Myrna Loy
Myrna Loy (
August 2,
1905 â€"
December 14,
1993) was an
American motion picture actress. Perhaps her most famous role was as
Nora Charles, wife of detective Nick Charles (
William Powell), in
The Thin Man series of madcap detective films. Loy was often
typecast as a pert, perfect wife, and was known for her charm, grace and elegance.
Born
Myrna Adele Williams in
Radersburg (near
Helena, Montana), the daughter of a rancher, David Franklin Williams, whose roots were in
Glamorgan,
Wales, and his wife, Adella. Loy's first name came from a train station whose name her father admired.
Myrna Williams made her stage debut at age 12 in Helena's Marlow Theater in a dance she choreographed based on "The Blue Bird" from the
Rose Dream Operetta. She moved to
Los Angeles, California when she was 12, after her father's death, and attended the Westlake School for Girls. At the age of 15 she began appearing in local stage productions. She went to
Venice High School, in
Venice, California, and in 1921, when she was 16, she posed for Harry Winebrenner's semi-nude statue, titled
Spiritual, which remained in front of Venice High School throughout the 20th Century and can be seen in the opening scenes of the film
Grease (1978). The
Spiritual statue was vandalized in recent years, and a restoration is planned.
Natacha Rambova, the second wife of
Rudolph Valentino, arranged a screen test for her which she failed, but she persevered, and in
1925 appeared in the Rambova penned movie
What Price Beauty? opposite Rambova and
Nita Naldi. Her silent film roles were mainly those of
vampish exotic women. For a few years she struggled to overcome this stereotype with many producers and directors believing that while she was perfect as
femme fatales, she was capable of little more. During her nine-year struggle to establish herself, she appeared in nearly 80 films.
 |
Myrna Loy in the 1920s |
Her breakthrough occurred in
1934 with two very successful films. The first was
Manhattan Melodrama with
Clark Gable and
William Powell. Her performance in
The Thin Man later the same year as
William Powell's sophisticated, witty wife Nora Charles made her a star. She and Powell proved to be a popular couple and appeared in 14 films together, the most prolific onscreen pairing in
Hollywood history.
In 1936, she was voted "Queen of Hollywood" (in a contest which also voted
Clark Gable "King") and was considered to epitomise the height of glamour and sophistication. During this period she was one of Hollywood's busiest and highest paid actresses.
With the outbreak of
World War II she all but abandoned her acting career to focus on the war effort and worked closely with the
Red Cross. She was fiercely outspoken against
Adolf Hitler and her name appeared on his "blacklist". She helped run a Naval Auxiliary
Canteen and toured frequently to raise funds.
She returned to films with
The Best Years Of Our Lives in
1946 and played the wife of returning serviceman
Fredric March. In later years Loy would recall this film as her proudest acting achievement. It also allowed Loy to make a film that demonstrated her social conscience. During her career she had championed the rights of black actors and characters to be depicted with dignity on film.
In later life she assumed a more influential role as Co-Chairman of the Advisory Council of the National Committee Against Discrimination in Housing. From 1949 until 1954 she also worked for
UNESCO; she also was an active member of the Democratic Party. Her film career continued sporadically (in 1960 she appeared in
Midnight Lace and
From the Terrace, and was not in another until 1969 in
The April Fools) and she also returned to the stage making her Broadway debut in a short-lived 1973 revival of
Clare Booth Luce's
The Women. Her autobiography
Myrna Loy: Being and Becoming was published in 1987.
In 1965 she won the
Sarah Siddons Award for her work in
Chicago theatre. She also received a
Lifetime Achievement Award from the
Kennedy Center in 1988.
Although Loy was never nominated for an
Academy Award for any single performance, she received an
Academy Honorary Award in
1991, after an intensive lobbying effort and letter-writing campaign spearheaded by
screenwriter Michael Russnow of
West Hollywood. Loy won the award "for her career achievement", and she accepted via camera from her New York home, though she sounded somewhat "slurry" by those who recall the broadcast. This was possibly due to medications that Loy was supposedly taking at the time. Upon her acceptance, Loy thanked "everyone" sincerely and graciously with exactly a nine-word speech, saying: "You've made me very happy. Thank you very much." It would be her last public appearance in any medium.
After apparently successfully battling
breast cancer and enduring two
mastectomies, Loy eventually died during surgery, the exact nature of which was never specified in the reports of her death (although the
IMDB lists it as cancer surgery) in
New York City at the age of 88.
Her remains were cremated and the ashes interred at Forestvale Cemetery, in the capital city of
Helena, which is near her birthplace of
Radersburg, in her beloved home state, and far from the pains of
Los Angeles and
NYC.
On
August 2,
2005, the centenary of Loy's birth,
Warner Home Video released the six films from
The Thin Man series, on
DVD as a boxed set.
Loy was married four times:
*Arthur Hornblow, Jr. (1936-1942), producer
*John Hertz Jr. of the rent-a-car family (1942-1944)
*Gene Markey (1946-1950), producer
*Howland H. Sergeant (1951-1960),
UNESCO delegate
Loy had no children of her own, though it is documented that she was very close to the children of her first husband, Arthur Hornblow. "Some perfect wife I am," she said, referring to her typecasting. "I've been married four times, divorced four times, have no children, and can't boil an egg."
She has a star on the
Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6685 Hollywood Blvd.
*
What Price Beauty? (1925)
*
The Wanderer (1925)
*
Pretty Ladies (1925)
*
Sporting Life (1925)
*
Ben-Hur (1925)
*
The Caveman (1926)
*
The Love Toy (1926)
*
Why Girls Go Back Home (1926)
*
The Gilded Highway (1926)
*
Exquisite Sinner (1926)
*
So This Is Paris (1926)
*
Don Juan (1926)
*
Across the Pacific (1926)
*
The Third Degree (1926)
*
Finger Prints (1927)
*
When a Man Loves (1927)
*
Bitter Apples (1927)
*
The Climbers (1927)
*
Simple Sis (1927)
*
The Heart of Maryland (1927)
*
A Sailor's Sweetheart (1927)
*
The Jazz Singer (1927)
*
The Girl from Chicago (1927)
*
If I Were Single (1927)
*
Ham and Eggs at the Front (1927)
*
Beware of Married Men (1928)
*
A Girl in Every Port (1928)
*
Turn Back the Hours (1928)
*
The Crimson City (1928)
*
Pay as You Enter (1928)
*
State Street Sadie (1928)
*
The Midnight Taxi (1928)
*
Fancy Baggage (1929)
*
Hardboiled Rose (1929)
*
The Desert Song (1929)
*
The Black Watch (1929)
*
The Squall (1929)
*
Noah's Ark (1929)
*
The Great Divide (1929)
*
Evidence (1929)
*
The Show of Shows (1929)
*
Cameo Kirby (1930)
*
Isle of Escape (1930)
*
Under a Texas Moon (1930)
*
Cock o' the Walk (1930)
*
Bride of the Regiment (1930)
*
The Last of the Duanes (1930)
*
The Jazz Cinderella (1930)
*
The Bad Man (1930)
*
Renegades (1930)
*
Rogue of the Rio Grande (1930)
*
The Truth About Youth (1930)
*
The Devil to Pay! (1930)
*
The Naughty Flirt (1931)
*
Body and Soul (1931)
*
A Connecticut Yankee (1931)
*
Hush Money (1931)
*
Transatlantic (1931)
*
Rebound (1931)
*
Skyline (1931)
*
Consolation Marriage (1931)
*
Arrowsmith (1931)
*
Emma (1932)
*
Vanity Fair (1932)
*
The Wet Parade (1932)
*
The Woman in Room 13 (1932)
*
New Morals for Old (1932)
*
Love Me Tonight (1932)
*
Thirteen Women (1932)
*
The Mask of Fu Manchu (1932)
*
The Animal Kingdom (1932)
*
Topaze (1933)
*
Scarlet River (1933) (cameo)
*
The Barbarian (1933)
*
The Prizefighter and the Lady (1933)
*
When Ladies Meet (1933)
*
Penthouse (1933)
*
Night Flight (1933)
*
Men in White (1934)
*
Manhattan Melodrama (1934)
*
The Thin Man (1934)
*
Stamboul Quest (1934)
*
Evelyn Prentice (1934)
*
Broadway Bill (1934)
*
Wings in the Dark (1935)
*
Whipsaw (1935)
*
Wife vs. Secretary (1936)
*
Petticoat Fever (1936)
*
The Great Ziegfeld (1936)
*
To Mary - with Love (1936)
*
Libeled Lady (1936)
*
After the Thin Man (1936)
*
Parnell (1937)
*
Double Wedding (1937)
*
Test Pilot (1938)
*
Man-Proof (1938)
*
Too Hot to Handle (1938)
*
Verdensberomtheder i Kobenhavn (1939) (documentary)
*
Lucky Night (1939)
*
The Rains Came (1939)
*
Another Thin Man (1939)
*
Northward, Ho! (1940) (short subject)
*
I Love You Again (1940)
*
Third Finger, Left Hand (1940)
*
Love Crazy (1941)
*
Shadow of the Thin Man (1941)
*
Show Business at War (1943) (short subject)
*
The Thin Man Goes Home (1945)
*
So Goes My Love (1946)
*
The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
*
The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer (1947)
*
Song of the Thin Man (1947)
*
The Senator Was Indiscreet (1947)
*
Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House (1948)
*
The Red Pony (1949)
*
That Dangerous Age (1949)
*
Cheaper by the Dozen (1950)
*
Belles on Their Toes (1952)
*
The Ambassador's Daughter (1956)
*
Lonelyhearts (1958)
*
From the Terrace (1960)
*
Midnight Lace (1960)
*
The April Fools (1969)
*
Airport 1975 (1974)
*
It Happened at Lakewood Manor (1977)
*
The End (1978)
*
Just Tell Me What You Want (1980)
*
Meet Me in St. Louis (1959)
*
Death Takes a Holiday (1971)
*
Do Not Fold, Spindle, or Mutilate (1971)
*
Columbo: Étude in Black (1972)
*
The Couple Takes a Wife (1972)
*
Indict and Convict (1974)
*
The Elevator (1974)
*
Summer Solstice (1981)
Note: Loy also appeared in various episodes over the years of
Family Affair,
The Virginian, and
Love, Sydney.*
Myrna Loy Centre", Helena, Montana, official site*
Myrna Loy's Gravesite*
Statue of Myrna Loy: "Venice Nymph Emerges as a Real Team Player"
