© Mark Ollig
During the 1920s, silent film actresses like Lillian Gish, Mary Pickford, and Clara Bow graced the silver screen.
My favorite, Louise Brooks, was born Mary Louise Brooks Nov. 14, 1906, in Cherryvale, KS.
During childhood, she was known as “Brooksie” and lived across the street from Vivian Roberta Jones, also born in Cherryvale, who became known as Vivian Vance and played Ethel Mertz on the TV show “I Love Lucy.”
Louise’s family relocated to Wichita, KS, when she was 13.
From 1922 to 1923, she toured with the Denishawn School of Dancing, with stops in Minnesota.
In 1924, Louise joined George White’s Scandals on Broadway in New York City as a chorus member and later became a specialty dancer with the Ziegfeld Follies.
In 1925, she inked a five-year acting agreement with Paramount Pictures.
Louise Brooks made her first uncredited appearance in the silent film “The Street of Forgotten Men” (1925), produced at Paramount’s Astoria Studios in Queens, NY.
Her first credited acting role was in “The American Venus” (1926), followed by her first leading role in “A Social Celebrity” (1926).
Some of Brook’s other silent films include: “It’s the Old Army Game” (1926) with W.C. Fields, “Love ‘Em and Leave ‘Em” (1926), “Now We’re in the Air” (1927), “Rolled Stockings” (1927), “Beggars of Life” (1928), and “A Girl in Every Port” (1928).
With her iconic bob hairstyle, Louise Brooks was an enigmatic flapper figure who left an indelible mark on the silver screen.
She exemplified 1920s flapper culture by challenging societal norms and celebrating her individuality by embracing a lifestyle viewed at the time as undisciplined and rebellious.
Louise’s natural beauty and acting talent allowed her to bring to life the emotions of her onscreen characters in a way that few others of the silent film era could.
Popular movie entertainment magazines of the era, like Photoplay, regularly featured Louise in their articles and advertisements.
Her compelling performance in “A Girl in Every Port” drew the interest of the renowned German film director and screenwriter Georg Wilhelm (G.W.) Pabst.
Pabst was searching for an actress to star as Lulu in his upcoming film “Pandora’s Box” and strongly desired to cast Louise Brooks in the role.
In mid-October of 1928, she completed filming “The Canary Murder Case,” another silent film for Paramount Pictures.
When Louise entered contract negotiations with Paramount Pictures, they said she would not receive a salary increase, offering the option of continuing with her current salary or resigning.
“Refusing to take what amounted to a cut, I quit Paramount,” Louise later wrote.
When she later learned of Pabst’s desire to cast her as Lulu, she sent a cablegram message accepting his offer to travel to Berlin, Germany, and star in his film.
Louise came close to losing the part, as German actress Marlene Dietrich was with Pabst in his Berlin office considering a contract to play Lulu just as Brooks’ cablegram arrived.
After Pabst read the cablegram message, he chose Louise Brooks to play Lulu.
Louise stayed at the Eden Hotel in Berlin from late October to November 1928 while filming “Pandora’s Box.”
I learned the film version of “Pandora’s Box” that premiered in the US in December of 1929 had considerable censorship edits.
Back in Hollywood, Paramount Pictures decided to convert their silent movie “The Canary Murder Case” into a talkie.
After Louise returned to New York, Paramount Pictures called and ordered her to “get on the train at once for Hollywood” to record the voice for Margaret O’Dell, the character Louise played in the movie.
She refused.
Even after Paramount offered her a contract with more money, Louise still refused, so Paramount hired Margaret Livingston to do the voice dubbing.
Louise later wrote that Paramount was so angry they spread the story they did not use her voice “because I was no good in talkies.”
In Europe, during June and July of 1929, Louise filmed “Diary of a Lost Girl,” released in September of the same year.
During August and September 1929, around Paris, France, she filmed “Prix de Beauté” (Beauty Prize), directed by Augusto Genina and co-written by Pabst.
In December 1929, she returned to the US, which had already experienced the stock market’s collapse, leading to the crash on Wall Street.
The following financial depression caused economic suffering by millions, redirected fashion trends, and caused the flapper style to fall out of favor.
In Hollywood, Louise had refused an offer from Warner Brothers Pictures to star alongside James Cagney in “The Public Enemy” (1931); the part instead went to Jean Harlow.
In April 1935, Louise Brooks and Hungarian partner Dario Borzani appeared in a ballroom dance act at the Capital Theatre in New York City.
In October 1935, she auditioned for a role in “Dancing Feet,” a film by Republic Pictures.
“The studio gave the part I had tested for to a girl who couldn’t dance,” Louise wrote in 1982.
Louise Brooks’ 25th and final movie, “Overland Stage Raiders” (1938), featured a young actor named John Wayne. She spoke in this movie and has a fine recording voice.
In 1940, she moved to Wichita, where she established a dance studio and wrote “The Fundamentals of Good Ballroom Dancing” booklet.
Louise left for New York in 1943 and worked various jobs, including teaching dance, writing columns, radio work, and sales at Saks Fifth Avenue.
In the mid-1950s, European film enthusiasts showed renewed interest in the movies Louise Brooks had acted in.
In 1956, James Card, a film curator and founder of the Motion Pictures Collection at the George Eastman House in Rochester, NY, convinced Louise to move to Rochester to, “Study old films and write bits about my rediscovered past,” she would later pen in her 1982 book, “Lulu in Hollywood,” a revealing autobiography of her personal and onscreen life.
Her character, Lulu, in “Pandora’s Box,” inspired the book’s title, and I am fortunate to own a first-edition copy, along with seven of her movies and other memorabilia.
Louise Brooks, a gifted dancer, actress, and author, passed away Aug. 8, 1985, in Rochester at 78.
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| Photograph of Louise Brooks in New York City (photo taken in 1926 by Edward Thayer Monroe) |