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Mary Brian | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Brian in 1931 | |
| Born | Louise Byrdie Dantzler (1906-02-17)February 17, 1906 Corsicana, Texas, U.S. |
| Died | December 30, 2002(2002-12-30) (aged 96) Del Mar, California, U.S. |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1924–1954 |
| Spouses | |
Mary Brian (bornLouise Byrdie Dantzler,[1] February 17, 1906 – December 30, 2002) was an American actress who made the transition fromsilent films tosound films.[2]
Brian was born in Corsicana, Texas,[3] the daughter of Taurrence J. Dantzler and Louise B. Her brother was Taurrence J. Dantzler, Jr.
Her father died when she was one month old and the family later moved to Dallas, Texas.[3] In the early 1920s, they moved to Long Beach, California. She had intended to become an illustrator, but that was laid aside when at age 16 she was discovered in a local bathing beauty contest. One of the judges was actressEsther Ralston (who was to play her mother in the upcomingPeter Pan and who became a lifelong friend).
She didn't win the $25 prize in the contest, but Ralston said "you've got to give the little girl something". So, her prize was to be interviewed by director Herbert Brenon for a role inPeter Pan. Brenon was recovering from eye surgery, and she spoke with him in a dimly lit room. "He asked me a few questions, Is that your hair? Out of the blue, he said I would like to make a test. Even to this day, I will never know why I was that lucky. They had made tests of every ingénue in the business for Wendy. He had decided he would go with an unknown. It would seem more like a fairy tale. It wouldn't seem right if the roles were to be taken by someone they (the audience) knew or was divorced. I got the part. They put me under contract."[citation needed] The studio renamed her Mary Brian.
After her showing in the beauty contest, she was given an audition byParamount Pictures and cast by directorHerbert Brenon as Wendy Darling in hissilent movie version ofJ.M. Barrie'sPeter Pan (1924).[4] There, she starred withBetty Bronson andEsther Ralston, and the three of them stayed close for the rest of their lives. Ralston described both Bronson and Brian as 'very charming people'.
The movie studio, who created her stage name for the movie and said she was age 16 instead of 18 because the latter sounded too old for the role, then signed her to a long-term contract. Brian played Fancy Vanhern, daughter ofPercy Marmont, in Brenon'sThe Street of Forgotten Men (1925), which had newcomerLouise Brooks in an uncredited role as a moll.
Brian was dubbed "The Sweetest Girl in Pictures." On loan-out toMGM, she played a college belle, Mary Abbott, oppositeWilliam Haines andJack Pickford inBrown of Harvard (1926). She was named one of theWAMPAS Baby Stars in 1926, along withMary Astor,Dolores Costello,Joan Crawford,Dolores del Río,Janet Gaynor andFay Wray.
During her years at Paramount, Brian appeared in more than 40 movies as the lead, the ingenue or co-star. She worked with Brenon again in 1926 when she played Isabel inP.C. Wren'sBeau Geste starringRonald Colman. The same year, she madeBehind the Front andHarold Teen. In 1928, she played ingenue Alice Deane inForgotten Faces oppositeClive Brook, her sacrificing father, withOlga Baclanova as her vixen mother andWilliam Powell as Froggy.Forgotten Faces is preserved in the Library of Congress.[5]
Her first sound film wasVarsity (1928), which was filmed with part-sound and talking sequences, oppositeBuddy Rogers. After successfully making the transition to sound, she co-starred withGary Cooper,Walter Huston andRichard Arlen inThe Virginian (1929), her first all-sound movie. In it, she played a spirited frontier heroine, schoolmarm Molly Stark Wood, who was the love interest of the Virginian (Cooper).
Brian co-starred in several hits during the 1930s, including her role as Gwen Cavendish inGeorge Cukor’s comedyThe Royal Family of Broadway (1930) withIna Claire andFredric March, as herself in Paramount's all-star revueParamount on Parade (1930), as Peggy Grant inLewis Milestone’s comedyThe Front Page (1931) withAdolphe Menjou andPat O'Brien.
After her contract with Paramount ended in 1932, Brian decided to freelance, which was unusual in a period when multi-year contracts with one studio were common. The same year, she appeared on thevaudeville stage at New York City'sPalace Theatre. Also in the same year, she starred inManhattan Tower.
Other movie roles include Murial Ross, aka Murial Rossi, inShadows of Sing Sing (1933), in which she received top billing; Gloria Van Dayham inCollege Rhythm (1934); Yvette Lamartine inCharlie Chan in Paris (1935); Hope Wolfinger,W.C. Fields’s daughter, inMan on the Flying Trapeze (1935); Sally Barnaby inSpendthrift (1936); and Doris inNavy Blues (1937), in which she received top billing.
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In 1936, she went to England and made three movies, includingThe Amazing Quest of Ernest Bliss, in which she starred oppositeCary Grant, to whom she became engaged for a time.
Her final film of the 1930s wasAffairs of Cappy Ricks, although she auditioned for the part that ultimately went toJanet Gaynor inA Star is Born.[6]
When World War II began in 1941, Brian began traveling to entertain the troops, spending most of the war years traveling the world with theU.S.O., and entertaining servicemen from theSouth Pacific to Europe, from Italy to North Africa. Commenting on those events, she said in 1996,
I was with Charlie Ruggles in Okinawa. And I was on the island of Tinian when they dropped the atomic bomb. Colonel Paul Tibbets, who was the pilot and the officer in charge [of dropping the bomb] took Charlie and me on the plane the next day, and nobody had been allowed in that encampment. So I was on theEnola Gay.[7]
Flying to England on a troop shoot, Brian was caught in theBattle of the Bulge and spent the Christmas of 1944 with the soldiers engaged in that battle.
She appeared in only a handful of films thereafter. Her last performance in movies was inDragnet (1947). Over the course of 22 years, Brian had appeared in more than 79 movies.
She played in the stage comedyMary Had a Little... in 1951 in Melbourne, Australia, co-starring with John Hubbard.
Like many "older" actresses, during the 1950s, Brian created a career in television. Perhaps her most notable role was playing the title character's mother inMeet Corliss Archer in 1954.
She also dedicated much time to portrait painting after her acting years.
Although she was engaged numerous times, and was linked romantically to numerous Hollywood men, including Cary Grant and silent film actorJack Pickford, Brian had only two husbands: magazine illustratorJon Whitcomb (for six weeks, beginning May 4, 1941) and film editorGeorge Tomasini (from 1947 until his death in 1964). After retiring from movies for good, she devoted herself to her husband's career; Tomasini worked as a film editor forAlfred Hitchcock onRear Window (1954) andPsycho (1960).[7]
Murray campaigned for the re-election of PresidentHerbert Hoover in 1932.[8]
She died of natural causes on December 30, 2002, at a retirement home in Del Mar, California at the age of 96.[9]
In 1960, Brian was inducted into theHollywood Walk of Fame with a motion pictures star at 1559 Vine Street.[10]
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