada'' (1927) co-starring Thelma Todd and William Powell, based on the Zane Gray novel, which was remade in 1944 as an early Robert Mitchum vehicle, the only time Cooper and Mitchum played the same role. He became a major star with his first sound picture, ''The Virginian'' (1929) opposite Walter Huston as the villainous Trampas. ''The Spoilers'' appeared the following year with Betty Compson, which was remade in 1942 with Compson lookalike Marlene Dietrich and John Wayne in Cooper's role. Cooper followed this action film with his own Dietrich film entitled ''Morocco'' (1930) in which he played a Foreign Legionnaire. ''Devil and the Deep'' (1932) featured Cary Grant in a supporting role with Talullah Bankhead and Cooper in the leads alongside Charles Laughton. The following year, Cooper was the second lead in the sophisticated Ernst Lubitsch comedy production of Noël Coward's ''Design for Living''. He was billed under Fredric March in the kind of fast-talking role Cooper never played again after Cary Grant staked out the light comedy leading man field with ''The Awful Truth'' four years later. The screen adaptation of ''A Farewell to Arms'' (1932), directed by Frank Borzage, and the title role in Frank Capra's ''Mr. Deeds Goes to Town'' (1936) furthered Cooper's box office appeal.

Cooper was producer David O. Selznick's first choice for the role of Rhett Butler in the 1939 film ''Gone with the Wind''. When Cooper turned down the role, he was passionately against it. He is quoted as saying, "''Gone with the Wind'' is going to be the biggest flop in Hollywood history. I’m glad it’ll be Clark Gable who’s falling flat on his nose, not me". Alfred Hitchcock wanted him to star in ''Foreign Correspondent'' (1940) and ''Saboteur'' (1942). Cooper later admitted he had made a "mistake" in turning down the director. For the former film, Hitchcock cast look-alike Joel McCrea instead.

Cooper cemented his cowboy credentials again in ''The Westerner'' (1940) opposite Walter Brennan as Judge Roy Bean and followed that immediately afterward with the lavish ''North West Mounted Police'' (1940), directed by Cecil B. DeMille and featuring Paulette Goddard.

In 1942, Cooper won his first Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance as the title character in ''Sergeant York''. It has often been rumored that Alvin York refused to authorize a movie about his life unless Cooper portrayed him. Evidence has since surfaced that the film's producer, Jesse L. Lasky, sent a telegram pleading with Cooper to take the part and signed York's name to it. ''Meet John Doe'' was released earlier the same year, a smash hit under the direction of Frank Capra. Ingrid Bergman had just made ''Casablanca'' when she and Cooper collaborated on ''For Whom the Bell Tolls'' (1943), based on a novel by Cooper's close friend Ernest Hemingway. As a change of pace, he made a Western comedy lampooning his hesitant speech and mannerisms and his own image in general called ''Along Came Jones'' (1945) in which he relied on gunslinging Loretta Young to save him when the chips were down. Cooper also starred in the original version of the Ayn Rand novel ''The Fountainhead'' (1949) with Patricia Neal.

In 1953, Cooper won his second Best Actor Academy Award for his performance as Marshal Will Kane in ''High Noon'', arguably considered his finest role. Ill with an ulcer, he wasn't present to receive his Academy Award in February 1953. He asked John Wayne to accept it on his behalf, a bit of irony in light of Wayne's stated distaste for the film.

Cooper continued to play the lead in films almost to the end of his life. Among his later box office hits were the stark Western adventure ''Garden of Evil'' (1954) with Susan Hayward and Richard Widmark; ''Vera Cruz'' (1954), an extremely influential Western in which he guns down villain Burt Lancaster in a showdown; his portrayal of a Quaker farmer during the American Civil War in William Wyler's ''Friendly Persuasion'' (1956); and Anthony Mann's ''Man of the West'' (1958), a hard-edged action Western with Lee J. Cobb. His final motion picture was a British film, ''The Naked Edge'' (1961), directed by Michael Anderson. Among his final projects was narrating an NBC documentary, ''The Real West,'' in which he helped clear up myths about famous Western figures.

Cooper appeared in live radio "remakes" of several of his films.

Congressional testimony

In 1944, Cooper joined the anti-communist Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals. While filming ''Good Sam'', he testified before the House Committee on Un-American Activities on October 23, 1947, characterized as a "friendly" witness. Asked if he had observed "communistic influence in Hollywood", Cooper named no one in particular but said he had "turned down quite a few scripts because I thought they were tinged with communistic ideas"; he also said he had heard statements such as "don't you think the Constitution of the United States is about 150 years out of date?" and "perhaps this would be a more efficient government without a Congress"— statements he characterized as "very un-American". He also told the committee the following:

''"Several years ago, when communism was more of a social chit-chatter in parties for offices, and so on when communism didn't have the implications that it has now, discussion of communism was more open and I remember hearing statements from some folks to the effect that the communistic system had a great many features that were desirable. It offered the actors and artists — in other words, the creative people — a special place in government where we would be somewhat immune from the ordinary leveling of income. And as I remember, some actor's name was mentioned to me who had a house in Moscow which was very large — he had three cars, and stuff, with his house being quite a bit larger than my house in Beverly Hills at the time — and it looked to me like a pretty phony come-on to us in the picture business. From that time on, I could never take any of this pinko mouthing very seriously, because I didn't feel it was on the level."''

Cooper's testimony occurred a month before the Hollywood blacklist was established.

Personal life

Cooper was friends with Ernest Hemingway and spent many vacations with the writer in Sun Valley, Idaho.

Family and relationships

Cooper had high-profile relationships with actresses Clara Bow, Lupe Vélez and the American-born socialite-spy Countess Carla Dentice di Frasso (née Dorothy Caldwell Taylor, formerly wife of British pioneer aviator Claude Grahame-White).

On December 15, 1933, Cooper wed Veronica Balfe (May 27, 1913 – February 16, 2000), known as "Rocky." Balfe was a New York Roman Catholic socialite who had briefly acted under the name of Sandra Shaw. She appeared in the film ''No Other Woman'', but her most widely seen role was in ''King Kong'', as the woman dropped by Kong. Her third and final film was ''Blood Money''. Her father was governor of the New York Stock Exchange, and her uncle was motion-picture art director Cedric Gibbons. During the 1930s she also became the California state women's skeet shooting champion. Cooper and Balfe had one child, Maria, now Maria Cooper Janis, married to classical pianist Byron Janis.

In the 1950s Cooper was slowly drawn to Catholicism and was baptized a Catholic in 1958. After he was married, but prior to his conversion, Cooper had affairs with several famous co-stars, including Marlene Dietrich, Grace Kelly and Patricia Neal. He pressured Neal to have an abortion in 1950, because fathering a child out of wedlock could have destroyed his career. Cooper's daughter Maria, when she was a little girl, famously spat at Neal, but many years later, the two became friends. Cooper separated from his wife between 1951 and 1954.

Politics

Cooper was a staunch supporter of the Republican Party. He voted for Calvin Coolidge in 1924 and Herbert Hoover in 1928 and 1932. He campaigned for Wendell Willkie in 1940, and heavily campaigned for Thomas Dewey in 1944.

In 1947, he testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee as a 'friendly witness'. He was a member of the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals and in his testimony spoke out against the Communist influence in Hollywood at the time. Fellow members in the Alliance included Clark Gable, Ginger Rogers, Victor Fleming and Barbara Stanwyck among many others.

Death

In April 1960, Cooper underwent surgery for prostate cancer after it had spread to his colon. It spread to his lungs and bones shortly thereafter.

Cooper was too ill to attend the Academy Awards ceremony in April 1961, so his close friend James Stewart accepted the honorary Oscar on his behalf. Stewart's emotional speech hinted that something was seriously wrong, and the next day newspapers ran the headline, "Gary Cooper has cancer." One month later, on May 13, 1961, six days after his 60th birthday, Cooper died.

Cooper was originally interred in Holy Cross Catholic Cemetery in Culver City, California. In May 1974 his body was removed from the Grotto Section of Holy Cross Cemetery, when his widow Veronica remarried and moved to New York, and she had Cooper's body exhumed and reburied in Sacred Heart Cemetery, in Southampton, New York, on Long Island. Veronica "Rocky" Cooper-Converse died in 2000 and was buried near Cooper at Sacred Heart Cemetery.

Legacy

For his contribution to the film industry, Cooper has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6243 Hollywood Blvd.

In 1966, he was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

In September 2009, Cooper was featured on a commemorative U.S. postage stamp.

He is mentioned in the Irving Berlin song, ''Puttin' on the Ritz''.

He is briefly mentioned in the song ''Streets Of Pain'' written by Richard Marx and Fee Waybill, performed by Marx.

Filmography

References

;Notes ;Citations ;Bibliography

Arce, Hector. ''Gary Cooper: An Intimate Biography''. New York: Bantam Books, 1980, First edition 1979. ISBN 978-0553141306.

Donnelley, Paul. ''Fade To Black: A Book Of Movie Obituaries, 2nd Edition''. Omnibus Press, 2005, First edition 2003. ISBN 978-1844494309.

Janis, Maria Cooper. ''Gary Cooper Off Camera: A Daughter Remembers''. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1999. ISBN 978-0810941304.

Meyer, Jeffrey. ''Gary Cooper: American Hero''. New York: William Morrow, 1998. ISBN 978-0688154943.

Rogers, Ginger. ''Ginger: My Story''. New York: Harper Collins, 1991. ISBN 978-0061564703.

Selznick, David O. ''Memo from David O. Selznick''. New York: Modern Library, 2000. ISBN 0-375-75531-4.

Shearer, Stephen Michael. ''Patricia Neal: An Unquiet Life''. Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky, 2006. ISBN 978-0813123912.

Swindell, Larry. ''The Last Hero: A Biography of Gary Cooper''. New York: Doubleday, 1980. ISBN 0-385-14316-8.

External links

Profile @ Turner Classic Movies

Photographs of Gary Cooper from virtual-history.com

Inside High Noon – The Documentary

Gary Cooper in the 1910 US Census, 1920 US Census, 1930 US Census, and Social Security Death Index.

Category:Academy Honorary Award recipients Category:American film actors Category:Actors from Montana Category:American Roman Catholics Category:20th-century actors Category:American silent film actors Category:Best Actor Academy Award winners Category:Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners Category:Burials at Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City Category:California Republicans Category:Montana Republicans Category:Converts to Roman Catholicism Category:Deaths from prostate cancer Category:American people of English descent Category:Grinnell College people Category:People from Helena, Montana Category:Western (genre) film actors Category:Cancer deaths in California Category:1901 births Category:1961 deaths Category:People educated at Dunstable Grammar School

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Coordinates	38°53′35.7″N77°1′29.9″N
bgcolour	silver
name	Johnny Downs
birth date	October 10, 1913
birth place	Brooklyn, New York, U.S.
death date	June 06, 1994
death place	Coronado, California U.S.
occupation	Film actor
birth name	John Morey Downs
yearsactive	1923-1953
spouse	June Downs (?-1994) (his death) 5 children
academyawards	}}

Johnny Downs (October 10, 1913 – June 6, 1994) was an American actor. Son of a Naval aviator, he was taken to Hollywood in 1921 when his father was transferred to the San Diego naval base. He began his career as a child actor, most notably playing Johnny in the ''Our Gang'' short series from 1923 to 1926. He remained active in films, television, and theatre up through the early 1960s.

After ''Our Gang''

Following his stint with ''Our Gang'', Downs stayed with the short-subject series until 1927, appearing in twenty-four two-reelers in various roles. He honed his dancing and singing skills on the vaudeville stage, working prominently on Broadway until returning to Hollywood in 1934. Downs became a fixture of the "college musical" movie cycle of the late 1930s, usually cast as a team captain or a cheerleader. His movie career declined just after he returned to Hal Roach to star in a 45-minute streamliner feature, ''All-American Co-Ed''. From then on he mainly walked the boards in vaudeville, summer stock, and one solid Broadway hit ("Are You With It"). One of his outstanding cameo appearances is his performance in ''Rhapsody in Blue: The George Gershwin Story'' where he dances to Robert Alda's piano playing of "Swanee". Downs made a short comeback in doing bit parts in the early 1950s. Despite never making it big, he has almost 100 movie credits to his name.

''The Johnny Downs Show''

In the 1950s and early 1960s he hosted a local, after-school kids' television show, ''The Johnny Downs Show'' on Channel 10 "KOGO" (call letters) in San Diego, California (KOGO was KFSD prior to 1961). The theme started out as an airport hangar with Downs playing a former World War II, "Johnny Jet". In between reruns of ''The Little Rascals'', Downs entertained and informed his studio audiences and his viewers. After that, it was trains, and he could be seen getting off or on a locomotive at the start and end of a show. As the show changed to feature more ''Popeye'' cartoons, his theme changed from being a train engineer to being a boat captain at the San Diego harbor. Regardless of the theme, Johnny Downs was always a big star to the kids of the area and was always a draw when he appeared at contests, festivals, parades, or other events.

Death

Downs died of cancer in June 1994, and is interred in the Holy Cross Cemetery in San Diego. Johnny and his wife June had five children: Mary, Claudia, John Jr., Mollie and Maureen.

Selected filmography

''Adventures of the Flying Cadets'' (1943)

''Freckles Comes Home'' (1942)

''The Mad Monster'' (1942)

''Adam Had Four Sons'' (1941)

''Babes in Toyland'' (1934)

''The Trail of '98'' (1928)

''The Crowd'' (1928)

''Chicken Feed'' (1927)

''Seeing the World'' (1927)

''45 Minutes from Hollywood'' (1926)

''Thundering Fleas'' (1926)

''Ask Grandma'' (1925)

''The Love Bug'' (1925)

''Dog Days'' (1925)

''Circus Fever'' (1925)

Broadway credits

''Hold It!'' (1948)

''Are You With It?'' (1945–1946)

''Ragged Army'' (1934)

''Growing Pains'' (1933)

''Strike Me Pink'' (1933)

External links

Category:Our Gang Category:American child actors Category:Actors from New York Category:People from Brooklyn Category:Vaudeville performers Category:Cancer deaths in California Category:1913 births Category:1994 deaths

Coordinates	38°53′35.7″N77°1′29.9″N
name	Jane Frazee
birthname	Mary Jane Frehse
birth date	July 18, 1918
birth place	Duluth, Minnesota
death date	September 06, 1985
death place	Newport Beach California
spouse	Glenn Tryon (1942-1947; 1 son)}}

Mary Jane Frehse (July 18, 1918 – September 6, 1985), known as Jane Frazee, was an American actress, singer, and dancer.

Professional life

At the age of 6, Jane and her older sister Ruth (1909–2001) formed a singing vaudeville act known as The Frazee Sisters. The act broke up in 1940, when Jane landed a leading role in the B film ''Melody and Moonlight'' (1940), the first of four "Moonlight.." musicals the young actress made for Universal Pictures. Under contract to the studio, she appeared in numerous musical films, including, most notably, Buck Privates, the high-grossing 1941 comedy/World War II film starring Bud Abbott and Lou Costello. Jane also frequently performed in Westerns, both in movies and on television, working with genre stars like Roy Rogers, Charles Starrett, Guinn Williams, Clayton Moore, Jock Mahoney, and Gene Autry. The actress ended her Hollywood career after appearing as "Alice McDoakes" in several Joe McDoakes one reel short subjects between 1954 and 1956. After retiring from acting, Jane started a real estate business.

Personal life

In 1942, Frazee married silent film actor and director Glenn Tryon. The marriage lasted five years and produced one son, Timothy. Jane Frazee died in 1985, after complications of a stroke.

Filmography

Billed with sister Ruth as The Frazee Sisters

''Captain Blue Blood'' (1935)

''Study and Understudy'' (1936)

''Up in Lights'' (1938)

''Rollin' in Rhythm'' (1939)

''Pharmacy Frolics'' (1939)

''Arcade Varieties'' (1939)

''Swing Styles'' (1939)

Motion Pictures

''Melody and Moonlight'' (1940)

''Music in the Morgan Manner'' (1941) (as Herself)

''Buck Privates'' (1941)

''Angels with Broken Wings'' (1941)

''San Antonio Rose'' (1941)

''Sing Another Chorus'' (1941)

''Moonlight in Hawaii'' (1941)

''Hellzapoppin''' (1941)

''Don't Get Personal'' (1942)

''What's Cookin'?'' (1942)

''Almost Married'' (1942)

''Moonlight Masquerade'' (1942)

''Get Hep to Love'' (1942)

''Moonlight in Havana'' (1942)

''When Johnny Comes Marching Home'' (1942)

''Hi'ya, Chum'' (1943)

''Keep 'Em Slugging'' (1943) (uncredited cameo)

''Rhythm of the Islands'' (1943)

''Beautiful But Broke'' (1944)

''Cowboy Canteen'' (1944)

''Rosie the Riveter'' (1944)

''Swing in the Saddle'' (1944)

''Kansas City Kitty'' (1944)

''She's a Sweetheart'' (1944)

''Practically Yours'' (1944)

''The Big Bonanza'' (1944)

''Ten Cents a Dance'' (1945)

''Swingin' on a Rainbow'' (1945)

''George White's Scandals'' (1945)

''A Guy Could Change'' (1946)

''Calendar Girl'' (1947)

''Springtime in the Sierras'' (1947)

''On the Old Spanish Trail'' (1947)

''The Gay Ranchero'' (1948)

''Under California Stars'' (1948)

''Incident'' (1948)

''Grand Canyon Trail'' (1948)

''Last of the Wild Horses'' (1948)

''Rhythm Inn'' (1951)

Joe McDoakes Short Films

''So You Want to Be Your Own Boss'' (March 1954) [as Alice McDoakes]

''So You Want to Go to a Nightclub'' (May 1954) [as Alice McDoakes]

''So You're Taking in a Roomer'' (October 1954) [as Alice McDoakes]

''So You Don't Trust Your Wife'' (January 1955) [as Alice McDoakes]

''So You Want to Be a Gladiator'' (March 1955) [as Alice McDoakes]

''So You Want to Build a Model Railroad'' (August 1955) [as Alice McDoakes]

''So You Think the Grass is Greener'' (January 1956) [as Alice McDoakes]

''So You Want to Play the Piano'' (May 1956) [as Alice McDoakes]

References

External links

Category:1918 births Category:1985 deaths Category:Actors from Minnesota Category:American film actors Category:American stage actors Category:American dancers Category:American singers Category:Deaths from stroke Category:People from Duluth, Minnesota

es:Jane Frazee