Barbara Stanwyck on stage, screen, radio and television
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Barbara Stanwyck (born Ruby Catherine Stevens, 1907–1990) was a prolific American actress and dancer who appeared in a total of 95 theatrically released full-length motion pictures.[1][2] Orphaned before she was old enough to attend school, she became fascinated by the burgeoning film industry, and actress Pearl White in particular, whom she would mimic on the playgrounds. "Pearl White was my goddess, and her courage, her grace, and her triumphs lifted me out of this world."[3]
She began her show business career as a teenage chorus girl in speakeasy nightclubs where the liquor prohibition laws were ignored, and the clientele were often mafia gangsters. At age of 15,[4] she danced in the El Fey Nightclub in Manhattan, operated by Texas Guinan, whose establishments showcased aspiring talent such as dancers George Raft and Ruby Keeler.[5] Biographer Dan Callahan opined that the same tough fortitude it took for a teenager to survive those experiences, was played out in the on-screen persona of her interpretation of determined and often hard-edged women.[6]
By age of 16, she was performing in the more mainstream-acceptable Ziegfeld Follies.[6] It was during this period that she became acquainted with playwright Willard Mack, who gave her a role in his stage production The Noose, and re-named her after actress Jane Stanwyck. During her run in the play Burlesque, her first leading role, she also appeared in advertisements for personal exercise equipment.[7]
Stanwyck got an uncredited bit part in the silent lost film Broadway Nights (1927).[6] Studio executive Joseph M. Schenck subsequently signed her for The Locked Door (1929) with Rod La Rocque. Afterwards, she had a role in Mexicali Rose (1929) for Columbia Pictures.[8] Stanwyck got her major break when director Frank Capra chose her for the lead role in his romantic drama Ladies of Leisure (1930).[9] She would go on to make four more films with Capra: The Miracle Woman (1931), Forbidden (1932), The Bitter Tea of General Yen (1933), and Meet John Doe (1941).[10] She also did five films with director William A. Wellman: Night Nurse (1931), The Purchase Price (1932), So Big! (1932), The Great Man's Lady (1942), and Lady of Burlesque (1943).[11] She starred in the 1947 film, "The Two Mrs. Carrolls", with Humphrey Bogart (directed by Peter Godfrey). Stanwyck was nominated four times for the Academy Award for Best Actress, but never won. In 1982, she was given an honorary Academy Award.[12]
On August 3, 1936, Stanwyck made the first of her 16 appearances on LUX Radio Theatre, hosted by director-producer Cecil B. DeMille. Her final performance with the radio series was in 1943.[13] She had a decades-long social relationship with actress and comedian Mary Livingstone and her husband Jack Benny, appearing on his radio show numerous times, and making her television debut on his show.[14] In the 1950s, Stanwyck began to branch out into television. She received the 1961 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress – Drama Series for The Barbara Stanwyck Show anthology series.[15] She was nominated for the same award three more times – 1966, 1967, and 1968 – for her series The Big Valley, winning it for that series in 1966.[16]
Stanwyck received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on February 8, 1960.[17]