I was born on Christmas Eve, 1922, in a rural community seven miles east of Smithfield, NC, as the youngest of seven children. The "Great Depression” effected the livelihood of my family and we eventually moved to Newport News, Virginia, to operate a boarding house for shipyard workers.
After my father died, my mother insisted I continue my education; and after I graduated from high school, I started college at Atlantic Christian.
My older sister had moved to New York and married a professional photographer who took a few pictures of me for display in the window of his Fifth Avenue shop. He later delivered some of those pictures to MGM’s New York office. After appearing for a screen test, I, at age 18, signed a seven-year movie contract for fifty dollars a week.
Shortly after arriving in Hollywood, I met and married a young, persistent actor named Mickey Rooney, but the marriage only lasted one year. My second marriage to bandleader Artie Shaw was also short-lived. I next married a famous Italian crooner who was the love of my life, but our marriage was too tempestuous to last. I never married again, but he later married a girl with a boyish haircut.
Career
I started out with small walk-on roles in 15 MGM movies until in 1946, MGM loaned me out to Universal to play a femme fatale in a classic film noir. I was noticed, so much so that Louis B. Mayer quickly wanted me back for casting in a movie opposite Clark Gable. After that, many other starring roles became mine, including one as a lady of mixed-race heritage in one of the greatest musicals of all time.
I was Oscar-nominated in 1953 for Best Actress in my role as Honey Bear Kelly in another film with Clark Gable, but I lost out to Audrey Hepburn. Years later I would receive a Golden Globe nomination in a movie which starred Richard Burton.
In the mid-1980's I did some work in television, including one season on Knots Landing. A screen legend, who am I?
Answer will be upcoming on this site, click here.
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