Mary Brian

Mary Brian (born Louise Byrdie Dantzler, February 17, 1906 – December 30, 2002), was an American actress, who made the transition from silent films to sound films. Brian was dubbed "The Sweetest Girl in Pictures." After her showing in a beauty contest, she was given an audition by Paramount Pictures and cast by director Herbert Brenon as Wendy Darling in his silent movie version of J. M. Barrie's Peter Pan. There she starred with Betty Bronson and Esther Ralston, and the three of them stayed close for the rest of their lives. Ralston described both Bronson and Brian as 'very charming people'. The studio, who created her stage name for the movie and said she was age 16 instead of 18, because the latter sounded too old for the role, then signed her to a long-term motion picture contract. Brian played Fancy Vanhern, daughter of Percy Marmont, in Brenon's The Street of Forgotten Men, which had newcomer Louise Brooks in an uncredited debut role as a moll. Her first talkie was Varsity, which was filmed with part-sound and talking sequences, opposite Buddy Rogers. After successfully making the transition to sound, she co-starred with Gary Cooper, Walter Huston and Richard Arlen in one of the earliest Western talkies, The Virginian, her first all-talkie feature. In it, she played a spirited frontier heroine, schoolmarm Molly Stark Wood, who was the love interest of the Virginian. Brian co-starred in several hits during the 1930s, including The Royal Family of Broadway, Paramount on Parade, and The Front Page. After her contract with Paramount ended in 1932, Brian decided to freelance, which was unusual in a period when multi-year contracts with one studio were common. That same year, she appeared on the vaudeville stage at New York's Palace Theatre. Also in the same year, she starred in Manhattan Tower. When World War II hit in 1941, Brian began traveling to entertain the troops, ending up spending most of the war years traveling the world with the U.S.O., and entertaining servicemen from the South Pacific to Europe, including Italy and North Africa.Flying to England on a troop shoot, Mary got caught in the Battle of the Bulge and spent the Christmas of 1944 with the soldiers fighting that battle. She appeared in only a handful of films thereafter. Her last performance on the silver screen was in Dragnet, a B-movie in which she played Anne Hogan opposite Henry Wilcoxon. Over the course of 22 years, Brian had appeared in more than 79 movies. She played in the stage comedy Mary Had a Little... in the 1951 in Melbourne, Australia, co-starring with John Hubbard. Like many "older" actresses, during the 1950s Brian created a career for herself in television. Perhaps her most notable role was playing the title character's mother in Meet Corliss Archer in 1954. She also dedicated much time to portrait painting after her acting years.

Known For: Acting

Born: Corsicana, Texas, USA, 1906-02-17

Died: 2002-12-30

No.	Year	Title	Role	Vote Average
1	1924	Peter Pan	Wendy Darling	69
2	1925	The Little French Girl	Alix Vervier	0
3	1925	The Air Mail	Minnie Wade	0
4	1925	The Street of Forgotten Men	Mary Vanhern	60
5	1925	He's a Prince!	Girl	0
6	1926	The Enchanted Hill	Hallie Purdy	0
7	1926	Behind the Front	Betty Bartlett-Cooper	60
8	1926	Paris at Midnight	Victorine Tallefer	90
9	1926	Brown of Harvard	Mary Abbot	56
10	1926	More Pay - Less Work	Betty Ricks	0
11	1926	Beau Geste	Isabel Rivers	60
12	1926	The Prince of Tempters	Mary	0
13	1926	Stepping Along	Molly Taylor	0
14	1927	Knockout Reilly	Mary Malone	0
15	1927	Running Wild	Elizabeth Finch	58
16	1927	Man Power	Alice Stoddard	0
17	1927	Shanghai Bound	Sheila	0
18	1927	Two Flaming Youths	Mary Gilfoil	0
19	1928	Under the Tonto Rim	Lucy Watson	0
20	1928	Partners in Crime	Marie Burke, The Cigarette Girl	20
21	1928	Harold Teen	Lillums Lovewell	70
22	1928	The Big Killing	Mary Beagle - Old Man Beagle's Daughter	0
23	1928	Forgotten Faces	Alice Deane	0
24	1928	Varsity	Fay	0
25	1928	Someone to Love	Joan Kendricks	0
26	1929	Black Waters	Eunice	0
27	1929	The Man I Love	Celia Fields	40
28	1929	The River of Romance	Lucy Jeffers	0
29	1929	The Virginian	Molly Stark Wood	58
30	1929	The Marriage Playground	Judith Wheater	58
31	1930	The Kibitzer	Josie Lazarus	47
32	1930	Burning Up	Ruth Morgan	35
33	1930	Only the Brave	Barbara Calhoun	0
34	1930	The Light of Western Stars	Ruth Hammond	28
35	1930	Paramount on Parade	Sweetheart (Dream Girl)	61
36	1930	The Social Lion	Cynthia Brown	60
37	1930	Only Saps Work	Barbara Tanner	55
38	1930	The Royal Family of Broadway	Gwen Cavendish	58
39	1931	Captain Applejack	Poppy Faire	65
40	1931	The Front Page	Peggy Grant	65
41	1931	Gun Smoke	Sue Vancey	55
42	1931	Homicide Squad	Millie	0
43	1931	The Runaround	Evelyn	70
44	1931	Hollywood Halfbacks		0
45	1932	It's Tough to Be Famous	Janet Porter McClenahan	57
46	1932	Blessed Event	Gladys Price	65
47	1932	The Unwritten Law	Ruth Evans	0
48	1932	Manhattan Tower	Mary Harper	59
49	1933	Hard to Handle	Ruth Waters	69
50	1933	Girl Missing	June Dale	51
51	1933	The World Gone Mad	Diane Cromwell	43
52	1933	Song of the Eagle	Elsa Kranzmeyer	0
53	1933	Moonlight and Pretzels	Sally Upton	0
54	1933	One Year Later	Molly Collins	63
55	1933	Fog	Mary Fulton	50
56	1934	Ever Since Eve	Elizabeth Vandergrift	0
57	1934	Monte Carlo Nights	Mary Vernon	59
58	1934	College Rhythm	Gloria Van Dayham	47
59	1934	Star Night at the Cocoanut Grove	Self	55
60	1935	Charlie Chan in Paris	Yvette Lamartine	65
61	1935	Man on the Flying Trapeze	Hope Wolfinger	59
62	1936	Spendthrift	Sally Barnaby	50
63	1936	The Amazing Quest of Ernest Bliss	Frances Clayton	69
64	1936	Once in a Million	Suzanne	50
65	1936	Three Married Men	Jennie Mullins	0
66	1936	Killer at Large	Linda Allen	60
67	1936	Two's Company	Julia Madison	0
68	1937	Navy Blues	Doris Kimbell	50
69	1937	Affairs of Cappy Ricks	Frances 'Frankie' Ricks	43
70	1941	I Was a Criminal	Frau Obermueller, the Mayor's Wife	0
71	1942	Jealous	dancer	0
72	1943	Calaboose	Doris Lane	0
73	1943	I Escaped from the Gestapo	Helen	55
74	1943	Danger! Women at Work	Pert	60
75	1947	Dragnet	Anne Hogan	60
76	2024	Noisy Silencers	(archive footage)	0

No.

Year

Title

Role

Vote Average

1924