Joan Rice (1930 - 1997)

Joan Rice (3 February 1930 – 1 January 1997) was a British film actress. One of four sisters from a broken home, she spent eight years in a convent orphanage in Nottingham. Upon arriving in London she first took a job as a waitress. After being crowned “Miss Nippy” in an in-house beauty contest, she was […]

Florence Rice (1907 - 1974)

Florence Rice (February 14, 1907 – February 23, 1974) was an American film actress. Florence Rice was born in Cleveland, Ohio, the daughter of Grantland Rice and Fannie Katherine Hollis, who became an actress during the early 1930s and after several Broadway roles, eventually made her way to Hollywood where she acted in almost fifty films […]

Candice Rialson (1951 - 2006)

Candice Ann Rialson (December 18, 1951 – March 31, 2006), also known as Candy Rialson, was an American actress known for her starring role in Hollywood Boulevard (1976). Candice Rialson was born in Santa Monica, California, won Miss Hermosa Beach aged 18 and worked as a go-go dancer. She worked in television and found herself appearing in […]

Vera Reynolds (1899 - 1962)

Vera Reynolds (November 25, 1899 – April 22, 1962) was an American film actress. Born in Richmond, Virginia in 1899, she started out as a dancer, worked as one of the Sennett Bathing Beauties, and became a leading lady in silent motion pictures. Among her film credits are starring roles in Sam Wood’s Prodigal Daughters (1923), […]

Dorothy Revier (1904 - 1993)

Dorothy Revier (April 18, 1904 – November 19, 1993) was an American actress. She was educated in the public schools of Oakland before going to New York City to study classical dancing. Later she went to Paris, France, to study and was discovered by a talent agent while working in a cabaret. She made her film debut […]

Estelle Reiner (1914 - 2008)

Estelle Reiner was born Estelle Lebost in The Bronx, New York City, and graduated from James Monroe High School. She was a visual artist and met her future husband, Carl Reiner, while she was working in the Catskills, designing stage sets for hotel shows. She married Reiner in 1943, and had three children Rob, Lucas […]

Ada Rehan (1859 - 1916)

Ada Rehan (April 22, 1859 – January 8, 1916) was an Irish born American actress. Ada Rehan was born as Delia Crehan in County Limerick, Ireland, and brought to the United States at about the age of six years. Her date of birth was later disputed by a critic who wrote in the Boston Globe on […]

Florence Reed (1883 - 1967)

Florence Reed (January 10, 1883 – November 21, 1967) was a stage and film actress. She is remembered for several outstanding stage productions, including The Shanghai Gesture, The Lullaby, The Yellow Ticket and The Wanderer. Her best remembered movie role was as Miss Havisham in the 1934 production of Great Expectations. In this version, however, […]

Joyce Redman (1915 - 2012)

Joyce Redman was born in Northumberland and grew up in County Mayo, Ireland. She was born into an Anglo-Irish family and educated by a private governess in Ireland, along with her three sisters. She trained in acting at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. Her acting roles were primarily in the theatre and in […]

Marvel Rea (1901 - 1937)

Marvel Rea was in Her Screen Idol (1918) with Ford Sterling and Louise Fazenda. Rea played the character, The Screen Idol’s Heroine. The movie was a humorous satire on the matinee idol of motion pictures. Sennett displayed the technique of illustrating a play within a play in this production. Rea was in movies from 1917 through […]

Sue Randall (1935 - 1984)

Philadelphia-born Sue Randall’s debut on the small screen came in the 1955 episode “Golden Victory” of the series Star Tonight. She later appeared as one of the employees in the Reference Department in the 1957 film Desk Set with Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn. She was cast in the ABC western series The Rebel as […]

Rebel Randall (1922 - 2010)

Rebel Randall (born Alaine Charlotte Dorothy Brandes (January 22, 1922 – July 22, 2010), was an American film actress and radio personality. She appeared in approximately 50 films between 1940 and 1956. She was a popular G.I. pin-up girl during the 1940s and did several layouts, including one for Esquire magazine. She did a stint as […]

Franca Rame (1929 - 2013)

Franca Rame was born in Parabiago, Lombardy, in 1929, into a family with a long theatre tradition. She made her theatrical debut in 1951. Shortly thereafter, she met Dario Fo, whom she married in 1954. Their son, Jacopo was born on 31 March 1955. In 1958, she co-founded the Dario Fo–Franca Rame Theatre Company in […]

Marjorie Rambeau (1889 - 1970)

Marjorie Rambeau was born in San Francisco to Marcel and Lilian Garlinda (née Kindelberger) Rambeau. Her parents separated when she was a child. She and her mother went to Nome, Alaska where young Marjorie dressed as a boy, sang and played the banjo in saloons and music halls. Her mother insisted she dress as a […]

Vera Ralston (1919 - 2003)

Vera Ralston was born Věra Helena Hrubá to a wealthy jeweler in Prague, Czechoslovakia. Her age was uncertain; Ralston at various times gave 1919, 1920, 1921, and 1923 as her year of birth. Her brother was Rudy Ralston, who later became a film producer in the United States. As a figure skater, she represented Czechoslovakia in […]

Marcia Ralston (1906 - 1988)

Marcia Ralston (19 September 1906 – 23 November 1988) was an Australian born actress who appeared in Hollywood films in the 1930s and 1940s. She was married to Phil Harris between 1927 and 1940. Born Marie Mascotte Ralston, her father was well known Australian singer and actor John Ralston. She attended Bethlehem College, Ashfield and won […]

Jobyna Ralston (1899 - 1967)

Jobyna Ralston was born Jobyna Lancaster Raulston in South Pittsburg, Tennessee in 1899 to parents who named her after famed entertainer of the time, Jobyna Howland. Ralston’s mother, a portrait photographer, carefully groomed her daughter for a show business career. At the age of nine she gave her first stage performance as Cinderella during the grand […]

Jessie Ralph (1864 - 1944)

Jessie Ralph (November 5, 1864 – May 30, 1944) was an American stage and screen actress, best known for her matronly roles in many classic motion pictures. She was routinely cast as kindly grandmothers, sagacious maids, and stern but loving governesses. She was born Jessie Ralph Chambers in Gloucester, Massachusetts, in 1864. She made her acting debut […]

Ella Raines (1920 - 1988)

Ella Raines born Ella Wallace Raubes near Snoqualmie Falls, Washington, Ella Raines studied drama at the University of Washington and was appearing in a play there when she was seen by Howard Hawks. She became the first actor signed to the new production company he had formed with the actor Charles Boyer, “B-H Productions”, and […]

Mady Rahl (1915 - 2009)

Mady Rahl (January 3, 1915 – August 29, 2009) was a German stage and film actress.  In a career stretching over 70 years she appeared in around 120 German movies but was for a time tainted by her association with the Nazi High Command. Born Edith Gertrud Meta Raschke in Neukölln, now part of Berlin, Rahl […]

Deborah Raffin (1953 - 2012)

Deborah Raffin appeared in several 1970s Hollywood films. She co-starred with Joseph Bottoms in the Gregory Peck-produced film The Dove (1974). Her 1976 television movie Nightmare in Badham County became a theatrical hit in mainland China, making Raffin a star there and leading to her later becoming the first Western actress ever to undertake a […]

Mae Questel (1908 - 1998)

Mae Questel was born as Mae Kwestel in the Bronx New York City to Simon and Freida Kwestel, she attended Morris High School and studied acting at the American Theatre Wing and with the Theatre Guild. Although she wanted to be an entertainer, her parents, who were Orthodox Jews, actively discouraged her from doing so, […]

Edna Purviance (1895 - 1958)

Edna Purviance was born in Paradise Valley, Nevada, to Louis and Madison Gates Purviance. When she was three, the family moved to Lovelock, Nevada, where they assumed ownership of a hotel. Her parents divorced in 1902, and her mother later married Robert Nurnberger, a German plumber. Growing up, Purviance was a talented pianist. She left Lovelock […]

Irene Purcell (1896 - 1972)

Irene Purcell appeared opposite William Haines in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s romantic comedy film Just a Gigolo (1931), directed by Jack Conway and adapted from the 1930 play Dancing Partner, by David Belasco. The same year, she played the lead role in Sam Wood’s romantic comedy The Man in Possession, adapted from H. M. Harwood’s play of the […]

Dorothy Provine (1935 - 2010)

Dorothy Provine was born in Deadwood in southwestern South Dakota, to William and Irene Provine. She attended the University of Washington at Seattle, Washington, where she majored in drama. In Washington, she handed out prizes for a quiz program on a local television station until she was hired by Warner Bros. at $500 per week. […]

Yvonne Printemps (1894 - 1977)

Yvonne Printemps was born in Ermont, a northern suburb of Paris, as Yvonne Wigniolle (some sources give Wignolle or Wigniole). Despite the misgivings of what she later described as “my highly bourgeois family”, she made her debut as a performer at the age of 12 in a revue at La Cigale in Paris. The music […]

Josephine Premice (1926 - 2001)

Josephine Premice was born in Brooklyn, New York, the daughter of Thelomaine and Lucas Premice. Her parents were part of the Haitian aristocracy who fled Haiti after her father, Lucas Premice, who allegedly had claim to the title Count de Brodequin, was part of a failed rebellion to try to overthrow the dictator of the […]

June Preisser (1920 - 1984)

Born in New Orleans, Louisiana, June Preisser was one of six children, and was an underweight baby. Her parents sent her to an athletic club at an early age, in an attempt to build her strength. There she, and her sister Cherry, learned acrobatics. Their mother was keen to have them follow a career in […]

Evelyn Preer (1896 - 1932)

Evelyn Preer began her performance career in early vaudeville and minstrel shows. She changed her surname to Preer. Her first film role was in Oscar Micheaux’s 1919 debut film The Homesteader, when she was 23. Micheaux promoted Preer as his leading actress with a steady tour of personal appearances and a publicity campaign. Her most well-known […]

Hana Pravda (1916 - 2008)

Hana Pravda (born Hana Becková on 29 January 1916 Prague − 22 May 2008 Oxford) was a Czechoslovakian-born British actress. Pravda trained in Leningrad in 1936 under Alexei Dikii.  She made her screen debut as Hana Beck at age seventeen in “Mariika the Unfaithful” (1934), which was soon followed by leading roles in several Czechoslovakian movies. On […]