Born Today October 10: Jane Winton

 

1905-1959

 

Tall for her day, actress, opera performer and writer Jane Winton was born on this day in Philadelphia.  Winton got her performance start with the famous Zegfeld Follies in the 1920's in New York.  She made her film debut in 1924 in the bit part that went uncredited in the rather large production that was Ernst Lubitsch's Three Women in Hollywood. Her first credited role came the following year in Tomorrow's Love, a small production of a comedic melodrama. Her film career would last less than 15 years, but she did have appearances in some major films of the silent era. Due to her height (she was nearly 5' 6"--quite tall for the day), she was often tapped to fill roles requiring a "commanding" females presence, such as aristocrats and other high society types.  One film in which she had a major role was a ground-breaker.  Don Juan was the first Vitaphone sound system film to be released. Vitaphone was the first system in Hollywood to provide actual synchronized sound, in this case, sound effects (Don Juan was by no means the first film with sound by a long shot however).  The films featured John Barrymore as the famous lover and Mary Astor as Adriana della Varnese; Winton occupied the role of Donna Isobel.  The film was a release of Warner Bros. who were the one major studio doing the most to advance sound in film in the mid to late 1920's; they were also the studio that had Winton under contract at the time. And, she was quite a bankable actor for them; she for example took top billing, along with Monte Blue and Myrna Loy, in the Spanish-American War exploit film Across the Pacific in 1926.  The studio also paired her up with Irene Rich in a couple of films, a casting that made sense given the height of both ladies. In 1927 and no longer working for Warner's, she made several films produced by different studios; they included The Monkey Talks (Fox Films), Perch of the Devil (Universal), Lonesome Ladies (First National), The Fair Co-Ed (Cosmopolitan/MGM), John Ford's "dramedy" Upstream (Fox) and Alan Crosland's The Beloved Rogue (Feature Productions/United Artists) starring John Barrymore and Conrad Veidt.  Without a doubt the most famous film in which she appeared was also released in the 1927.  F. W. Murnau's Sunrise remains to this day among the top ten most well known silents, despite that it was released in large cities as a partial silent using Fox's own Movietone system for sound effects and a full score (a first). The film shared the "Best Picture" "oscar" with William Wellman's Wings at the very first Academy Awards in 1929 (the first set of awards had two categories for Best Picture, and technically Wings is considered the very first film to win for Best Picture--it's hair-splitting really, if you ask me....let's call it a tie).  It is also considered by many to be among the top ten best films ever made (not something that Wings enjoys now). Nonetheless, Winton was amongst the credited cast, with George O'Brien and Janet Gaynor in the lead. So that makes two films with ground breaking sound advances that Winton acted in. She went on to appear in twelve more films in the remainder of the decade, ten of them fully silent. Her first full talking film actually came in 1928 in Universal's Melody of Love, released in October and directed by Arch Heath (one of the few director's at the time that also directed all black casts). Her last film of the decade was also a Universal production with partial sound (talking sequences); a melodrama, Scandal featured Laura La Plante and Huntley Gordon in the lead roles.  She made the transition to a full sound Hollywood with ease. Though she had a role in the Crosland directed mystery The Furies released in spring of 1930 (another lost feature), her first film appearance of the new decade came in the prologue of Edward F. Cline's morality melodrama In the Next Room, which was released in January. Her major film appearance of the last portion of her film career without a doubt came in Howard Hughes' epic Hell's Angels (November 1930).  She left Hollywood after this, for whatever reason, and moved back to New York. I've read a lot about how her "star was fading," her "star faded quickly"--personally I don't see any evidence that she could not have continued to act in the same sort of supporting roles that she had been. My best guess is that she tired of those type of roles. She was possessed of other talents, and the fact that by 1933 she was singing high opera in New York tells me that she must have felt that was a perishable skill and if she wanted to pursue that in life, she had better go sooner rather than later for that goal.  She did appear in some films after this date. Notable among these are two Warner Bros. short mysteries filmed at Warner's Eastern Vitagraph Studio in Brooklyn (it was part of the "Vitagraph Inspector Carr series")--her appearances came in releases in 1931 and 1932. She also had an appearance in Hired Wife, released in March of 1934 and filmed entirely in Florida. Other than an appearance that she made in a little Al Christie film in 1935, she only made other film appearance in 1937 in Limelight (also known as Backstage)--a musical. The film was British and she had been in London during the time of it's filming performing opera. She made no additional films appearances after this, but she did eventually become a published novelist in 1951. Her second novel was published the following year. In addition to her artistic talents in writing, she was also a painter. Her life was cut short when she died suddenly (of what we still do not know) on the 22nd of September in 1959 at the age of 53.  She is interred in her husband's family crypt in the Jewish cemetery in Hudson-on-Hastings: Temple Israel in New York state. 

 

[Source: James Lacy (Find a Grave)]

[Source: James Lacy (Find a Grave)]

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Born Today April 19: George O'Brien

1899-1985

Handsome actor of the silent silver screen George O'Brien was born on this day in San Francisco, California.  His father Dan was a higher up in the San Francisco police department, who would go on to become Police Chief there.  As a matter of trivia from the silent era, it was George's father who ordered the arrest of Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle.  Before turning his sites to Hollywood, George served in the first World War in the Navy as a submarine chaser.  He also was a volunteer stretcher bearer for wounded Marines during the war and was decorated for that service.  Always an athletic type, he became the Light Heavyweight boxing champion for the Pacific Fleet.  After the war, and in his early twenties, he left for Hollywood with the ambition of becoming a camera man.  And he did work as a assistant camera man at first.  He was known to have worked in that capacity on both Buck Jones and Tom Mix films, but the credits for those appear to be lost.  The one Tom Mix film that he has a credit for is Just Tony (1922), where he served as a Production Assistant; this may or may not be the first film that he ever worked on.  He quickly switched to acting, and the first film that he definitely acted in also came in 1922 as a "Sailor" in White Hands.  Also in 1922 he landed a bit part in a Rudolph Valentino film:  Moran Of The Lady.  Just two years later he was cast in his first starring role in The Man Who Came Back, where he received top billing.  This earned him the attention of director John Ford (who would become a lifelong friend), who cast him in his 1924 western The Iron Horse.  From there on out, O'Brien would enjoy top billing status throughout the rest of the silent era.  His acting took on depth that few would have thought possible when he first arrived in Hollywood, so his roles were quite varied.  In fact, he was chosen to star in a very early talkie in 1928 in duel roles in Noah's Ark, a Michael Curtiz and Darryl F. Zanuck project that starred Dolores Costello.  In the 1930's he mostly began to specialize in westerns, though he did have a few roles in other genres.  In the westerns, he would often appear with his own horse named Mike.  During World War II, he re-enlisted in the Navy, where he served as beachmaster in the Pacific; he was decorated multiple times.  He also remained in the Naval Reserve and in that capacity took on a project by the Eisenhower administration called "People to People" where he was project director for a series of Asian focused films, one of which he teamed with old friend John Ford to make.  He would continue acting until 1964, even at one point appearing in a Three Stooges film.  He retired from acting, with the role of Maj. Braden being his last in Cheyenne Autumn, another John Ford film starring Richard Widmark.  Today O'Brien is probably best remembered for his starring role in F. W. Murnau's Sunrise, one the earliest multiple Oscar winning films dating from the year 1927.  In his retirement, he relocated to Oklahoma, where he lived as a rancher for the rest of his life.  In 1981 he suffered a stroke with a heart event involved, this left him bed ridden for the last four years of his life.  He eventually succumbed to to the disease on the 4th of September.  Par naval tradition, he was buried at sea.  He was 86.

In Murnau's Sunrise along with Janet Gaynor.

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Born Today October 6: Janet Gaynor

1906-1984

Born Laura Augusta, with either her last name spelled Gainor or Gainer, in Germantown, Pennsylvania, she was nicknamed "Lolly" as a child.  Her father was a theatrical painter and paperhanger; it was he that began to teach her song and dance, as well as acrobatics when she was just a toddler.  When she entered school, she then began to act in school plays.  After her parents divorced and her mother remarried, the family eventually settled in San Francisco. When she graduated from high school there, she began doing stage work in Melbourne, Florida while on winter vacation. Upon her return to San Francisco, the whole family moved to Los Angeles so she could be pursue a career in acting.  She, accompanied by her stepfather, began to present herself at studios there, where she eventually landed a role as an extra in a Hal Roach film.  The film was Cupid's Rustler, the year was 1924.  She continued to get work in roles as extras regularly until 1926, when she began to get small roles that she credited for, the first of which was The Johnstown Flood, a Fox film that she was hired for after Fox offered her a screen test. By 1927, she had blossomed into one of Hollywood's leading ladies.  She played a lead role as "The Wife" in F. W. Murnau's 1927 feature Sunrise, for which she won one of the very earliest Oscars, in the category of Best Actress in a Leading Role--she was the very first winner for this category.  She also won for her role in Street Angel (a partial sound film).  The award, which was presented in the year 1929, combined the work.  Another interesting fact is that she was only 22 years of age at the time; she would remain the youngest actress to win in the category until 1986, when at 21 Marlee Matlin won for Children Of A Lesser God.  Her first full sound film came in 1928 with 4 Devils, which had an alternative silent print, and was also directed by Murnau. By 1929, she had made the transition to speaking roles and even starred in a film with early color sequences (Sunnyside Up).  By the age of 33, she had been making films for almost 20 years and had made up her mind to retire, which she did in 1938.  After this, she worked sporadically, and almost entirely in television.  She found a new profession is painting however, becoming very accomplished in still life depictions of flowers and vegetables.  She finally made her professional stage debut in 1980!  She worked in the theater for 2 years.  In September of 1982, a taxi in which she was a passenger was struck by a van that had run a red light; she was left with several very serious injuries, including 11 broken ribs.  She passed away 2 years later on 14 September; with her long time doctor declaring that her death was brought on by the accident, from which she had never fully recovered.  She is buried in the famous Hollywood Forever Cemetery.  [For anyone that interested in visiting, it is located in the Garden of Legends section, Lot 193)

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Born Today November 25: Margaret Livingston

1900-1984

Born in Salt Lake City, Utah, she followed her older Ivy into acting.  She made her film debut in The Chain Invisible in 1916, obviously as a teenager, in an actual named part.  She made more than 50 films, the bulk of her career, in the silent era.  She made the successful change to talking parts in the late 1920's with her first full talkie coming in 1929 in The Canary Murder Case, she even did a turn as a Vamp in 1928 in Beware of Bachelors an early partial talkie.  What she is most famous for is her third billing in Marnau's  Sunrise, as "The Woman From The City;" which won 3 of the very first Oscars ever awarded.  She continued her career well into the 1930's, but retired from acting when she Jazz musician Paul Whiteman, and never returned.  She is portrayed Claudia Harrison in Peter Bogdanovich's The Cat's Meow (2001), which is a seriously fictionalized story based on what may or may not have happened early film pioneer Thomas Ince, that led to his death days after being on board newspaper mogul William Randolph Hearst's yacht one weekend in 1924.  She died in Warrington, Pennsylvania on 13 December 1984.  She shares a birthday with my son!  She is interred at First Presbyterian Church of Ewing Cemetery in Ewing, New Jersey.

A fashion photo of her dating from 1927.

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