Myrna loy biography

By now, friends were suggesting that her chances might be better if she changed her name, there being too many actors called "Williams" in the business already. A writer friend much taken with the nonsensical sound poems of Gertrude Stein came up with "Loy" as a suitable complement to her first name. The headshots Myrna sent to Warner Bros. Loy's fear of limiting labels was amply justified for the next six years.

She was condemned to a dreary series of B pictures in which she was typecast as the sensuous, mysterious, and often treacherous foreign femme fatale of vague Asian extraction with such names as Yasmini, Nubi, and Fah Lo See. She was the "native girl" who ruins the career of an innocent young American sailor in Across The Pacific; a "Hindu princess" in The Black Watch , outfitted in silk pants, a halter top, and a strange black wig that one reviewer thought made her look like "a weird cross between Cleopatra and the goddess Kali"; and a Gypsy in The Squall , in which she arouses the passions of a group of naive farmers with whom she takes refuge during a storm.

Even the film's director, a young Alexander Korda , later remembered it as "that ghastly picture. Give the girl a chance! A few in Hollywood heeded Peel's suggestion. Mamoulian was sure enough of Loy's talent that he created the role of Valentine especially for her, over Paramount's objections, and handed Myrna her lines, scribbled on blue sheets of paper, when she arrived on the set each morning.

To Thalberg's embarrassment, however, it was the two pictures Loy did for RKO, to which Thalberg had loaned her, that indicated her star potential. This inspired Thalberg to cast Loy in MGM's The Prizefighter and the Lady as a gun moll who falls for a good-hearted boxer, played by real-life pugilist Max Baer in his first film role. The film was directed by W.

Woody Van Dyke, who joined the ranks of Loy converts and cast her in 's Penthouse , Myrna's first role in a comedy. By now, Thalberg was willing to move Loy on to the studio's A-list. She appeared in the first of a number of films with Clark Gable , 's Night Flight , and the following year with Gable and William Powell in Manhattan Melodrama the film that had such disastrous consequences for John Dillinger , and the only film in which she appears with her two most popular leading men at the same time.

Myrna plays a woman who reconciles two men, friends since childhood,. Loy, who confided many years later that she considered Gable "a terrible actor," found working with him challenging. I had to play tough, independent women [opposite him]. It was his next film that would make Myrna Loy a star. A few years earlier, MGM had bought the rights to one of novelist Dashiell Hammett 's mystery novels, The Thin Man , in which Hammett had first introduced his debonair if slightly dipsomaniacal sleuthing couple, Nick and Nora Charles, and their mischievous dog, Asta.

Hammett had drawn on his own relationship with Lillian Hellman to create the characters of Nick, with his working knowledge of thugs, cops, rackets and molls, and Nora, from a more socially impressive and wealthy background, but with an almost anthropological interest in her husband's former milieu and a talent for quickwitted riposte. Thalberg assigned Van Dyke to what he expected to be a typical and inexpensive B picture.

But it was precisely his efficient directing style and the film's short, day shooting schedule that gave the final product the breezy, informal and amusing tone that would also mark six more such films over the next 13 years. Despite the fact that Loy had over 70 films to her credit by , it was the part of Nora that made her career.

Myrna always had that. The fame Loy achieved came with a price. Always careful to keep her private and professional lives separate, Myrna was dismayed at the publicity that surrounded her marriage to Arthur Hornblow, Jr. Loy had met Hornblow some years earlier on the MGM lot, where he was an assistant producer, and their affair during her pre-Nora days had drawn little attention, even though Hornblow was still a married man.

The couple's plan to marry quietly in Mexico when Hornblow's divorce from his first wife became final was disrupted by a trail of photographers and reporters, leading Loy to complain, "I can't see what [the marriage] has to do with my work. All I can say is, if you're successful at something, God help you! By the end of , Loy was among MGM's highest-paid stars, earning as much as any of the studio's male stars, including Clark Gable, after waging a successful "equal pay for equal work" fight with Louis Mayer himself.

But Loy's private life once again became tabloid news when her divorce from Arthur Hornblow in Mexico and, six days later, her marriage to millionaire John Hertz, Jr. Hertz was the heir to a vast business empire for which his father's rental-car company had been the catalyst.

Myrna loy biography

Myrna's political activism was much reported on, too. She had spoken out publicly against Hitler as early as , loudly enough that by the time of America's entry into the war, Hitler had banned from German movie screens any film in which Myrna Loy appeared. Mayer finally relented on the condition that filming be completed within three weeks, as Loy was committed to start filming Stamboul Quest.

Loy received excellent reviews and was acclaimed for her comedic skills. She and her costar William Powell proved to be a popular screen couple and appeared in 14 films together, one of the most prolific pairings in Hollywood history. Loy later referred to The Thin Man as the film "that finally made me Her successes in Manhattan Melodrama and The Thin Man marked a turning point in her career, and she was cast in more important pictures.

Such films as Wife vs. In , Loy had begun dating producer Arthur Hornblow Jr. As selfish as it sounds, I liked having a man like Spence in the background wanting me. It's rather nice when nothing's required in return. She also made three more films with Gable at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer MGM : Parnell was a historical drama and one of the most poorly received films of either Loy's or Gable's career, but their other pairings in Test Pilot and Too Hot to Handle both were successes.

While working for MGM, Loy was outspoken about the studio's casting hierarchy, especially based on race , and was quoted as saying: "Why does every black person in the movies have to play a servant? How about a black person walking up the steps of a court house carrying a briefcase? During this period, Loy was one of Hollywood's busiest and highest-paid actresses, and in and she was listed in the annual "Quigley Poll of the Top Ten Money Making Stars", which was compiled from the votes of movie exhibitors throughout the United States for the stars who had generated the most revenue in their theaters over the previous year.

By the late s, Loy was highly regarded for her performances in romantic comedies, and she was anxious to demonstrate her dramatic ability. On June 1, , Loy divorced her husband Hornblow in Reno , citing "mental cruelty" as the impetus for separating. Hertz, Jr. With the outbreak of World War II the same year, Loy all but abandoned her acting career to focus on the war effort and began devoting her time to working with the Red Cross.

Around , Loy began dating producer and screenwriter Gene Markey , who had previously been married to actresses Joan Bennett and Hedy Lamarr. Loy was paired with Cary Grant in David O. Selznick 's The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer The film co-starred a teenaged Shirley Temple. Following its success, she appeared again with Grant in Mr.

Blandings Builds His Dream House In , she had become a member of the U. Sargeant , U. Throughout the s, Loy assumed an influential role as co-chairman of the Advisory Council of the National Committee Against Discrimination in Housing. Loy, a lifelong Democrat , publicly supported the election of John F. Kennedy in , finding Richard Nixon to be an unscrupulous man.

She divorced her fourth husband Sargeant in Also in , she appeared on Family Affair in the episode "A Helping Hand" as a woman out of work and taking on hired-help and cook work, comically aided by Mr. French, though, the job did not work out, and she takes the failure out on John Williams , who was temporarily substituting for Sebastian Cabot in the role of Mr.

In , she had a supporting part in Airport playing Mrs. Devaney, a heavy-drinking woman imbibing Jim Beam and Olympia Beer mixed together; a foil to the character played by Sid Caesar. In , Loy was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent two mastectomies to treat the disease. In , she appeared in the film The End as the mother of the main character played by Burt Reynolds.

She also returned to the stage, making her Broadway debut in a short-lived revival of Clare Boothe Luce 's The Women. In , she appeared in the television drama Summer Solstice , [ 60 ] which was Henry Fonda 's last performance. Her last acting role was a guest spot on the sitcom Love, Sidney , in Tools Tools. In other projects. Wikimedia Commons Wikidata item.

Myrna Loy. Helena , Montana , U. Arthur Hornblow, Jr. John Hertz, Jr. Gene Markey. She passed away on December 14, , at the age of Myrna Loy's legacy as a talented actress and a dedicated philanthropist continues to endure. Contact About Privacy. Paul Terry. Simone Simon.