Mary Frances "Debbie"Reynolds (April 1, 1932 – December 28, 2016) was an American actress, singer and entrepreneur. Her acting career spanned almost 70 years. Reynolds performed on stage and television and in films into her 80s.
Reynolds (right) with her grandmother O. Harman (center) and father Ray Reynolds in 1955
Mary Frances Reynolds was born on April 1, 1932, inEl Paso, Texas, to Maxene N. "Minnie" Harman and Raymond Francis "Ray" Reynolds, a carpenter who worked for theSouthern Pacific Railroad.[citation needed] She was of Scottish-Irish and English ancestry[9] and was raised in a strictNazarene church of her domineering mother.[10] She had an older brother, William, who was two years her senior.[11] Reynolds was aGirl Scout, once saying that she wanted to die as the world's oldest living Girl Scout.[12] Reynolds was also a member ofThe International Order of Job's Daughters.[13]
Her mother took in laundry for income, while they lived in a shack on Magnolia Street in El Paso.[11] "We may have been poor," she said in a 1963 interview, "but we always had something to eat, even if Dad had to go out in the desert and shoot jackrabbits."
One of the advantages of having been poor is that you learn to appreciate good fortune and the value of a dollar, and poverty holds no fear for you because you know you've gone through it and you can do it again... But we were always a happy family and a religious one. And I'm trying to inculcate in my children the same sense of values, the same tone that my mother gave to me.[11]
Her family moved toBurbank, California, in 1939.[14] When Reynolds was a 16-year-old student atBurbank High School in 1948, she won the Miss Burbank beauty contest.[14] Soon after, she was offered a contract with Warner Brothers[14] and was given the stage name "Debbie" by studio headJack L. Warner.[15]
One of her closest high school friends said that she rarely dated during her teenaged years in Burbank.
They never found her attractive in school. She was cute, but sort of tomboyish, and her family never had any money to speak of. She never dressed well or drove a car. And, I think, during all the years in school, she was invited to only one dance.[11]
Reynolds agreed, saying, "when I started, I didn't even know how to dress. I woredungarees and a shirt. I had no money, no taste, and no training."[16] Her friend adds:
I say this in all sincerity. Debbie can serve as an inspiration to all young American womanhood. She came up the hard way, and she has a realistic sense of values based on faith, love, work, and money. Life has been kind to her because she has been kind to life. She's a young woman with a conscience, which is something rare in Hollywood actresses. She also has a refreshing sense of honesty.[11]
Reynolds was discovered by talent scouts fromWarner Bros. and MGM, who were at the 1948 Miss Burbank contest. Both companies wanted her to sign up with their studio, and had to flip a coin to see which one got her. Warner Bros. won the coin toss, and she was with the studio for two years.[17] When Warner Bros. stopped producing musicals, she moved to MGM.
With MGM, Reynolds regularly appeared inmovie musicals during the 1950s, and had several hit records during the period. Her song "Aba Daba Honeymoon" (featured in the filmTwo Weeks with Love (1950) and sung as a duet with co-starCarleton Carpenter) was the first soundtrack recording to become a top-of-the-chart gold record, reaching number three on theBillboard charts.[18]
Her performance in the film greatly impressed the studio, which then gave her a co-starring role in what became her highest-profile film,Singin' in the Rain (1952), a satire on movie-making in Hollywood during the transition from silent to sound pictures.[17] It co-starredGene Kelly, whom she called a "great dancer and cinematic genius," adding, "He made me a star. I was 18 and he taught me how to dance and how to work hard and be dedicated."[19] In 1956, she appeared in the musicalBundle of Joy with her then-husband,Eddie Fisher.[20]
Reynolds was one of 14 top-billed names inHow the West Was Won (1962) but she was the only one who appeared throughout, the story largely following the life and times of her character Lilith Prescott. In the film, she sang three songs: "What Was Your Name in the States?", as her pioneering family begin their westward journey; "Raise a Ruckus Tonight", starting a party around a wagon train camp fire; and, three times, "Home in the Meadow" – to the tune of "Greensleeves" with lyrics bySammy Cahn.[21]
Her starring role inThe Unsinkable Molly Brown (1964) led to a nomination for theAcademy Award for Best Actress.[22] Reynolds noted that she initially had issues with its director,Charles Walters. "He didn't want me," she said. "He wantedShirley MacLaine," who at the time was unable to take the role. "He said, 'You are totally wrong for the part.'" But six weeks into production, he reversed his opinion. "He came to me and said, 'I have to admit that I was wrong. You are playing the role really well. I'm pleased.'"[23] Reynolds also played inGoodbye Charlie, a 1964 comedy film about a callous womanizer who gets his just reward. It was adapted fromGeorge Axelrod's playGoodbye, Charlie and also starredTony Curtis andPat Boone.
She next portrayedJeanine Deckers inThe Singing Nun (1966). In what Reynolds once called the "stupidest mistake of my entire career,"[24] she made headlines in 1970 after instigating a fight with the NBC television network over cigarette advertising on her weeklytelevision show. Although she was television's highest-paid female performer at the time, she quit the show for breaking its contract:[24]
I was shocked to discover that the initial commercial aired during the premiere of my new series was devoted to a nationally advertised brand of cigarette (Pall Mall). I fully outlined my personal feelings concerning cigarette advertising ... that I will not be a party to such commercials, which I consider directly opposed to health and well-being.[25]
When NBC explained to Reynolds that banning cigarette commercials from her show would be impossible, she kept her resolve. The show drew mixed reviews, but according to NBC, it captured about 42% of the nation's viewing audience. She said later she was especially concerned about the commercials because of the number of children watching the show.[26] She did quit doing the show after about a year, which she said had cost her about $2 million of lost income: "Maybe I was a fool to quit the show, but at least I was an honest fool. I'm not a phony or pretender. With me, it wasn't a question of money, but integrity. I'm the one who has to live with myself."[27] The dispute would have been rendered moot and in Reynolds' favor anyway had she not resigned; by 1971, thePublic Health Cigarette Smoking Act (which had been passed into law before she left the show) would ban all radio and television advertising for tobacco products.
Reynolds voiced Charlotte in theHanna-Barbera animated musicalCharlotte's Web (1973), where she originated the song "Mother Earth and Father Time."[28] Reynolds continued to make other appearances in film and television. She playedHelen Chappel Hackett's mother, Deedee Chappel, on theWings episode "If It's Not One Thing, It's Your Mother," which first aired November 22, 1994.[29]
In 2000, Reynolds took up a recurring voice role on the children's television programRugrats, playing the grandmother of two of the characters. In 2001, she co-starred withElizabeth Taylor, Shirley MacLaine, andJoan Collins in the comedyThese Old Broads, a television movie written for her by her daughter, Carrie Fisher.[33] She had a cameo role as herself in the 2004 filmConnie and Carla. In 2013, she appeared inBehind the Candelabra, as the mother ofLiberace.[34]
Reynolds appears with her daughter inBright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds, a 2016 documentary about the very close relationship between the two.[35] It premiered at the2016 Cannes Film Festival. The television premiere was January 7, 2017, onHBO.[6] According toUSA Today, the film is "an intimate portrait of Hollywood royalty ... [it] loosely chronicles their lives through interviews, photos, footage, and vintage home movies... It culminates in a moving scene, just as Reynolds is preparing to receive the 2015 Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award, which Fisher presented to her mom."[36]
She releasedThe Best of Debbie Reynolds album in 1991.[40]
Marquee listing Reynolds' world premiere at theRiviera Hotel, Las Vegas, December 1962
For 10 years, she headlined for about three months a year in Las Vegas's Riviera Hotel. She enjoyed live shows, though that type of performing "was extremely strenuous," she said in 1966:
With a performing schedule of two shows a night, seven nights a week, it's probably the toughest kind of show business, but in my opinion, the most rewarding. I like the feeling of being able to change stage bits and business when I want. You can't do that in motion pictures or TV.[41]
As part of her nightclub act, Reynolds was noted for doing impressions of celebrities such as Eva and Zsa Zsa Gabor, Mae West, Barbra Streisand, Phyllis Diller, and Bette Davis. Her impersonation of Davis was inspired following their co-starring roles in the 1956 film,The Catered Affair.[27] Reynolds had started doing stage impersonations as a teenager; her impersonation ofBetty Hutton was performed as a singing number during the Miss Burbank contest in 1948.[27]
Her 1992 holiday collaboration withDonald O'Connor,Christmas with Donald and Debbie, arranged and conducted by Angelo DiPippo, would be her final album release.[42]
Reynolds was also a French horn player. Gene Kelly, reflecting on Reynolds's sudden fame, recalled, "There were times when Debbie was more interested in playing the French horn somewhere in the San Fernando Valley or attending a Girl Scout meeting....She didn't realize she was a movie star all of a sudden."[43]
Reynolds prior to performing a show in Las Vegas in 1975
With limited film and television opportunities coming her way, Reynolds accepted an opportunity to make her Broadway debut.[44] She starred in the 1973 revival ofIrene, a musical first produced 60 years before.[44] When asked why she waited so long to appear in a Broadway play, she explained:
Primarily because I had two children growing up, I could make movies and recordings and plays in nearby Las Vegas and handle a television series without being away from them. Now, they are well on the way to being adults. Also, there was the matter of being offered a show that I felt might be right for me ... I felt thatIrene was it and now was the time.[45]
Reynolds and her daughter Carrie both made their Broadway debuts in the play.[45] Per reports, the production broke records for the highest weekly gross of any musical.[44] For that production, she received a Tony nomination. Reynolds also starred in the Broadway revueDebbie in 1976.[46] She toured withHarve Presnell inAnnie Get Your Gun,[47] then wrapped up the Broadway run ofWoman of the Year in 1983,[48][49] while Fisher was appearing inAgnes of God.[50][51] In the late 1980s, Reynolds repeated her role as Molly Brown in the stage version ofThe Unsinkable Molly Brown, first opposite Presnell (repeating his original Broadway and movie role)[47] and later withRon Raines.[52]
Reynolds amassed a large collection ofmovie memorabilia, beginning with items from the landmark1970 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer auction, and she displayed them, first in a museum at her Las Vegas hotel and casino during the 1990s[56] and later in a museum close to theKodak Theatre in Los Angeles.
The museum was to relocate to be the centerpiece of the Belle Island Village tourist attraction in the resort city ofPigeon Forge, Tennessee, but the developer went bankrupt.[57][58] The museum filed forChapter 11 bankruptcy[59] in June 2009. The most valuable asset of the museum was Reynolds' collection.[57] Todd Fisher, Reynolds' son, announced that his mother was "heartbroken" to have to auction off the collection.[57] It was valued at $10.79 million in the bankruptcy filing.[58] Los Angeles auction firmProfiles in History was given the responsibility of conducting a series of auctions.[60] Among the "more than 3500 costumes, 20,000 photographs, and thousands of movie posters, costume sketches, and props" included in the sales wereCharlie Chaplin's bowler hat andMarilyn Monroe's white "subway dress," whose skirt is lifted up by the breeze from a passing subway train in the filmThe Seven Year Itch (1955).[60] The dress sold for $4.6 million in 2011;[61] the final auction was held in May 2014.[62]
In 1979, Reynolds opened her own dance studio in North Hollywood. In 1983, she released an exercise video,Do It Debbie's Way![63] She purchased theClarion Hotel and Casino, a hotel and casino inLas Vegas, in 1992. She renamed it the Debbie Reynolds Hollywood Hotel but it was not a success and Reynolds was forced to declare bankruptcy in 1997.[64] In June 2010, she replacedIvana Trump on theGlobe weekly'sadvice column[65] but many of the published letters were plagiarized fromSlate'sDear Prudence and possibly others.[66]
Reynolds was a longtime ally of the LGBT community and an early advocate for people with AIDS.[67] In 1983, Reynolds performed at an AIDS fundraiser with her friend Shirley MacLaine.[68] In a 2014 interview withThe Daily Telegraph, Reynolds revealed that she had helped several closeted actors conceal their homosexuality by dating them.[69] When asked when she realized she was a gay icon, Reynolds replied, "Over the years many of the boys that have worked for me as dancers have been gay. The creative people were all gay people, from producers to writers. To me, they were just family."[70]
Reynolds and Eddie Fisher on their wedding day, 1955
Reynolds was married three times. Her first marriage was to singer and actorEddie Fisher in 1955.[71] They became the parents ofCarrie Fisher andTodd Fisher. The couple divorced in 1959 when it was revealed shortly after the death ofElizabeth Taylor's husbandMike Todd that Fisher had been having an affair with her; Taylor and Reynolds were good friends at the time. The Eddie Fisher – Elizabeth Taylor affair was a great public scandal, which led to the cancellation ofEddie Fisher's television show.[72]
In 2011, Reynolds was onThe Oprah Winfrey Show just weeks before Elizabeth Taylor's death. She explained that Taylor and she happened to be traveling at the same time on the ocean liner (RMS Queen Elizabeth) some time in the 1960s when they reconciled.[73] Reynolds sent a note to Taylor's room, and Taylor sent a note in reply asking to have dinner with Reynolds and end their feud. As Reynolds described it, "we had a wonderful evening with a lot of laughs."[74] In 1972, she noted the bright side of the divorce and her remarriage:
Now in retrospect, though it was not my will, I think it probably was the best thing that ever happened to me. He did give me two great children and for that I will ever be grateful. Our door is always open to him. I believe in peaceful coexistence and being friends with the father of your children.[27]
Life is both faith and love. Without faith, love is only one dimensional and incomplete. Faith helps you to overlook other people's shortcomings, and love them as they are. If you ask too much of any relationship, you can't help but be disappointed. But if you ask nothing, you can't be hurt or disappointed.
Reynolds' second marriage, to millionaire businessman Harry Karl, lasted from 1960 to 1973.[73] For a period during the 1960s, she stopped working at the studio on Friday afternoons to attendGirl Scout meetings, since she was the leader of the Girl Scout Troop of which her 13-year-old daughter Carrie and her stepdaughter Tina Karl, also 13, were members.[75] Reynolds later found herself in financial difficulty because of Karl's gambling and bad investments.[1]
Reynolds' third marriage was to real estate developer Richard Hamlett from 1984 to 1996.[76]
In 2011, Reynolds stepped down after 56 years of involvement inThe Thalians,[77] a charitable organization devoted to children and adults with mental-health issues.
Reynolds was hospitalized in October 2012 atCedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles due to an adverse reaction to medication. She canceled appearances and concert engagements for the next three months.[78]
She published the autobiographiesDebbie: My Life in 1988 andUnsinkable: A Memoir in 2013.[79]
On December 28, 2016, Reynolds was taken by ambulance toCedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, after suffering a "severe stroke," according to her son.[80] Later that afternoon, Reynolds was pronounced dead in the hospital; she was 84 years old.[81][82][83] On January 9, 2017, her cause of death was determined to be anintracerebral hemorrhage, withhypertension a contributing factor.[84]
On December 23, 2016, Reynolds' daughter, actress and writerCarrie Fisher, suffered a medical emergency on a flight from London to Los Angeles, and died one day before her mother, December 27, at the age of 60 atRonald Reagan UCLA Medical Center.[80][85]
Todd Fisher later said that Reynolds had been seriously affected by her daughter's death, and that her grief partially contributed to her stroke, noting that his mother had stated, "I want to be with Carrie," shortly before she died.[86][87][88] During an interview for the December 30, 2016, airing of theABC-TV program20/20, Todd Fisher elaborated on this, saying that his mother had joined his sister in death because Reynolds "didn't want to leave Carrie and did not want her to be alone."[89] He added, "she didn't die of a broken heart" as some news reports had implied, but rather "just left to be with Carrie."[90]
Reynolds was entombed with a portion of her daughter's ashes atForest Lawn Memorial Park inHollywood Hills during a memorial service held on January 6,[91][92] while the remainder of Carrie Fisher's ashes are held in a giant, noveltyProzac pill.[93]
^Byrne, James Patrick. Coleman, Philip. King, Jason Francis.Ireland and the Americas: Culture, Politics, and History: A Multidisciplinary Encyclopedia. Volume 2, p. 804. ABC-CLIO, 2008;ISBN978-1-85109-614-5.
^Roberts, Jerry (2009)."John Korty".Encyclopedia of Television Film Directors. London: Scarecrow Press. p. 310.ISBN9780810863781. RetrievedDecember 29, 2016.
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