Fade to Black: A Book of Movie Obituaries Read online

  CAUSE: He retired to his Surrey home, 6 Painshill House, Cobham, Surrey, following a stroke. He died in a Sussex nursing home aged 90.

  Agnes Ayres

  (AGNES EYRE HENKEL)

  Born April 4, 1896

  Died Christmas Day, 1940

  Twenties leading lady. Born in Carbondale, Illinois, she made her film début in The Masked Wrestler (1914) and went on to appear in more than 80 films. She is best known for appearing opposite Rudolph Valentino in The Sheik (1921) as Lady Diana Mayo, The Son Of The Sheik (1926) as Diana and in Cecil B. DeMille’s The Ten Commandments (1923). Her career ended in 1929 with the advent of talkies although she did appear in bit parts in five films in 1936 and 1937. 5́ 3˝ Agnes Ayres was married twice, to the producer Manuel Reachi (b. 1900, d. April 26, 1955) by whom she had one child, and to Frank P. Schuker.

  CAUSE: She died of a cerebral haemorrhage in Los Angeles, California. She was 44.

  Lew Ayres

  Born December 28, 1908

  Died December 30, 1996

  Actor with a conscience. Lewis Frederick Ayres III was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the scion of a musical family. His parents separated when he was 14 and he went to live in San Diego, California, with his mother. When he left Lake Harriett High School in Minneapolis, he studied medicine at the University of Arizona. Ayres formed a band and toured for a while before hooking up with Henry ‘Hank’ Halstead. At a tea dance working with Ray West’s Cocoanut Grove Orchestra, he was spotted by Paul Bern (later Jean Harlow’s husband), an executive with Pathé, who signed him up on a six-month contract. In that time he made just one film, The Sophomore (1929), before moving to MGM where he starred opposite Garbo in The Kiss (1929). It was the lead role as Paul Baumer, the patriotic German soldier in Lewis Milestone’s All Quiet On The Western Front (1930), that made the 5˝11˝ Ayres a star and also instilled pacifist views in him, beliefs that were to be sorely tested. The famous hand reaching out for a butterfly in the film is not Ayres’; it belongs to Lewis Milestone. Bizarrely, the film was banned in the Fatherland for being anti-German and in Poland for being pro-German. During the Thirties Ayres appeared in mainly disappointing B films, such as Common Clay (1930), My Weakness (1933), State Fair (1933) and Holiday (1938) before making the nine-part Dr Kildare series (1938–1942) opposite Lionel Barrymore. However, none matched up to All Quiet… On America’s belated intervention in World War II, Ayres, a devout Quaker, was one of the first stars to be called up. In March 1942 he declared himself a conscientious objector and refused to go. MGM were bombarded with thousands of letters calling him a traitor and a coward, but Ayres stuck to his guns. He worked as an assistant to a chaplain and a doctor during the conflict in battle areas. Following the cessation of hostilities, his welcome back was lukewarm. It is often said Hollywood will forgive anything except failure and Ayres proved his mettle in The Dark Mirror (1946) and Johnny Belinda (1948), which garnered him a Best Actor nomination for his portrayal of Dr Robert Richardson, the medic who befriends a deaf mute. In 1955 he made Altars Of The East, a documentary about religion and two years later he was appointed to a three-year term with UNESCO. Just when it seemed he was destined for a quiet retirement, Ayres appeared in Battle For The Planet Of The Apes (1973), Damien – Omen II (1978), Battlestar Galactica (1979) and the pilot of Hawaii Five-O, which aired on September 20, 1968, playing the governor. Ayres married three times. He wed Lola Lane in Las Vegas, Nevada, on September 15, 1931, and was divorced in Los Angeles two years later on February 3, 1933. On November 14, 1934, in the Little Church of the Flowers in Glendale, California, he married Ginger Rogers (Janet Gaynor and Mary Brian were the bridesmaids) but that union ended acrimoniously in 1936; they divorced on March 13, 1940. Ayres said of the match: “Ginger Rogers was married to her career and to that mother of hers. I interfered with both relationships. They were stronger or more important to Ginger than I was. It was fine while it lasted, except I often felt like an interloper. When it ended, I felt a bit sad and a lot relieved.” Single for almost 30 years, he married English-born Diana Hall on February 7, 1964. His only child, a son called Justin Bret, was born on December 27, 1968.

  CAUSE: Ayres died in his sleep two days after his 88th birthday, in Los Angeles.

  B

  Jim Backus

  Born February 25, 1913

  Died July 3, 1989

  The voice of Mr Magoo. James Gilmore Backus was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and educated at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. As with many performers, he appeared in vaudeville and on the radio before progressing to movies. His voice meant he was destined to play character parts instead of leads but he also branched out on television as Judge Bradley Stevens on I Married Joan (1952–1955), the pompous Thurston Howell III in Gilligan’s Island (1964–1967) and, of course, the voice of myopic Quincy Magoo. One of his dramatic film roles was as James Dean’s father in Rebel Without A Cause (1955). Among his other films were The Pied Piper (1942), The Great Lover (1949), Don’t Bother To Knock (1952), Meet Me In Las Vegas (1956), a sheriff in Macabre (1960), a drunk pilot in It’s A Mad Mad Mad Mad World (1963), Myra Breckinridge (1970), Pete’s Dragon (1977) and C.H.O.M.P.S. (1979). He was married to actress Henriette ‘Henny’ Kay and up to his death they lived at 10914 Bellagio Road, Bel-Air. One of their neighbours was Alfred Hitchcock.

  CAUSE: He was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease some time before his death. On June 13, 1989, he was admitted to St. John’s Hospital, Santa Monica because he had contracted pneumonia. For the two weeks leading up to his death he and wife Henny wrote two humorous books about living with Parkinson’s. He died of complications from the disease aged 76. He was buried in Westwood Village Memorial Park, 1218 Glendon Avenue, Los Angeles 90024.

  Olga Baclanova

  Born August 19, 1896

  Died September 6, 1974

  ‘The Russian Tigress’. Born in Moscow, one of six children of Vladimir Baklanoff and his wife Alexandra, 5́ 4˝ Olga Baclanova graduated from the Cherniavsky Institute in Moscow and in 1912 aged 16 she enrolled in the Moscow Arts Theatre. She left the theatre in 1918 four years after she began making films. Her early work included: Simfoniya Lyubvi E Smerti (1914), Kugda Zvuchat Struni Serdtza (1914), Velikij Magaraz (1915), Zagrobnaya Skitalitsa (1915), the title role in Zhenshchina Vampir (1915), Lyubov Pod Maskoi (1915), Tot, Kto Poluchayet Poshchechini (1916), Tsvety Zapozdalye (1917) as Maruska and Khleb (1918), a pro-communist propaganda vehicle. In 1925 she toured America for eight months and when the theatre company returned to the Soviet Union she defected. She was spotted by Hollywood studios while playing the part of the nun in The Miracle in Los Angeles. Her Tinseltown début was a bit part in United Artists’ The Dove (1927). In 1928 she made several films – The Czarina’s Secret, The Man Who Laughs as Duchess Josiana opposite Conrad Veidt, Three Sinners as Baroness Hilda Brings, Street Of Sin as Annie, Forgotten Faces as Lilly Harlow, The Docks Of New York as Lou and Avalanche as Grace Stillwell – and her career was in the ascendancy. But then as the talkies became ever more popular she was reduced to supporting roles because of her stage mannerisms (not because of her accent as is generally supposed). She appeared in The Wolf Of Wall Street (1929) as Olga, A Dangerous Woman (1929) as Tania Gregory, The Man I Love (1929) as Sonia Barondoff, Cheer Up And Smile (1930) as Yvonne, Are You There? (1930) as Countess Helenka and The Great Lover (1931) as Savarova. It was her next film that brought notoriety to all concerned and the film was banned in Britain for many years. In MGM’s Freaks (opened on July 8, 1932), directed by Tod Browning at a cost of $311,000, Baclanova played Cleopatra, a trapeze artist who married a wealthy midget for his money. The film featured many deformed and disabled people who had previously been exhibited in sideshows for the public amusement. Studio head Louis B. Mayer was appalled and the film was withdrawn before being reissued with the title Nature’s Mistakes. After Freaks Baclanova made just four more films before retiring from the screen – Downstairs (1932) as Baroness Eloise von Burgen, Billion Dollar Scandal (1933) as An
na, Telephone Blues (1935) and Claudia (1943) as Madame Daruschka. For ten years from 1933 she appeared in a number of Broadway shows and then toured America. She made her West End début in 1936 in Going Places. She later became a radio announcer before permanent retirement. She refused to travel to England because her dog would have to go into quarantine. When the animal died, she put its corpse into one of her drawers rather than bury it. She was married three times. Her first husband (in 1922) was Vladimir Zoppi by whom she had one child. They divorced on February 23, 1929. On March 5, 1929 she married the actor Nicholas Soussanin (b. Yalta, Russia, January 16, 1889, d. New York, April 27, 1975 of a heart attack) and had another child. Their marriage was dissolved in 1939, the year she married the film distributor Richard Davis.

  CAUSE: After years of poor health, she died in Vevey, Switzerland.

  Lloyd Bacon

  Born December 4, 1889

  Died November 15, 1955

  Multi-talent. Born in San Jose, California, 5˝10˝ Lloyd Francis Bacon intended to become a lawyer rather than an actor like his father, Frank (b. Marysville, California, January 16, 1864, d. Chicago, Illinois, November 19, 1922) and mother Jane Jennie Weidman. But the lure of the greasepaint was too much and he entered show business. Lloyd made his film début in 1914 and the following year joined Essanay where he worked with Charlie Chaplin. He appeared with the Little Tramp in The Floorwalker (1916) but then his career was interrupted by the First World War. Demobbed in 1919 he signed for Triangle but two years later moved behind the cameras as a director. He worked for Mack Sennett, Universal and Warner Bros. His films included The Singing Fool (1928) with Al Jolson, Moby Dick (1930), The Picture Snatcher with James Cagney, Wonder Bar again with Al Jolson, 42nd Street (1933), Footlight Parade (1933), Devil Dogs Of The Air (1935), Gold Diggers Of 1937 (1937), A Slight Case Of Murder (1938) with Edward G. Robinson, The Oklahoma Kid (1939), Give My Regards To Broadway (1948) and The French Line (1954). He was married to Margaret Adele Lowdermilk. Another brother, the 6́ tall Irving (b. St Joseph, Missouri, September 6, 1893, d. Hollywood, California, February 5, 1965) also became an actor and appeared in more than 400 films between 1915 (A Favorite Fool) and 1958 (Fort Massacre).

  CAUSE: He died aged 65 of a cerebral haemorrhage in Burbank, California.

  Angela Baddeley, CBE

  (MADELEINE AGGIE CLINTON-BADDELEY)

  Born July 4, 1900

  Died February 22, 1976

  Overshadowed sibling. Born at 64 Pretoria Road, West Ham, London, one of the four daughters of journalist William Herman Clinton-Baddeley and his wife, Louise Rosalie Bourdin, she was a descendant of Sir Henry Clinton, the British general who captured New York during the American War of Independence. Educated privately, the elder sister of Hermione Baddeley made her stage début at the Old Vic on November 22, 1915, aged 15 (not 11 as many reference books have it) in Richard III playing the little Duke of York. It was on the stage that she predominantly worked and she excelled as Jenny Diver in the long-running revival (June 5, 1920–1923) of John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera at The Lyric, Hammersmith. She had a versatility that annoyed some critics and delighted others. James Agate once commented that she could be “an ingénue without being a ninny”. She was one of Emlyn Williams’ favourite actresses in the Thirties and Forties. She was acclaimed for her portrayal of Olivia Grayne in his macabre Night Must Fall on May 31, 1935 at the Duchess Theatre. This part took her to her American stage début at the Barrymore Theater in New York on September 28, 1936. She joined the Old Vic company in the late Forties. Her films were The Speckled Band (1931) which starred Raymond Massey as Sherlock Holmes, The Ghost Train (1931), written by Dad’s Army’s Arnold Ridley (Private Godfrey), Arms And The Man (1932), The Citadel (1938) and Tom Jones (1963). It was for her portrayal of the cook Mrs Bridges in Upstairs Downstairs (1971–1975) that she became known to TV audiences. She married twice. Her first husband (in 1921) was director Stephen Kerr Thomas by whom she had a daughter. He left her on the day that her sister, Hermione, married for the first time. Husband number two (on July 8, 1929) was the bisexual actor-director Glencairn Alexander Byam Shaw, CBE (b. December 13, 1904, d. Goring-on-Thames, April 29, 1986) by whom she had a son and a daughter. He numbered Siegfried Sassoon among his lovers and had an affair with Rachel Kempson, Lady Redgrave.