This book is the definitive guide to the film, stage, radio and television career of Kay Francis, one of the most glamorous stars from the golden age of Hollywood. For each film, the authors provide a thorough synopsis plus cast and crew information (including biographies), opening dates, production notes, behind-the-scenes details, and reviews. In addition, information is provided on her stage, radio, and television appearances, and a section is devoted to collecting Kay Francis memorabilia, including such items as cigarette cards, sheet music and soundtracks. Also covered is the stage and vaudeville career of Kay Francis' mother, Katherine Clinton. A brief biography of Kay Francis is provided, along with an insightful foreword by film scholar James Robert Parish. Truly a treasure trove for Kay Francis fans and anyone interested in classic filmmaking in the 1930s and 1940s, the book includes more than 130 illustrations, many of them rare.

Kay Francis came of age in the Roaring Twenties and relished the era's hedonistic pursuits. Her career as an actress was launched at the same time, and before her death in 1968, she had appeared on many theater stages, in more than 60 films, on radio, in USO tours, as a model, and on television. The tall, stylish actress had a husky voice and dark beauty that was striking on film. Despite her financial success, relaxed morals, and life as a socialite, the millionaire actress shunned luxuries such as limousines and sprawling estates popular among Hollywood elite. The actress, who insisted she wanted to be forgotten, left behind scrapbooks, boxes of memorabilia and detailed diaries. These rich resources help provide an exhaustive look at the life of one of Hollywood's most intriguing early stars. Francis' biography is the heart of this book, beginning with her family background and her upbringing by a vaudevillian actress mother. The story of her extensive career and never-ending romantic pursuits is peppered with comments from the media and her own diaries, and supplemented with ample photographs. A chronology gives dates of theater openings, film releases, marriages, television and radio appearances, births and deaths. A filmography includes complete cast and credit lists.

How did Laurette Taylor (1884-1946) become America's most celebrated actress? What training and experience led to her first stage success, Peg o' My Heart, in 1912? How did her failed 1920s silent film career influence her stage technique? What was so remarkable about her portrayal of Amanda Wingfield in the original 1945 Broadway production of The Glass Menagerie that many actors and critics have proclaimed her performance as the greatest they have ever seen, before or since? How did alcoholism affect her career? And why has it been so difficult to tell her story on stage and screen? This biography offers fascinating new insights into the life and craft of Laurette Taylor. Included is a very short play written by the actress, entitled The Dying Wife.

Evelyn Brent's life and career were going quite well in 1928. She was happily living with writer Dorothy Herzog following her divorce from producer Bernard Fineman, and the tiny brunette had wowed fans and critics in the silent films The Underworld and The Last Command. She'd also been a sensation in Paramount's first dialogue film, Interference. But by the end of that year Brent was headed for a quick, downward spiral ending in bankruptcy and occasional work as an extra. What happened is a complicated story laced with bad luck, poor decisions, and treachery detailed in this first and only full-length biography.

Katty Stewart, Elizabeth (Moosie) White, Walker Ellis and Walter Stauffer were socialites born in New Orleans around the turn of the 20th century. Among their ancestors were Confederate soldiers, plantation owners, self-made millionaires and even a U.S. President. This book tells the story of four flawed, socially connected people who used newspaper society columns to craft highly curated images of themselves. But the newspapers of the time did not include the more salacious, messy, complicated and secretive details of their lives. This is also a social history of New Orleans during the Jazz Age, including descriptions of queer culture, the French Quarter, European travel, and life in the social circles of Kay Francis, Zelda and F. Scott Fitzgerald, Waldo Peirce, Caresse and Harry Crosby, Gerald and Sara Murphy and many others. Full of humorous anecdotes, drama, romance and tragedy, this book is an insightful chronicle of a fascinating time in New Orleans' LGBTQ history.

Actresses and Mental Illness investigates the relationship between the work of the actress and her personal experience of mental illness, from the late nineteenth through to the end of twentieth century. Over the past two decades scholars have made great advances in our understanding of the history of the actress, unearthing the material conditions of her working life, the force of her creative agency and the politics of her reception and representation. By focusing specifically on actresses’ encounters with mental illness, Fiona Gregory builds on this earlier work and significantly supplements it. Through detailed case studies of both well-known and neglected figures in theatre and film history, including Mrs Patrick Campbell, Vivien Leigh, Frances Farmer and Diana Barrymore, it shows how mental illness – actual or supposed – has impacted on actresses’ performances, careers and celebrity. The book covers a range of topics including: representing emotion on stage; the ‘failed’ actress; actresses and addiction; and actresses and psychiatric treatment. Actresses and Mental Illness expands the field of actress studies by showing how consideration of the personal experience of the actress influences our understanding of her work and its reception. The book underscores how the actress can be perceived as a representative public woman, acting as a lens through which we can examine broader attitudes to women and mental illness.

Known as the first film teenager, Deanna Durbin was one of the most popular actresses of the 1930s and 1940s. From starring alongside legends like Judy Garland to playing the lead role in classic film musicals, her rise to fame seemed almost like fantasy. But her life behind the scenes was anything but glamorous. Though Durbin was a princess to the public, she was a puppet to film studios and producers and a punching bag for critics and gossip columnists. At the end of her twelve-year career, her only wish was to be forgotten. Impossible. This book pays tribute to Deanna Durbin by detailing her life and career in the context of her time and appraises her film work from both a contemporaneous and a modern view. It includes a short biography, an in-depth discussion of her films, and an extensive filmography and bibliography of her work. Readers will discover the true identity behind the people's Cinderella and how Durbin's career opened Hollywood's studio gates to a generation of adolescent performers.

On stage from her childhood, Martha Raye (1916-1994) proudly embraced the role of the clown, her gift for slapstick comedy enhanced by a fine singing voice. She became a star with her first feature film, Rhythm on the Range (1936), as the zany, loudmouthed girl looking for love--or chasing it as it ran away. She won popular and critical acclaim with The Martha Raye Show (1954-1956) before it was abruptly cancelled, partly because of her chaotic personal life. Drawing on new interviews with her colleagues, this retrospective covers the life and career of an enduringly funny lady who influenced a generation of women comedians. Her reign as a top NBC star of the 1950s is covered, along with her appearances on popular variety shows, her roles in fondly remembered series like The Bugaloos, McMillan and Alice, and her film career that teamed her with the likes of Jack Benny, Charlie Chaplin and Doris Day.