Mary Miles Minter(1902-1984)
- Actress
Little Mary Miles Minter was a child star who was dominated by her
mother. At the age of 5 she first appeared on the stage in the play
"Cameo Kirby". From that time on she worked steadily without a single
vacation. Her greatest stage success was in "The Littlest Rebel", with
William Farnum and
Dustin Farnum. In 1911, at the age of 9, a
New York paper described her as " . . . a ragged, straight-haired,
woman-faced little one". She continued on the stage until 1915, when
she started her film career. She was being groomed as a
Mary Pickford star - a child of innocence.
Her early pictures carried this theme with such titles as
Lovely Mary (1916),
L'enfant du péché (1916) and
Dimples (1916). Mary was described by the
press as "of the screen as a sweet, pretty little girl with an
abundance of blonde curls, a picture actress slightly bigger than a
faint recollection, a little queen with delicate features and endearing
young charms". She later worked for
Adolph Zukor at Realart Pictures and one of
her favorite directors was
William Desmond Taylor. While at
Realart Mary made a number of films including
Anne of Green Gables (1919),
Le Loupiot (1920),
L'enfant de la tempête (1920) and
L'indésirable (1921). Her
salary, which started at $150 per week in 1915, increased to $2250 per
week. At that time she also became involved with Taylor, but it is not
known whether Taylor was looking out for his biggest star or if there
was any real romance.
Then everything crumbled. On February 1, 1922, Taylor was shot to death in his Hollywood bungalow. His unsolved murder was one of Hollywood's major scandals, coming at the same time as the Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle incident. Though she was never considered a suspect in the murder, when the public learned of Mary's involvement with a man who had questionable dealings with women and was more than twice her age, they boycotted her films. The discovery of her belongings in Taylor's bungalow effectually killed her career in pictures. Mary was so weak from grief that she was barricaded in her home for a month. By the next year she had moved out of the home she shared with her mother and was out of pictures forever.
Then everything crumbled. On February 1, 1922, Taylor was shot to death in his Hollywood bungalow. His unsolved murder was one of Hollywood's major scandals, coming at the same time as the Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle incident. Though she was never considered a suspect in the murder, when the public learned of Mary's involvement with a man who had questionable dealings with women and was more than twice her age, they boycotted her films. The discovery of her belongings in Taylor's bungalow effectually killed her career in pictures. Mary was so weak from grief that she was barricaded in her home for a month. By the next year she had moved out of the home she shared with her mother and was out of pictures forever.
