1910-1990
Actress Joan Bennett is instantly recognizable as the matriarch of the cult gothic television series "Dark Shadows," but she got her start in films at a very young age and very much in the silent era. Bennett was born on this day in the Palisades area of film studio town Fort Lee, New Jersey. Her career was a long a varied one that started when she was just six years old. Bennett was one of three acting daughters of actor Richard Bennett and his second wife actress/writer Adrienne Morrison. The Bennett's were from a long line of actors, with Richard being the first to enter films. As far as silent films go, it is Joan's older sister Constance is much more associated with the era. Her other older sister Barbara, was also an actress, though much lesser known, with a very short career. All three of them made their motion picture debut in The Valley of Decision, starring both of their parents, in 1916. Joan is also listed as having a small part in the 1923 Bert Lytell/Barbara La Marr war drama The Eternal City at the age of 13. She was married and divorced, and had a child, all before making her actual professional acting debut at the age of 18. And, her debut came on the stage in 1928; acting again with her father, she had a major part in a Broadway production that ran for more than 130 performances. She also started her film career in earnest that same year, starting out in the fully silent comedy Power with William Boyd (later Hopalong Cassidy) and Alan Hale Sr. (father of "The Skipper" on Gilligan's Island). Though she only had a supporting role (Jacqueline Logan had the female lead), her performance got her noticed, making her instantly an in-demand actor for film work. She was almost instantly cast in the early talkie Bulldog Drummond (May 1929) starring Ronald Colman; following close on with Three Live Ghosts (September 1929) and the Oscar winning Disraeli (November 1929). At just 19, Joan Bennett was a full fledged film star; and appeared in one additional talkie in 1929, taking the female lead in The Mississippi Gambler opposite Austrian born actor Joseph Schildkraut (there was a silent version of this film and that released simultaneously with the all talking version). She quickly followed this up with the leading lady role of Dolores Fenton in the romantic nightlife film Puttin' on the Ritz in March of 1930. Just a few of her leading roles in the 1930's include: Moby Dick (1930) with John Barrymore, Doctors' Wives (1931) with Warner Baxter, She Wanted a Millionaire (1932) with Spencer Tracy, Little Women (1933) with Katherine Hepburn, The Pursuit of Happiness (1934) with Francis Lederer, Two For Tonight (1935) with Bing Crosby, Wedding Present (1936) with Cary Grant, I Met My Love Again (1938) with Henry Fonda and The Man In The Iron Mask (1939) with Louis Hayward. In 1940, she appeared in James Whale's adventure film Green Hell with Douglas Fairbanks Jr., John Howard, Alan Hale Sr., and Vincent Price. She next appeared in the gangster film The House Across the Bay (1940) with George Raft, worked with director Fritz Lang in Man Hunt (1941) and Otto Preminger in Margin For Error (1943). She would work with Lang three more times during the decade. But, Bennett is best known today for her television work, and she made her television debut in 1951 in an episode of Nash Airflyte Theatre (which aired on the 8th of February). The series was live. Though she did act in a handful of films during the 1950's, most of her work during that decade was for the small screen. In 1959 she was given her own series "Too Young to Go Steady," made for NBC, though it was cancelled after seven episode. In 1966, she was cast as Elizabeth Collins Stoddard in the supernatural soap "Dark Shadows" created by Dan Curtis for ABC. Bennett appeared in nearly 400 episodes during the six years of the show's run. Her other famous role of Madame Blanc came in Dario Argento's 1977 witch horror Suspiria. She had just three more acting jobs after appearing in Argento's film; all of them were made for television films. The last of these was Divorce Wars: A Love Story, made for ABC, it stars Tom Selleck and Jane Curtin (yes the SNL alum) and aired on the 1st of March in 1982. She then retired and lived in New York state until her death from natural causes on the 7th of December in 1990 at her home in Scarsdale. She was 80. She is interred at the Pleasant View Cemetery in Lyme, Connecticut. During her career, Bennett also acted through at least the 1960's on the stage as well.
[Source: Jan Franco (Find A Grave)] 
[Source: Jeanne Stewart (Find A Grave)]
with Jonathan Frid as Barnabas Collins in Dark Shalows
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| Suspiria (1977) lobby card |
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