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Mae Clarke

For those of a similar name, seeMay Clarke (disambiguation).

Mae Clarke(bornViolet Mary Klotz;August 16, 1910 – April 29, 1992) was an American actress. She is widely remembered for playing Henry Frankenstein's bride Elizabeth, who is chased byBoris KarloffinFrankenstein,and for being on the receiving end ofJames Cagney's halved grapefruit inThe Public Enemy.[3]Both films were released in 1931.

Mae Clarke
Clarke in 1932
Born
Violet Mary Klotz

(1910-08-16)August 16, 1910
Philadelphia,Pennsylvania, U.S.
DiedApril 29, 1992(1992-04-29)(aged 81)
Woodland Hills, California,U.S.
Resting placeValhalla Memorial Park Cemetery
Occupation(s)Actress, singer
Years active1926–1970
Spouses
​
​
(m.1928;div.1930)​
Stevens Bancroft
​
​
(m.1937;div.1940)​
  • Herbert Langdon
    (m. 1946; div. 1947 or 1948)[1][2]

Early life

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Mae Clarke was born in Philadelphia.[4]Her father was a theatre organist. She studied dancing as a child and began on stage invaudevilleand also worked in night clubs.[5]In 1922, at the age of 12, she marched in the Miss America Pageant Parade on the Atlantic City Boardwalk dressed as a lobster. She returned to the Boardwalk Parade again in 1940 as a featured guest, riding atop a white limousine convertible.[6]

Career

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Clarke started her professional career as a dancer in New York City, sharing a room withBarbara Stanwyck.[7]She starred in many films forUniversal Studios,including the original screen version ofThe Front Page(1931) and the first sound version ofFrankenstein(1931), withBoris Karloff.Clarke played the role of Elizabeth,Henry Frankenstein's fiancée, who is attacked by theMonster(Boris Karloff) on her wedding day.

The Public Enemy,released that same year, contained one of cinema's more famous (and frequently parodied) scenes, in which James Cagney pushes a half grapefruit into Clarke's face, then goes out to pick upJean Harlow.[8]

Cagney mashes a grapefruit into Mae Clarke's face in a famous scene from Cagney's breakthrough movie,The Public Enemy(1931)

The film was so popular that it ran 24 hours per day at a movie theatre inTimes Squareupon its initial release; four months after the premiere,The Hollywood Reporterinformed readers that Clarke's ex-husbandLew Briceclaimed to have seen the film more than 20 times (and at least twice per week) and that Brice "says he goes to see the scene wherein Mae Clarke gets hit in the eye with a grapefruit—and that it's a plazure!"[9][a]

Clarke appeared as Myra Deauville in the 1931pre-Codeversion ofWaterloo Bridge.In the film, she portrays a young American woman who is forced by circumstance into a life of prostitution in World War I London; both the film and Clarke's performance were well received by the critics.[3]

Frame from trailer forLady Killer(1933)

Clarke also appeared in the modestpre-CodeUniversalfilmNight World(1932), withLew Ayres,Boris Karloff,Hedda Hopper,andGeorge Raft.In 1933, she was the female lead inFast Workers,John Gilbert's last film as a contracted MGM star, andLady Killerwith James Cagney andMargaret Lindsay.The same year, she and actorPhillips Holmeswere in a single-car accident that left Clarke with a broken jaw and facial scarring.[12]Those injuries, however, did not end her film career, for she remained a leading lady for most of the 1930s. She was, though, increasingly cast in productions with lower budgets that lacked the status of her earlier films. Then, by 1940, Clarke slipped into supporting roles, although she did have a few last leading roles later in the decade, notably as the heroine in theRepublicserialKing of the Rocket Men(1949). In the 1950s and 1960s, Clarke played uncredited bit parts in several notable films, includingSingin' in the Rain,The Great Caruso,andThoroughly Modern Millie.[3]Her last screen appearance was in the 1970 filmWatermelon Man.[3]

Clarke with fellow actorJohn Beradinoin the daytime dramaGeneral Hospital(1963)

On television, Clarke appeared in many episodic series, includingGeneral Hospital,Perry MasonandBatman.Clarke retired in 1970 and taught drama.[3]

Personal life and death

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Clarke was married and divorced three times: toFanny Brice's brotherLew Brice,[13]Stevens Bancroft,[14]and Herbert Langdon.[15][16]All of the unions were childless.[17]

In later years Clarke resided at theMotion Picture & Television Country House and Hospitalin Woodland Hills, California.[18]Clarke died of cancer on April 29, 1992, at age 81.[12]She is buried inValhalla Memorial Park Cemetery.[12]

Selected filmography

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Features

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Short subjects

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  • Screen Snapshots(1932, Documentary short) - Herself
  • Screen Snapshots Series 16, No. 7(1937, Documentary short) - Herself

Notes

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  1. ^In an article published inVarietymore than two years after the film's release, Brice's total number of claimed viewings had somehow dwindled to eight.[10]In James Cagney's 1976 autobiography, he claims that Clarke's disgruntled ex—mistakenly dubbedMonte Brice—soon had the grapefruit scene timed so as to arrive shortly beforehand and depart immediately thereafter.[11]

References

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Bibliography

  • Cagney, James.Cagney by Cagney.New York: Doubleday, 1976.ISBN978-0385520263.
  • Clarke, Mae.Featured Player: An Oral Autobiography of Mae Clarke;Edited With An Introduction by James Curtis. Santa Barbara: Santa Teresa Press, 1996.ISBN978-0810830448.
  • Goldman, Herbert G.Fanny Brice.New York: Oxford University Press, 1992.ISBN978-0-19-535901-5.
  • Halliwell, Leslie.Halliwell's Filmgoers Companion(Halliwell's Who's Who in the Movies). New York: Collins Reference, 1997.ISBN978-0062734785.
  • Madsen, Axel.Stanwyck: A Biography.New York: HarperCollins, 1994.ISBN0-06-017997-X.

Footnotes

  1. ^Kilgallen, Dorothy (September 11, 1947)."Voice of Broadway".Mansfield News Journal.p. 9. "Mae Clarke, the actress who rose to fame when Jimmy Cagney massaged her face with a grapefruit, has Reno in the bean-o. Her husband is Herbert Langdon." Retrieved July 21, 2022.
  2. ^Clarke, Mae; Curtis, James, ed. (1996).Featured Player: An Oral Autobiography of Mae Clarke.Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press. p. 222.
    Clarke:"We divorced quickly because I added everything up and said, 'I've got to get out of this if I'm going to get on with responsibility for my own survival.' I couldn't carry him as a load, and he wasn't going to help me any. I had to go, and he didn't mind letting me go. By then, I guess I wasn't too pretty. And we hadn't even gotten to know each other. It was a fast marriage to begin with, an emotional thing at the time of the war."
    Curtis:"You got back into films in the spring of 1948."ISBN0-8108-3044-2.
  3. ^abcdeFolkart, Burt A.; Stassel, Stephanie (April 30, 1992)."Mae Clarke, Famed for Grapefruit Scene, Dies".Los Angeles Times.ISSN0458-3035.RetrievedJanuary 2,2018.
  4. ^Mae ClarkeatAllMovie
  5. ^Halliwell 1987, p. 130.
  6. ^Article by Mae Clark entitled The Return of "Miss Lobster of 1922" (1940)
  7. ^Madsen 1994, pp. 16–17, 20.
  8. ^Clarke 1996, p. back cover.
  9. ^"Chivalry".The Hollywood Reporter.August 26, 1931. p. 1.ProQuest2297350426.
  10. ^"Proxy Revenge".Variety.May 23, 1933. p. 7. Retrieved July 19, 2022.
  11. ^Cagney 1976,p. 45.
  12. ^abcMank, Gregory William (May 17, 2005).Women in Horror Films, 1930s.McFarland.ISBN9780786423347.
  13. ^Goldman1992, pp. 136-7, 144.
  14. ^"Mae Clarke Wins Divorce".New York Herald Tribune.January 6, 1940.RetrievedNovember 8,2018.
  15. ^Clarke 1996,p. 221.
  16. ^"Obituary".Variety.May 2, 1992.RetrievedNovember 8,2018.
  17. ^Mank, Gregory William (2014).The Very Witching Time of Night: Dark Alleys of Classic Horror Cinema.McFarland. p. 371.ISBN9780786449552.
  18. ^Green, Jesse; Mark, Mary Ellen (March 1991)."You Must Remember This".Premiere.

Further reading

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