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Gloria Swanson, Her Cardboard Lover, Herbert Marshall, Jeanne Eagels, Jeanne Eagels: A Life Revealed, Joseph M. Schenck, Joseph P. Kennedy, Louella Parsons, Man Woman and Sin, Rain, Raoul Walsh, Sadie Thompson, Silent Movies, United Artists, Will Hays
Gloria May Josephine Swanson was born in Chicago on March 27, 1899. Her father was in the US army, and the family moved frequently during her childhood. After an aunt took her to visit Essanay Studios in Chicago, she left school to work as an extra. She made an uncredited debut in The Song of Soul, and acted alongside Charlie Chaplin in His New Job (1915.) Continue reading
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Samuel Henry Harris was born in New York City on February 3, 1872. His early jobs ranged from selling cough drops to keeping the Irish storyteller and vaudevillian, John W. Kelly, out of saloon bars during a troubled stint at Miner’s Bowery Theatre. He also worked as a boxing promoter, managing prize-fighter Terry McGovern. By the age of twenty-two, Harris owned six racehorses. 
Tallulah Brockman Bankhead was born in Huntsville, Alabama on January 31, 1902. Her mother, Adelaide, died of blood poisoning three weeks after Tallulah’s birth. Her father William, a prominent Democrat, suffered bouts of alcoholism and depression, and Tallulah was largely raised by her grandmother. 
William Somerset Maugham was born in Paris on January 25, 1874, the fourth of six children. His father was a lawyer for the British Embassy. His mother died of tuberculosis when he was eight, and when his father passed away two years later, Maugham was sent to live with his uncle in England. 
John Colton was born in Minneapolis on December 31, 1887. He spent his first fourteen years in Japan, where his English father was a diplomat. This early experience of colonial life in the Far East would inspire his writing. 
One of my favourite Hollywood stars, 
Next up in the series profiling key figures in Jeanne Eagels: A Life Revealed is Fredric March. One of Hollywood’s versatile actors, his career spanned six decades. 
Next up in the series profiling major figures in Jeanne Eagels: A Life Revealed is Francine Larrimore, who made theatrical history as Roxie Hart in Chicago. 
Why did Jeanne Eagels – the original Sadie Thompson, and a Broadway legend – never bring Rain to the big screen? Author Laini Giles considers this lost opportunity, in a Classic Movie Blogathon post for 