| Myrna Loy (August 2, 1905 -
December 14, 1993) was a United States motion
picture actress. Perhaps her most famous role was as Nora Charles in "The Thin Man" series of mapcap detective films and for her typecasting as a pert,
perfect wife.
Born Myrna Adele Williams in Raidersburg (near
Helena, Montana), the daughter of a rancher, David Franklin
Williams, and his wife, Della Mae. Her unusual first name came from a train station whose name her father admired. She moved to
Los Angeles, California when she was twelve, after
her father's death. At the age of fifteen she began appearing in local stage productions. Natacha Rambova, the wife of Rudolph
Valentino, arranged a screen test for her which she failed, but she
persevered, and in 1925 appeared in the movie What Price Beauty. Her
silent film roles were mainly those of vampish exotic women and for a few
years she struggled to overcome this stereotype with many producers and directors believing that while she was perfect as these
femme fatales, she was capable of little more. During her nine year struggle to establish herself, she appeared in nearly 80
films.
Her breakthrough occurred in 1934 with two very successful films. The
first was Manhattan Melodrama with Clark Gable and William
Powell. Her performance in The Thin Man later the same year as
William Powell's sophisticated, witty wife Nora made her a star. She and Powell proved to be a popular couple and appeared
in 14 films together, the most prolific onscreen pairing in Hollywood history.
In 1936, she was voted "Queen of Hollywood" (in a contest which also voted Clark Gable
"King") and was considered to epitomise the height of glamour and sophistication. During this period she was one of Hollywood's
busiest and highest paid actresses. With the outbreak of World War II she
all but abandoned her acting career to focus on the war effort and worked closely with the Red Cross. She was fiercely outspoken against Adolf Hitler
and her name appeared on his "blacklist". She helped run a Naval Auxilary Canteen and toured frequently to raise funds.
She returned to films with The Best Years
Of Our Lives in 1946 and played the wife of returning serviceman
Fredric March. In later years Loy would recall this film as her proudest
acting achievement. It also allowed Loy to make a film that demonstrated her social conscience. During her career she had
championed the rights of black actors and characters to be depicted with dignity on film. In later life she assumed a more
influential role as Co-Chairman of the "Advisory Council of the National Committee Against Discrimination in Housing". From 1949
until 1954 she also worked for UNESCO; she also was an active member of the United States Republican Party. Her film career
continued sporadically and she also returned to the stage making her Broadway debut
in 1973. Her autobiography Myrna Loy:
Being and Becoming was published in 1987.
She received a Lifetime Achievement Award
from the Kennedy Center in 1986.
Although she was never nominated for an Academy Award for any single
performance, she received an Academy Honorary Award in
1991 "for her career achievement".
Loy was married four times. Her first husband was producer Arthur Hornblow Jr (1936-42); John Hertz Jr. of the rent-a-car
family (1942-44); producer Gene Markey (1946-50), and UNESCO delegate Howland H. Sergeant (1951-1960). She had no children. "Some
perfect wife I am," she said, referring to her typecasting. "I've been married four times, divorced four times, have no children,
and can't boil an egg."
After surviving breast cancer and a double mastectomy, Myrna Loy died during cancer surgery in New York City and was cremated; her ashes are buried at Forestvale Cemetery, in
Helena, Montana.
She has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6685
Hollywood Blvd.
Filmography
- What Price
Beauty? (1925}
- The Wanderer (1925)
- Pretty Ladies (1925)
- Sporting Life (1925)
- Ben-Hur (1925)
- The Caveman (1926)
- The Love Toy (1926)
- Why Girls Go
Back Home (1926)
- The Gilded Highway
(1926)
- Exquisite Sinner
(1926)
- So This Is Paris
(1926)
- Don Juan (1926)
- Across the Pacific
(1926)
- The Third Degree
(1926)
- Finger Prints (1927)
- When a Man Loves
(1927)
- Bitter Apples (1927)
- The Climbers (1927)
- Simple Sis (1927)
- The Heart of
Maryland (1927)
- A Sailor's
Sweetheart (1927)
- The Jazz Singer (1927)
- The Girl from
Chicago (1927)
- If I Were Single
(1927)
- Ham and
Eggs at the Front (1927)
- Beware of
Married Men (1928)
- A Girl in Every
Port (1928)
- Turn Back the
Hours (1928)
- The Crimson City
(1928)
- Pay as You Enter
(1928)
- State Street Sadie
(1928)
- The Midnight Taxi
(1928)
- Fancy Baggage (1929)
- Hardboiled Rose
(1929)
- The Desert Song (1929)
- The Black Watch (1929)
- The Squall (1929)
- Noah's Ark (1929)
- The Great Divide (1929)
- Evidence (1929)
- The Show of Shows
(1929)
- Cameo Kirby (1930)
- Isle of Escape (1930)
- Under a Texas Moon
(1930)
- Cock o' the Walk
(1930)
- Bride of the
Regiment (1930)
- The Last of
the Duanes (1930)
- The Jazz
Cinderella (1930)
- The Bad Man (1930)
- Renegades (1930)
- Rogue of the
Rio Grande (1930)
- The Truth About
Youth (1930)
- The Devil to Pay!
(1930)
- The Naughty Flirt
(1931)
- Body and Soul (1931)
- A Connecticut
Yankee (1931)
- Hush Money (1931)
- Transatlantic (1931)
- Rebound (1931)
- Skyline (1931)
- Consolation
Marriage (1931)
- Arrowsmith (1931)
- Emma (1932)
- Vanity Fair (1932)
- The Wet Parade (1932)
- The Woman in Room
13 (1932)
- New Morals for Old
(1932)
- Love Me Tonight (1932)
- Thirteen Women (1932)
- The Mask of Fu Manchu (1932)
- The Animal Kingdom
(1932)
- Topaze (1933)
- Scarlet River (1933)
(cameo)
- The Barbarian (1933)
- The Prizefighter and the Lady (1933)
- When Ladies Meet
(1933)
- Penthouse (1933)
- Night Flight (1933)
- Men in White (1934)
- Manhattan Melodrama (1934)
- The Thin Man (1934)
- Stamboul Quest (1934)
- Evelyn Prentice
(1934)
- Broadway Bill (1934)
- Wings in the Dark
(1935)
- Whipsaw (1935)
- Wife vs. Secretary
(1936)
- Petticoat Fever
(1936)
- The Great Ziegfeld (1936)
- To Mary - with
Love (1936)
- Libeled Lady (1936)
- After the Thin Man (1936)
- Parnell (1937)
- Double Wedding (1937)
- Test Pilot (1938)
- Man-Proof (1938)
- Too Hot to Handle (1938)
- Verdensberomtheder i Kobenhavn (1939) (documentary)
- Lucky Night (1939)
- The Rains Came (1939)
- Another Thin Man (1939)
- Northward, Ho! (1940)
(short subject)
- I Love You Again
(1940)
- Third
Finger, Left Hand (1940)
- Love Crazy (1941)
- Shadow of the Thin Man (1941)
- Show Business at
War (1943) (short subject)
- The Thin Man Goes Home (1945)
- So Goes My Love
(1946)
- The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
- The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer (1947)
- Song of the Thin Man (1947)
- The
Senator Was Indiscreet (1947)
- Mr. Blandings Builds His
Dream House (1948)
- The Red Pony (1949)
- That Dangerous Age
(1949)
- Cheaper by the Dozen (1950)
- Belles on Their
Toes (1952)
- The
Ambassador's Daughter (1956)
- Lonelyhearts (1958)
- From the Terrace (1960)
- Midnight Lace (1960)
- The April Fools
(1969)
- Airport 1975 (1974)
- The End (1978)
- Just
Tell Me What You Want (1980)
External links
|
