Ida Lupino | |
|---|---|
 Lupino before performance on the radio seriesCavalcade of America | |
| Born | (1918-02-04)4 February 1918 Herne Hill,Middlesex, England |
| Died | 3 August 1995(1995-08-03) (aged 77) |
| Citizenship |
|
| Alma mater | Royal Academy of Dramatic Art |
| Occupations |
|
| Years active | 1931–1978 |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 1 |
| Parents |
|
| Family | Lupino |
| Signature | |
 | |
Ida Lupino (4 February 1918[1] – 3 August 1995) was a British-American actress, director, writer, and producer. Throughout her 48-year career, she appeared in 59 films and directed eight, working primarily in the United States, where she became a citizen in 1948. She is widely regarded as the most prominent female filmmaker working in the 1950s during the Hollywood studio system.[2] With her independent production company, she co-wrote and co-produced severalsocial-message films and became the first woman to direct afilm noir,The Hitch-Hiker, in 1953.
Among Lupino's other directed films, the best known areNot Wanted (1949), about unwed pregnancy (she took over for a sick director and refused directorial credit);Never Fear (1950), loosely based upon her own experiences battling paralyzing polio;Outrage (1950), one of the first films about rape;The Bigamist (1953), andThe Trouble with Angels (1966). Her short yet immensely influential directorial career, tackling themes of women trapped by social conventions, usually undermelodramatic ornoir coverings, is a pioneering example ofproto-feminist filmmaking.[3]
As an actress, Lupino's best known films areThe Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1939) withBasil Rathbone;They Drive by Night (1940) withGeorge Raft andHumphrey Bogart;High Sierra (1941) with Bogart;The Sea Wolf (1941) withEdward G. Robinson andJohn Garfield;Ladies in Retirement (1941) withLouis Hayward;Moontide (1942) withJean Gabin;The Hard Way (1943);Deep Valley (1947) withDane Clark;Road House (1948) withCornel Wilde andRichard Widmark;While the City Sleeps (1956) withDana Andrews andVincent Price; andJunior Bonner (1972) withSteve McQueen.
Lupino also directed more than 100 episodes of television shows in a variety of genres, including westerns, supernatural tales, situation comedies, murder mysteries, and gangster stories.[4] She was the only woman to direct an episode of the originalThe Twilight Zone series ("The Masks"), and the only director to star in an episode ("The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine").[5]
.jpg)
Lupino was born at 33 Ardbeg Road inHerne Hill, London, to actressConnie O'Shea (also known asConnie Emerald) andmusic hall comedianStanley Lupino, a member of the theatricalLupino family, which includedLupino Lane, a song-and-dance man.[6] She was raised Catholic.[7] Her great-grandfather, George Hook, changed his name to Lupino. Her father, a top name inmusical comedy in the UK, encouraged her to perform at an early age. He built an outdoor theatre for Lupino and her sister Rita (1921–2016), who also became an actress and dancer.[6] Lupino wrote her first play at age seven and toured with a travelling theatre company as a child.[8] By the age of ten, Lupino had memorised the leading female roles inShakespeare's plays. After her childhood training for stage plays, Ida's uncle Lupino Lane assisted her in moving towards film acting by getting her work as a background actress atBritish International Studios.[9]
She wanted to be a writer, but to please her father Lupino enrolled in theRoyal Academy of Dramatic Art. She excelled in a number of "bad girl" film roles, often playing prostitutes.[10] Lupino did not enjoy being an actress and felt uncomfortable with many of the early roles she was given. She felt that she was pushed into the profession due to her family history.[11]
Lupino made her first film appearance inThe Love Race (1931) and the following year, aged 14, she worked under directorAllan Dwan inHer First Affaire, in a role for which her mother had previously tested.[12] She played leading roles in five British films in 1933 atWarner Bros.' Teddington studios and forJulius Hagen atTwickenham, includingThe Ghost Camera withJohn Mills andI Lived with You withIvor Novello. She said of her early roles "My father once said to me: 'You're born to be bad', and it was true. I made eight films in England before I came to America, and I played a tramp or a slut in all of them".[13]
Dubbed "the EnglishJean Harlow", she was discovered by Paramount in the 1933 filmMoney for Speed, playing a good girl/bad girl dual role. Lupino claimed the talent scouts saw her play only the sweet girl in the film and not the part of the prostitute, so she was asked to try out for the lead role inAlice in Wonderland (1933). When she arrived in Hollywood, the Paramount producers did not know what to make of their sultry potential leading lady, but she did get a five-year contract.[4] While at Paramount, Lupino played the lead in a stage production ofThe Pursuit of Happiness at the Paramount Studio Theatre.[14]
Lupino starred in over a dozen films in the mid-1930s, working with Columbia in a two-film deal, one of which,The Light That Failed (1939), was a role she acquired after running into the director's office unannounced, demanding an audition.[12] After this breakthrough performance as a spiteful cockney model who tormentsRonald Colman, she began to be taken seriously as a dramatic actress. As a result, her parts improved during the 1940s, and she jokingly referred to herself as "the poor man'sBette Davis", taking the roles that Davis refused.[15][16]
Mark Hellinger, associate producer at Warner Bros., was impressed by Lupino's performance inThe Light That Failed, and hired her for the femme-fatale role in theRaoul Walsh-directedThey Drive by Night (1940), opposite starsGeorge Raft,Ann Sheridan andHumphrey Bogart. The film did well and the critical consensus was that Lupino stole the movie, particularly in her unhinged courtroom scene.[17] Warner Bros. offered her a contract which she negotiated to include some freelance rights.[12] She worked with Walsh and Bogart again inHigh Sierra (1941), where she impressed criticBosley Crowther in her role as an "adoring moll".[18]
Her performance inThe Hard Way (1943) won theNew York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress.[6] She starred inPillow to Post (1945), which was her only comedic leading role.[12] Although in demand throughout the 1940s, she arguably never became a major star although she often had top billing in her pictures, above actors such as Humphrey Bogart, and was repeatedly critically lauded for her realistic, direct acting style.
She often incurred the ire of studio boss Jack Warner by objecting to her casting, refusing poorly written roles that she felt were beneath her dignity as an actress, and making script revisions deemed unacceptable by the studio. As a result, she spent a great deal of her time at Warner Bros. suspended.[16] In 1941, she rejected a supporting role inKings Row and a lead role inJuke Girl and was put on suspension at the studio. Within a few months, a rapprochement was brokered, but her relationship with the studio remained strained over the next few years. After the dramaDeep Valley (1947) finished shooting, Lupino left Warner Brothers having turned down a four-year exclusive contract.[10] A year later, she appeared for20th Century Fox as a nightclub singer in the film noirRoad House, performing her musical numbers in the film. She starred inOn Dangerous Ground in 1951, and may have taken on some of the directing tasks of the film while directorNicholas Ray was ill.[8]
While on suspension, Lupino had ample time to observe filming and editing processes, and she became interested in directing.[19] She described how bored she was on set while "someone else seemed to be doing all the interesting work",[16] and said "It's so much more fun. Creating it yourself, not just parading in front of a camera".[13]
She and her then-husband, producer and writerCollier Young, formed an independent company, The Filmakers Inc., to "produce, direct, and write low-budget, issue-oriented films".[4][20][21] It was formed in 1948 with Lupino as vice-president, Collier Young as president, and screenwriterMalvin Wald as treasurer.[10] The Filmakers produced 12 feature films, six of which Lupino directed or co-directed, five of which she wrote or co-wrote, three of which she acted in, and one of which she co-produced.[22] The Filmakers' mission was to make socially conscious films, encourage new talent, and bring realism to the screen.[23] Their goal was to tell "how America lives" through independent B pictures shot in two weeks for less thanUS$200,000 with a creative "family", "the ring of truth" emphasized by fact-based stories – a combination of "social significance" and entertainment.[24] In short, low-budget pictures, they explored virtually taboo subjects[24] such as rape inOutrage (1950) andThe Bigamist (1953).[22] The latter received rave reviews at the time of release, withHoward Thompson ofThe New York Times calling it "Filmakers' best offering, to date".[25] Lupino's best-known directorial effort,The Hitch-Hiker, a 1953 RKO release, is the onlyfilm noir from the genre's classic period directed by a woman.[26][27]
Her first directing job came unexpectedly in 1949 when directorElmer Clifton suffered a mild heart attack and was unable to finishNot Wanted, a film Lupino co-produced and co-wrote.[12] Lupino stepped in to finish the film without taking directorial credit out of respect for Clifton. Although the film's subject of out-of-wedlock pregnancy was controversial, it received a vast amount of publicity, and she was invited to discuss the film withEleanor Roosevelt on a national radio program.[22]
Never Fear (1949), a film about polio, which she had personally experienced at age 16 , was her first director's credit.[12] The film was noticed byHoward Hughes, who was looking for suppliers of low-budget feature films for distribution by his recently acquiredRKO Pictures. Hughes agreed to put up financing and distribute The Filmakers' next three features through RKO, leaving The Filmakers total control over the content and the production of the films.[28]After producing four more films about social issues, includingOutrage (1950), a film about rape (while this word is never used in the movie),[29] Lupino directed her first hard-paced, all-male-cast film,The Hitch-Hiker (1953), making her the first woman to direct a film noir.
Lupino once called herself a "bulldozer" to secure financing for her production company, but she referred to herself as "mother" while on set.[22] The back of her director's chair was labeled "Mother of Us All".[4] Her studio emphasized her femininity, often at the urging of Lupino herself. She said of her refusal to renew her contract with Warner Bros. "I had decided that nothing lay ahead of me but the life of the neurotic star with no family and no home." She made a point to seem non-threatening in a male-dominated environment, stating, "That's where being a man makes a great deal of difference. I don't suppose the men particularly care about leaving their wives and children. During the vacation period, the wife can always fly over and be with him. It's difficult for a wife to say to her husband, come sit on the set and watch."[10]
Although directing became Lupino's passion, she continued acting to make enough money to make her own productions.[16] She became a wily low-budget filmmaker, reusing sets from other studio productions and talking her physician into appearing as a doctor in the delivery scene ofNot Wanted. She used what is now calledproduct placement, placing Coca-Cola, United Airlines, Cadillac, and other brands in her films, such asThe Bigamist. She was acutely conscious of budget considerations, planning scenes in pre-production to avoid technical mistakes and retakes, and shooting in public places such as MacArthur Park and Chinatown to avoid set-rental costs.[10] She joked that if she had been the "poor man's Bette Davis" as an actress, she had now become the "poor man'sDon Siegel" as a director.[10][30]
The Filmakers production company ceased operations in 1955, and Lupino turned almost immediately to television, directing episodes of more than thirty US TV series from 1956 through 1968. She also directed a feature film in 1965, the Catholic schoolgirl comedyThe Trouble With Angels, released in 1966, starringHayley Mills andRosalind Russell; this was Lupino's last theatrical film as a director. She also continued acting, going on to a successful television career throughout the 1960s and 1970s.[31]
| Year | Title | The Filmakers Inc. function | Screenplay / Writers | Producers | Directors |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1949 | Not Wanted | Production Company (Emerald Productions) | Paul Jarrico Ida Lupino Malvin Wald | Anson Bond Ida Lupino | Elmer Clifton Ida Lupino (uncredited) |
| 1949 | Never Fear | Production Company | Ida Lupino Collier Young | Norman A. Cook Ida Lupino Collier Young | Ida Lupino James Anderson (assistant) |
| 1950 | Outrage | Production Company | Ida Lupino Malvin Wald Collier Young | Collier Young Malvin Wald | Ida Lupino |
| 1951 | Hard, Fast and Beautiful | Production Company | Martha Wilkerson | Norman A. Cook Collier Young | Ida Lupino James Anderson (assistant) |
| 1951 | On the Loose | Production Company | Dale Eunson Katherine Albert | Collier Young | Charles Lederer James Anderson (assistant) |
| 1952 | Beware, My Lovely | Presented by | Mel Dinelli | Collier Young Mel Dinelli | Harry Horner |
| 1953 | The Hitch-Hiker | Present | Ida Lupino Collier Young | Collier Young Christian Nyby | Ida Lupino |
| 1953 | The Bigamist | Production Company © | Collier Young | Robert Eggenweiler Collier Young | Ida Lupino |
| 1954 | Private Hell 36 | Presents © | Collier Young Ida Lupino | Robert Eggenweiler Collier Young | Don Siegel |
| 1955 | Mad at the World | Production Company | Harry Essex | James H. Anderson Collier Young | Harry Essex |
Lupino's career as a director continued through 1968. Her directing efforts during these years were almost exclusively for television productions such asAlfred Hitchcock Presents,Thriller,The Twilight Zone,Have Gun – Will Travel,Honey West,The Donna Reed Show,Gilligan's Island,77 Sunset Strip,The Rifleman,The Virginian,Sam Benedict,The Untouchables,Hong Kong,The Fugitive, andBewitched.
After the demise of The Filmakers, Lupino continued working as an actress until the end of the 1970s, mainly in television. Lupino appeared in 19 episodes ofFour Star Playhouse from 1952 to 1956, an endeavor involving partnersCharles Boyer,Dick Powell andDavid Niven. From January 1957 to September 1958, Lupino starred with her then-husbandHoward Duff in the sitcomMr. Adams and Eve, in which the duo played husband-and-wife film stars named Howard Adams and Eve Drake, living in Beverly Hills, California.[32] Duff and Lupino also co-starred as themselves in 1959 in one of the 13 one-hour installments ofThe Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour and an episode ofThe Dinah Shore Chevy Show in 1960. Lupino guest-starred in numerous television shows, includingThe Ford Television Theatre (1954),Bonanza (1959),Burke's Law (1963–64),The Virginian (1963–65),Batman (1968),The Mod Squad (1969),Family Affair (1969–70),The Wild, Wild West (1969),Nanny and the Professor (1971),Columbo: Short Fuse (1972),Columbo: Swan Song (1974) in which she playsJohnny Cash's character's zealous wife,Barnaby Jones (1974),The Streets of San Francisco,Ellery Queen (1975),Police Woman (1975), andCharlie's Angels (1977). Her final acting appearance was in the 1979 filmMy Boys Are Good Boys.
Lupino has two distinctions withThe Twilight Zone series, as the only woman to have directed an episode ("The Masks") and the only person to have worked as both actor for one episode ("The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine"), and director for another.[33]
Lupino's Filmakers movies deal with unconventional and controversial subject matter that studio producers would not touch, including out-of-wedlock pregnancy, bigamy, and rape. She described her independent work as "films that had social significance and yet were entertainment ... based on true stories, things the public could understand because they had happened or been of news value." She focused on women's issues for many of her films and she liked strong characters, "[Not] women who have masculine qualities about them, but [a role] that has intestinal fortitude, some guts to it."[34]
In the filmThe Bigamist, the two women characters represent the career woman and the homemaker. The title character is married to a woman (Joan Fontaine) who, unable to have children, has devoted her energy to her career. While on one of many business trips, he meets a waitress (Lupino) with whom he has a child, and then marries her.[35] Marsha Orgeron, in her bookHollywood Ambitions, describes these characters as "struggling to figure out their place in environments that mirror the social constraints that Lupino faced".[16] However, Donati, in his biography of Lupino, said "The solutions to the character's problems within the films were often conventional, even conservative, more reinforcing the 1950s' ideology than undercutting it."[10]
Ahead of her time within the studio system, Lupino was intent on creating films that were rooted in reality. OnNever Fear, Lupino said, "People are tired of having the wool pulled over their eyes. They pay out good money for their theatre tickets and they want something in return. They want realism. And you can't be realistic with the same glamorous mugs on the screen all the time."[36]
DirectorMartin Scorsese noted that, "As a star, Lupino had no taste for glamour, and the same was true as a director. The stories she told inOutrage,Never Fear,Hard, Fast and Beautiful,The Bigamist andThe Hitch-Hiker were intimate, always set within a precise social milieu: she wanted to "do pictures with poor, bewildered people, because that's what we are." Her heroines were young women whose middle-class security was shattered by trauma – unwanted pregnancy, polio, rape, bigamy, parental abuse. There's a sense of pain, panic and cruelty that colors every frame."[37]
Lupino rejected the commodification of female stars, and as an actress she resisted becoming an object of desire. She said in 1949, "Hollywood careers are perishable commodities", and sought to avoid such a fate for herself.[11]
Lupino was diagnosed withpolio in 1934.The New York Times reported that the outbreak of polio within the Hollywood community was due to contaminated swimming pools.[38] She recovered and eventually directed, produced, and wrote many films, including a film loosely based upon her travails with polio titledNever Fear in 1949, the first film that she was credited for directing (she had earlier stepped in for an ill director onNot Wanted and refused directorial credit out of respect for her colleague). Her experience with the disease gave her the courage to focus on her intellectual abilities over simply her physical appearance.[39] In an interview withHollywood, she said, "I realized that my life and my courage and my hopes did not lie in my body. If that body was paralyzed, my brain could still work industriously...If I weren't able to act, I would be able to write. Even if I weren't able to use a pencil or typewriter, I could dictate."[39] Film magazines from the 1930s and 1940s, such asThe Hollywood Reporter andMotion Picture Daily, frequently published updates on her condition.[40][14] Lupino worked for various nonprofit organizations to raise funds for polio research.[41]
Lupino's interests outside the entertainment industry included writing short stories and children's books, and composing music. Her composition "Aladdin's Suite" was performed by theLos Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra in 1937.[6] She composed it while recovering from polio in 1935.[42]
She became an American citizen in June 1948[43][44]
She supported the presidency ofJohn F. Kennedy.[10]
Lupino was married and divorced three times. She married actorLouis Hayward in November 1938. They separated in May 1944 and divorced in May 1945.[45][46]
Her second marriage was to producerCollier Young on 5 August 1948. They divorced in 1951. When Lupino filed for divorce in September that year, she was already pregnant from an affair with future husband Howard Duff. The child was born seven months after she filed for divorce from Young.[47]
Lupino's third and final marriage was to actorHoward Duff, whom she wed on 21 October 1951.[48] Six months later, they had a daughter, Bridget, on 23 April 1952.[49] They separated in 1966 and divorced in 1983.[50][51]
She petitioned a California court in 1984 to appoint her business manager, Mary Ann Anderson, as herconservator due to poor business dealings from her prior business management company and her long separation from Howard Duff.
Lupino died from a stroke while undergoing treatment forcolon cancer in Los Angeles on 3 August 1995, at the age of 77.[52] Her memoirs,Ida Lupino: Beyond the Camera, were edited after her death and published by Mary Ann Anderson.[53]
Lupino learned filmmaking from everyone she observed on set, includingWilliam Ziegler, the cameraman forNot Wanted. When in preproduction onNever Fear, she conferred withMichael Gordon on directorial technique, organization, and plotting. CinematographerArchie Stout said of Ms. Lupino, "Ida has more knowledge of camera angles and lenses than any director I've ever worked with, with the exception ofVictor Fleming. She knows how a woman looks on the screen and what light that woman should have, probably better than I do." Lupino also worked with editorStanford Tischler, who said of her, "She wasn't the kind of director who would shoot something, then hope any flaws could be fixed in the cutting room. The acting was always there, to her credit."[10]
AuthorAlly Acker compares Lupino to pioneering silent-film directorLois Weber for their focus on controversial, socially relevant topics. With their ambiguous endings, Lupino's films never offered simple solutions for her troubled characters, and Acker finds parallels to her storytelling style in the work of the modern European "New Wave" directors, such asMargarethe von Trotta.[4]
Film critic Ronnie Scheib, who issued a Kino release of three of Lupino's films, likens Lupino's themes and directorial style to directorsNicholas Ray,Sam Fuller, andRobert Aldrich, saying, "Lupino very much belongs to that generation ofmodernist filmmakers."[54] On whether Lupino should be considered a feminist filmmaker, Scheib states, "I don't think Lupino was concerned with showing strong people, men or women. She often said that she was interested in lost, bewildered people, and I think she was talking about the postwar trauma of people who couldn't go home again."[31]
Martin Scorsese calls Lupino's thematic film work "essential", noting that "What is at stake in Lupino's films is the psyche of the victim. [Her films] addressed the wounded soul and traced the slow, painful process of women trying to wrestle with despair and reclaim their lives. Her work is resilient, with a remarkable empathy for the fragile and the heart-broken."[37]
Author Richard Koszarski noted Lupino's choice to play with gender roles regarding women's film stereotypes during the studio era: "Her films display the obsessions and consistencies of a true auteur... In her filmsThe Bigamist andThe Hitch-Hiker, Lupino was able to reduce the male to the same sort of dangerous, irrational force that women represented in most male-directed examples of Hollywood film noir."[55]
Lupino did not consider herself a feminist, saying, "I had to do something to fill up my time between contracts. Keeping a feminine approach is vital – men hate bossy females ... Often I pretended to a cameraman to know less than I did. That way I got more cooperation."[4]Village Voice writer Carrie Rickey, though, holds Lupino up as a model of modern feminist filmmaking: "Not only did Lupino take control of production, direction, and screenplay, but [also] each of her movies addresses the brutal repercussions of sexuality, independence and dependence."[19] By 1972, Lupino said she wished more women were hired as directors and producers in Hollywood, noting that only very powerful actresses or writers had the chance to work in the field.[4] She directed or costarred a number of times with young, fellow British actresses on a similar journey of developing their American film careers likeHayley Mills andPamela Franklin.
ActressBea Arthur, best remembered for her work inMaude andThe Golden Girls, was motivated to escape her stifling hometown by following in Lupino's footsteps and becoming an actress, saying, "My dream was to become a very small blonde movie star like Ida Lupino and those other women I saw up there on the screen during theDepression."[56]
Eddie Muller is a fan:
Although her ambition exceeded her achievements, she left a body of work that proved her to be a capable director, a good writer, an excellent producer, and a superior actress. Most important, she was a total pro, and the most multitalented woman in the history of Hollywood.[57]
| Title | Year | As actress | Role | As director | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Love Race | 1931 | Yes | Minor supporting role | Uncredited | |
| Her First Affaire | 1932 | Yes | Ann Brent | ||
| Money for Speed | 1933 | Yes | Jane | ||
| I Lived with You | 1933 | Yes | Ada Wallis | ||
| Prince of Arcadia | 1933 | Yes | The Princess | ||
| The Ghost Camera | 1933 | Yes | Mary Elton | ||
| High Finance | 1933 | Yes | Jill | ||
| Search for Beauty | 1934 | Yes | Barbara Hilton | ||
| Come On, Marines! | 1934 | Yes | Esther Smith-Hamilton | ||
| Ready for Love | 1934 | Yes | Marigold Tate | ||
| Paris in Spring | 1935 | Yes | Mignon de Charelle | ||
| Smart Girl | 1935 | Yes | Pat Reynolds | ||
| Peter Ibbetson | 1935 | Yes | Agnes | ||
| La Fiesta de Santa Barbara | 1935 | Yes | Herself | Short film made inTechnicolor, with several celebrities appearing as themselves | |
| Anything Goes | 1936 | Yes | Hope Harcourt | ||
| One Rainy Afternoon | 1936 | Yes | Monique Pelerin | ||
| Yours for the Asking | 1936 | Yes | Gert Malloy | ||
| The Gay Desperado | 1936 | Yes | Jane | ||
| Sea Devils | 1937 | Yes | Doris Malone | ||
| Let's Get Married | 1937 | Yes | Paula Quinn | ||
| Artists and Models | 1937 | Yes | Paula Sewell / Paula Monterey | ||
| Fight for Your Lady | 1937 | Yes | Marietta | ||
| The Lone Wolf Spy Hunt | 1939 | Yes | Val Carson | ||
| The Lady and the Mob | 1939 | Yes | Lila Thorne | ||
| The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes | 1939 | Yes | Ann Brandon | ||
| The Light That Failed | 1939 | Yes | Bessie Broke | ||
| Screen Snapshots Series 18, No. 6 | 1939 | Yes | Herself | Promotional short film | |
| They Drive by Night | 1940 | Yes | Lana Carlsen | ||
| High Sierra | 1941 | Yes | Marie | ||
| The Sea Wolf | 1941 | Yes | Ruth Webster | ||
| Out of the Fog | 1941 | Yes | Stella Goodwin | ||
| Ladies in Retirement | 1941 | Yes | Ellen Creed | ||
| Moontide | 1942 | Yes | Anna | ||
| Life Begins at Eight-Thirty | 1942 | Yes | Kathy Thomas | ||
| The Hard Way | 1943 | Yes | Mrs. Helen Chernen | New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress | |
| Forever and a Day | 1943 | Yes | Jenny | ||
| Thank Your Lucky Stars | 1943 | Yes | Herself | ||
| In Our Time | 1944 | Yes | Jennifer Whittredge | ||
| Hollywood Canteen | 1944 | Yes | Herself | ||
| Pillow to Post | 1945 | Yes | Jean Howard | ||
| Devotion | 1946 | Yes | Emily Brontë | ||
| The Man I Love | 1947 | Yes | Petey Brown | ||
| Deep Valley | 1947 | Yes | Libby Saul | ||
| Escape Me Never | 1947 | Yes | Gemma Smith | ||
| Road House | 1948 | Yes | Lily Stevens | ||
| Lust for Gold | 1949 | Yes | Julia Thomas | ||
| Not Wanted | 1949 | Yes | Uncredited (completed film started byElmer Clifton); also co-writer, producer | ||
| Never Fear | 1950 | Yes | also co-writer, producer | ||
| Woman in Hiding | 1950 | Yes | Deborah Chandler Clark | ||
| Outrage | 1950 | Yes | Country Dance Attendee | Yes | Uncredited cameo as actress |
| Hard, Fast and Beautiful | 1951 | Yes | Seabright Tennis Match Supervisor | Yes | Uncredited cameo as actress |
| On the Loose | 1951 | Yes | Narrator | Voice, Uncredited | |
| On Dangerous Ground | 1952 | Yes | Mary Malden | ||
| Beware, My Lovely | 1952 | Yes | Mrs. Helen Gordon | ||
| The Hitch-Hiker | 1953 | Yes | also co-writer | ||
| Jennifer | 1953 | Yes | Agnes Langley | ||
| The Bigamist | 1953 | Yes | Phyllis Martin | Yes | |
| Private Hell 36 | 1954 | Yes | Lilli Marlowe | also co-writer | |
| Women's Prison | 1955 | Yes | Amelia van Zandt | ||
| The Big Knife | 1955 | Yes | Marion Castle | ||
| While the City Sleeps | 1956 | Yes | Mildred Donner | ||
| Strange Intruder | 1956 | Yes | Alice Carmichael | ||
| Teenage Idol | 1958 | Yes | TV movie | ||
| The Trouble with Angels | 1966 | Yes | |||
| Women in Chains | 1972 | Yes | Claire Tyson | TV movie | |
| Deadhead Miles | 1972 | Yes | Herself | ||
| Junior Bonner | 1972 | Yes | Elvira Bonner | ||
| The Strangers in 7A | 1972 | Yes | Iris Sawyer | TV movie | |
| Female Artillery | 1973 | Yes | Martha Lindstrom | TV movie | |
| I Love a Mystery | 1973 | Yes | Randolph Cheyne | TV movie | |
| The Letters | 1973 | Yes | Mrs. Forrester | TV movie | |
| The Devil's Rain | 1975 | Yes | Mrs. Preston | Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress | |
| The Food of the Gods | 1976 | Yes | Mrs. Skinner | ||
| My Boys Are Good Boys | 1978 | Yes | Mrs. Morton | Final film role |
| Title | Year | As actress | Role | As director | Episode |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Ford Television Theatre | 1954 | Yes | Petra Manning | "Marriageable Male" episode aired Feb 25, 1954[63][64] | |
| Mr. Adams and Eve | 1957–1958 | Yes | Eve Adams/Eve Drake | Yes | Main cast (66 episodes); 1 episode 1958[65] |
| The Twilight Zone | 1959 | Yes | Barbara Jean Trenton | "The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine" | |
| Bonanza | 1959 | Yes | Annie O'Toole | "The Saga of Annie O'Toole" | |
| Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour | 1959 | Yes | Herself | "Lucy's Summer Vacation" | |
| Death Valley Days | 1960 | Yes | Pamela Mann | "Pamela's Oxen" | |
| The Rifleman | 1961 | Yes | "Assault" | ||
| Thriller | 1961 | Yes | "The Last of the Sommervilles" | ||
| The Investigators | 1961 | Yes | "Something for Charity" | ||
| Kraft Suspense Theatre | 1963 | Yes | Harriet Whitney | "One Step Down" | |
| The Virginian | 1963 | Yes | Helen Blaine | "A Distant Fury" | |
| The Twilight Zone | 1964 | Yes | "The Masks" | ||
| Gilligan's Island | 1964 | Yes | "Goodnight, Sweet Skipper" | ||
| Gilligan's Island | 1964 | Yes | "Wrongway Feldman" | ||
| Bewitched | 1965 | Yes | "A is for Aardvark" | ||
| Honey West | 1965 | Yes | "How Brillig, O, Beamish Boy" | ||
| Gilligan's Island | 1966 | Yes | "The Producer" | ||
| It Takes A Thief | 1968 | Yes | Doctor Schneider | "Turnabout" | |
| Batman | 1968 | Yes | "Doctor Cassandra" Spellcraft | "The Entrancing Dr. Cassandra" | |
| Family Affair | 1969 | Yes | Lady "Maudie" Marchwood | "Maudie" | |
| Family Affair | 1970 | Yes | Lady "Maudie" Marchwood | "Return of Maudie" | |
| Columbo | 1972 | Yes | Roger Stanford's Aunt | "Short Fuse" | |
| The Streets of San Francisco | 1973 | Yes | Wilma Jamison | "Blockade" | |
| Columbo | 1974 | Yes | Mrs. Edna Brown | "Swan Song" | |
| Police Woman | 1975 | Yes | Hilda Morris | "The Chasers" | |
| Charlie's Angels | 1977 | Yes | Gloria Gibson | "I Will Be Remembered" |
| Year | Program | Episode/source |
|---|---|---|
| 1937 | The Chase and Sanborn Hour | |
| 1937 | Lux Radio Theatre | The 39 Steps |
| 1938 | The Silver Theatre | Challenge for Three |
| 1939 | The Campbell Playhouse | The Bad Man |
| 1939 | The Chase and Sanborn Hour | |
| 1939 | Lux Radio Theatre | Wuthering Heights |
| 1939 | Woodbury's Hollywood Playhouse | For All Our Lives |
| 1940 | Lux Radio Theatre | The Young in Heart |
| 1940 | Good News of 1940 | The Light That Failed |
| 1940 | Lux Radio Theatre | Wuthering Heights |
| 1940 | Lux Radio Theatre | Rebecca |
| 1942 | Charlie McCarthy Show | |
| 1942 | It's Time to Smile | |
| 1942 | Lux Radio Theatre | A Woman's Face |
| 1943 | Lux Radio Theatre | Now, Voyager |
| 1943 | Lux Radio Theatre | Ladies in Retirement |
| 1943 | Duffy's Tavern | |
| 1943 | Command Performance | |
| 1943 | Burns and Allen | |
| 1944 | Everything for the Boys | The Citadel |
| 1944 | Mail Call | |
| 1944 | Screen Guild Players | High Sierra[66] |
| 1944 | Suspense | The Sisters |
| 1944 | Suspense | Fugue in C Minor |
| 1944 | This Is My Best | Brighton Rock |
| 1945 | Cavalcade of America | Immortal Wife |
| 1945 | Lux Radio Theatre | Only Yesterday |
| 1945 | Screen Guild Players | Pillow to Post |
| 1946 | Cavalcade of America | Star in the West |
| 1946 | Theatre of Romance | The Hard Way |
| 1946 | Encore Theatre | Nurse Edith Cavell[67] |
| 1946 | Tell Me a Story | The Pond |
| 1947 | Cavalcade of America | Abigail Opens the White House |
| 1947 | Cavalcade of America | A Lady of Distinction |
| 1947 | Cavalcade of America | Kitchen Scientist |
| 1947 | Lux Radio Theatre | The Seventh Veil |
| 1947 | Lux Radio Theatre | Saratoga Trunk |
| 1948 | Lux Radio Theatre | Daisy Kenyon |
| 1948 | Suspense | Summer Night |
| 1948 | Lux Radio Theatre | The Razor's Edge |
| 1948 | Hallmark Playhouse | Woman with a Sword |
| 1949 | Bill Stern Colgate Sports Newsreel | |
| 1949 | Suspense | The Bullet |
| 1950 | Hollywood Calling | |
| 1950 | Hallmark Playhouse | The Love Story of Elizabeth Barrett |
| 1953 | Guest Star | Fear |
| 1953 | Stars over Hollywood | Chasten Thy Son[68] |
| 1954 | Lux Radio Theatre | The Star |
| 1954 | Lux Radio Theatre | So Big |
| 1959 | Suspense | On a Country Road |
