Film Actresses from Alabama Before 1960 (4): Mary Anderson

Back in January of this year I did a post in the "Movies with Alabama Connections" series on Lifeboat, a 1944 Alfred Hitchcock film that starred two state natives, Tallulah Bankhead and Mary Anderson. Now I'd like to do a post in this series on Mary Anderson.

She was born in Birmingham on April 3, 1918 or perhaps 1920. She attended Howard College [now Samford University] and started acting in the theater department there. Her BhamWiki entry says she was runner-up in the Miss Birmingham contest. 

The 1930 U.S. Census shows 12-year old Mary living with her parents James O. and Mary E. Anderson, younger brother James and her 72-year old grandfather. The family lived at 533 McMillan Avenue in southwest Birmingham. By the 1940 census she is living at 5757 Franklin Avenue in Los Angeles. Mother Mary and brother James are also shown living with her. The record notes she had finished two years of college. 

Those census records do not settle the question of her birth year. The 1920 and 1930 census both estimate her birth year at 1918; the 1940 census estimates 1921. 

Whatever Anderson's age, she was in Hollywood in 1939 and auditioned for the role of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind. She and hundreds of other actresses did not get that role, but she was tapped for the supporting role of Maybelle Merriwhether. In that same year she also had a small uncredited part in another high profile movie, The Women. Another Birmingham native, Dorothy Sebastian, also had a tiny role in the film. 

Anderson appeared in several other films in addition to Lifeboat. She had a significant role in 1943's The Song of Bernadette alongside Jennifer Jones, who played the title character. You can find all her acting credits here. 

In addition to the film roles, Anderson performed on a number of television shows in the 1950's and 1960's. The programs ranged from Target and Mike Hammer to Perry Mason, My Three Sons and Peyton Place. In her appearance on the 1958 episode "The Case of the Rolling Bones" on Perry Mason, she might have had a chance to trade Birmingham stories with Gail Patrick, another actress born in the city who by that time was producing the show. Anderson's final appearance was an uncredited "Old Lady in Music Store" in the 1980 film Cheech and Chong's Next Movie. 

Younger brother James [1921-1969] also became an actor; he played Bob Ewell in To Kill a Mockingbird. His credits include appearances in several Westerns and other films as well. They acted together in one movie, the 1951 noir thriller Hunt the Man Down. 

Anderson died in April 2014 in Burbank, California. Her first husband was writer Leonard M. Behrens; married in 1940, they divorced in 1950. In 1953 she married cinematographer Leon Shamroy; he won 4 Academy Awards and was nominated 14 additional times. One of those wins was for the 1944 film Wilson in which Mary Anderson played Eleanor, the youngest daughter of President Wilson. She had one child by Shamroy.

As noted below, Anderson returned to Birmingham in November 1947 for the world premier of her film Whispering City and a public appearance at Pizitz. The film premier benefited the Crippled Children's Clinic and was held at the Empire Theater on Third Avenue North.

You can find a number of photographs of Anderson, including glamour shots, at this Pinterest board. 

Anderson with actor Charles Russell in Behind Green Lights (1946)

Source: Wikipedia

Source: Listal

Source: The Film Daily 1946

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections

Source: Wikipedia

This November 1947 newspaper ad announces the opening of new escalators for the first four floors of the Birmingham Pizitz store. The dark photograph in the upper left corner notes that actress Mary (Bebe) Anderson will be on hand to untie the ribbon. Others present for what was treated as a major event on November 24 were Mayor Cooper Green and representatives from Westinghouse, the company that made the escalator. That day's Birmingham News covered the addition in an article, "Pizitz store installs moving stairways."

Source: Tim Hollis and his book Pizitz: Your Store [History Press, 2010]

Anderson starred in two of the films, Henry Aldrich for President (1941) and Henry and Dizzy (1942). 

Source: Birmingham Rewound

Movies with Alabama Connections: Faithless

Despite her talents and wide success as an actress in live theater, her outrageous behavior and rapier wit, Alabama native Tallulah Bankhead never made much impact in the movies. She easily conquered stages in New York and London, and also appeared on radio and television before her death in 1968, but Alfred Hitchcock's 1944 film Lifeboat is considered her only real success on the silver screen. 

Previously on this blog I've written about that appearance in the Hitchcock film, which also included a performance by another Alabama native, Mary Anderson. I've also discussed Talluah's appearances with Lucille Ball--one as herself and another as interpreted by Lucy. I recently watched Bankhead in the 1932 pre-Code movie, Faithless. I enjoyed it very much and thought I would discuss it here. 

The years from 1929 until mid-1934 are known as the "pre-Code" era in Hollywood. In 1930 the studios agreed to adopt the Motion Picture Production Code  that outlined topics forbidden in their films. The subjects ranged from drug use, prostitution and homosexuality to adultery and excessive violence. Strict enforcement did not begin until mid-1934, so many early sound films made during that brief period cover behaviors that would largely disappear from most American studio films until the Code was abandoned in 1968. Faithless includes such uncomfortable topics for the prudish as wild parties among the wealthy and the widespread deprivations of the Great Depression that lead Tallulah's character into promiscuity and then prostitution. And things end happily for Tallulah, which the Code did not toperate.

Bankhead's co-star is Robert Montgomery, a very successful actor and the father of actress Elizabeth Montgomery, who also had a long career in film and television. More comments are below.  

Faithless was released on October 15, 1932, by MGM; running time is a brisk 77 minutes. Beaumont directed a number of films between 1915 and 1948, including some with other stars such as John Barrymore and Joan Crawford. This film is based on Mildred Cram's story "Tinfoil".

Tallulah plays Carol Morgan, a rich New York socialite in love with advertising executive Bill Wade [Montgomery]. The film opens with Carol on the phone talking to Bill as they plan their evening. Clever repartee follows. 

Carol is very good at lounging around until late morning.

Bill Wade is an advertising executive pulling down $20,000 a year, which was a fabulous amount in 1932 America. We never do learn how these lovebirds met.

Being a spoiled socialite, Carol knows how to pout when needed, even if it is over the telephone.

Carol and Bill return from their date to her upscale apartment  

This film is worth watching just for the fabulous furniture, lighting and costumes filling the screen in the first half.

Bill and Carol seem headed for marriage. Based on their exchange here, they will do well in the conversation department:

Carol: I've nice feet, haven't I? Hmmm?

Bill: Can't expect a man to write poetry about feet at five o'clock in the morning.

You can find other great quotes from the film here. Especially hilarious is the long case Carol makes to Bill concerning her suitability as a wife.  

Bill and Carol make plans to marry, even launching the announcement at a large party of her friends. But roadblocks quickly pop up. Bill wants to live off his salary, not her inheritance. Carol, who seems to be very wealthy, is not impressed with his job or his income. The two break up.

Carol continues to party and blow through her inheritance until one day her bankers tell her she's broke. As in she-doesn't-have-one-thin-dime broke. 

How could this have happened? she wants to know. You spent all your money, they say.

Carol goes to see Bill and confesses her newly-acquired poverty. Problem is, Bill has lost his job that very day and is headed to Chicago to see what kind of job he can find. Carol doesn't want to do that and their possible reconciliation doesn't happen. Bill's younger brother Tony is on hand to offer his negative opinion of Carol. Before all this happens, though, Carol and Tony have the kind of barely veiled sex talk that must have driven the prudish in the audience right out of the theater. 

Now broke, Carol makes the rounds of friends she can bunk with and borrow money from until her welcome wears out. A wealthy cad finds her at the gaming tables of Monte Carlo [where Carol had suggested she and Bill go on their honeymoon] and makes her his mistress.

Bill tracks down a very drunken Carol at her benefactor's apartment, and after he leaves Carol is so humiliated she leaves her lover.

Now Carol is near rock bottom, waiting in a breadline. Naturally they run out of bread just as she reaches the window. She is forced to give her landlady her shoes to pay something toward rent.

Carol scrapes together enough money to buy a bowl of soup and runs into Bill in the restaurant. He has a job as a truck driver and asks her to marry him, saying the past is past. 

Bill loses that job, and is injured on his new one as a truck driving strikebreaker or scab. He  needs medicine that neither of them can afford. 

Carol is briefly forced into prostitution to buy the medicine. A policeman confronts her, but instead of arresting Carol he gets her a job at the very cafe where she had tried and failed earlier to get work.  

Bill finally recovers, and they get married and hopefully, after all their ups and downs, live happily ever after.

This film's story is hardly original, and cliches abound, but the two stars and the supporting actors make it work. In its review the New York Times declared Faithless to be a "lumbering species of drama" but did acknowledge the "capable portrayals" of the leads. 

The first half is full of crisp, often funny dialog, great sets and costumes. The second half pours on the pathos but manages to keep it from being too cloying. Bankhead's legendary theatrical performances were not preserved on film, but we get some idea of her range here in a role that displays her talents for both  wit and drama. 

Miss Tallulah Bankhead as "Black Widow" (1)

The live action Batman TV series ran for 120 episodes in the swinging sixties, from January 12, 1966 until March 14, 1968. The campy take on the legendary character was so popular ABC broadcast episodes two nights a week during the first two seasons. The series also spawned the first full-length feature film with Batman, released in 1966. 

A prominent aspect of the show featured recurring villains played by well-known actors of the day who joined in the fun. Cesar Romero played The Joker, Burgess Meredith The Penguin and Frank Gorshin and John Astin both played The Riddler. Julie Newmar and Eartha Kitt starred as Catwoman. Less well-known villains were acted by George Sanders, Vincent Price, Cliff Robertson, Milton Berle, Anne Baxter and Carolyn Jones among others.

Alabama's own Tallulah Bankhead appeared in two episodes in season two, "Black Widow Strikes Again" on March 15, 1967, and "Caught in the Spider's Den" the following night. I've done several blog posts on Bankhead and will no doubt do others in the future. I wrote about her 1932 film with Robert Montgomery, Faithless and her 1944 film Lifeboat. She made two appearances, sort of, on Lucille Ball comedy shows. I've also written about a 2018 visit to the Jasper home of her father, William Bankhead. You can find my brief biography of her in that Lucille Ball post.

Well, just how did Miss Tallulah Bankhead get on this show, anyway? Joel Lobenthal in his 2004 biography Tallulah!: The Life and Times of a Leading Lady tells the tale. One of her lifelong friends was actress Estelle Winwood, and she told Tallulah what a good time she'd had during her appearances. Bankhead made a late night call to executive producer William Dozier  and told him she "must" be on the program. Production staff member Robert Mintz wrote two scripts about a new villain created just for her. The Black Widow had taken up a life of crime after the death of her husband, Max Black. In the show her partners call her "Blackie" or "BW". Batman declares she is "sophisticated but evil."

By the time these episodes were broadcast, Tallulah was less than two years away from her death on December 12, 1968. Her health problems had limited her acting in the 1960's. Her last appearance on Broadway came in a revised version of Tennessee Williams' The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore which ran briefly in January 1964. Williams' had written the play for her and loosely based the character Flora Goforth on her. 

Bankhead made her last trip to Hollywood from her home in New York City in December 1967 to appear on the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. She appeared on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson one final time on May 14, 1968. Joe Garagiola was guest hosting; John Lennon and Paul McCartney, and pie-in-the face comedian Soupy Sales were also guests.

I recently watched these two Batman episodes, and in this blog post and a second one I'll be discussing them. See further comments below. The show certainly wasn't high art, but these episodes with Bankhead were fun to watch.

Alabama has had at least two other "spider" women, Carol Foreman & Marie Hilley. Alabama native and actress Forman played the lead in The Black Widow, a 1947 film serial from Republic Studios. Hilley was a real-life Alabama serial killer often called "The Black Widow". 

As our story opens, Black Widow arrives at a bank in the sidecar of a motorcycle driven by one of her underlings. 

In the bank president's office she turns on the charm. 

Black Widow used hypnosis, drugs, and other methods to control victims. In this first episode she uses a machine to short-circuit brain waves and make the victim obey her commands. 

Soon she is leaving the bank with a big bag of money.

In her lair, the Black Widow and her henchmen admire the money.

Soon she is arriving at another bank. Here, before she can take possession of the money, Batman and Robin show up. Police Commissioner Gordon has asked for thei help in catching her.

Blackie whips out another of her weapons, the Instant Nerve Paralyzer ad zaps Batman with it. She doesn't even bother with little Robin. 

With Batman under control, the Black Widow can toy with Robin.

Black Widow and her driver return to the lair, which is underneath a suburban home. 

On her periscope she watches the arrival of Batman and Robin after the nerve paralyzer has worn off. 

Black Widow soon has the Dynamic Duo in her web, literally, and questions arise when she unleashes her real giant spiders.

Well, as they say, "Tune in tomorrow night...."

These are the actors who played Black Widow's partners in crime. Donald Barry acted in a number of western TV shows as well as other programs and films. Al Ferrara has only a few credits in the IMDB in addition to these episodes. Michael Lane had a number of roles in films and television between 1956 and 1994 including Hondo, Gunsmoke, Kojak, and Mission Impossible. 

Actor George Raft makes a brief, uncredited appearance near the end of this episode. In November 1933 Bankhead had a five-hour radical hysterectomy at a Los Angeles Hospital. The operation, which almost killed her, was done to treat an advanced case of gonorrhea. According to Lobenthal's biography, she later told a confidante that Raft had given the disease to her. The two actors don't have a scene together, but the juxtaposition seems odd. Were such uncredited appearances common on the show, or did Tallulah have something to do with it in this episode?