Maria Montez

Montez was born María África Gracia Vidal (some sources cite María Antonia Gracia Vidal de Santo Silas or María África Antonia Gracia Vidal de Santo Silas as her birth name) in Barahona, Dominican Republic.[3] Educated at the Sacred Heart Convent in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Spain, she was the second[4] of ten children (Isidoro Gracia Vidal, Aquilino Gracia Vidal[5]) born to Isidoro Gracia y García,[6][7] a Spaniard, from Garafía,[8][4] La Palma, Canary Islands, Spain and Regla María Teresa Vidal y Recio, a Dominican of Criollo descent, although it is unclear how many survived into adulthood.

In the mid-1930s, her father was appointed to the Spanish consulship in Belfast, Northern Ireland where the family moved. It was there that Montez met her first husband, William G. McFeeters, whom she married at age 17.[1]

"A finales de 1929, con 17 años, su padre la internó en un colegio de religiosas de Tenerife con la intención de que olvidara a un cincuentón del que se había enamorado. Pero en octubre de 1930, la actriz regresó a su tierra natal y reanudó sus relaciones con el banquero irlandés William G. MacFeeters, con el que terminaría casándose en 1932."[2]

Montez learned English and was educated at a Catholic convent school in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Spain.[9]

Maria Montez in Magazine ad.

On 3 July 1939, Montez arrived in New York.[9] Her first job, for $50, was for the cover of a magazine.[9]

Montez was spotted by a film talent scout in New York. Her first film was Boss of Bullion City (1940), a Johnny Mack Brown western produced by Universal Pictures. This was the first film where she played a leading role and the only role where she speaks some Spanish.

Her next film role was in The Invisible Woman (1940). It was made for Universal Pictures, who signed her to a long-term contract starting at $150 a week.[10]

She had small decorative roles in two films with the comedy team of Richard Arlen and Andy Devine, Lucky Devils and Raiders of the Desert; the Los Angeles Times said she "was attractive as the oasis charmer" in the latter.[11] She also appeared in Moonlight in Hawaii and Bombay Clipper. She had a small part in That Night in Rio (1941), made at 20th Century Fox.

Universal did not have a "glamour girl" like other studios, an equivalent to Hedy Lamarr (MGM), Dorothy Lamour (Paramount), Betty Grable (20th Century Fox), Rita Hayworth (Columbia), or Ann Sheridan (Warner Bros). They decided to groom Maria Montez to take on this role, and she received a lot of publicity.[12] Montez was also a keen self-promoter.[13][14] In the words of The Los Angeles Times "she borrowed an old but sure-fire technique to get ahead in the movies. She acted like a movie star. She leaned on the vampish tradition set up by Nazimova and Theda Bara... She went in heavily for astrology. Her name became synonymous with exotic enchantresses in sheer harem pantaloons."[15] She took on a "star" pose in her private life. One newspaper called her "the best commissary actress in town... In the studio cafe, Maria puts on a real show. Always Maria makes an entrance."[10]

In June 1941 Montez's contract with Universal was renewed.[16] She graduated to leading parts with South of Tahiti, co-starring Brian Donlevy. She also replaced Peggy Moran in the title role of The Mystery of Marie Roget (1942).[17] Public response to South of Tahiti was enthusiastic enough for the studio to cast Montez in her first starring part, Arabian Nights. She claimed in 1942 she was making $250 a week.[12]

Arabian Nights and stardom

Maria Montez.

Arabian Nights was a prestigious production for Universal, its first shot in three-strip Technicolor, produced by Walter Wanger and starring Montez, Jon Hall, and Sabu. The resulting film was a big hit and established Montez as a star.

Montez wanted to portray Cleopatra,[18] but instead Universal reunited her with Hall and Sabu in White Savage (1943) (where Montez was upped from second-billing to top-billing). They went on to make a third film, Cobra Woman (1944). All three were audience favorites.

In 1943 Montez was awarded two medals from the Dominican government for her efforts in promoting friendly relations between the US and her native land.[19]

Universal wanted three more films starring Montez, Hall, and Sabu. Sabu, however, was drafted into the US Army and so was replaced by Turhan Bey in Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves (1944). Hall, Montez, and Bey were meant to reunite in Gypsy Wildcat (1944), but Bey was required on another film and ended up being replaced by Peter Coe. Sudan (1945) starred Montez, Hall, and Bey, with Bey as Montez's romantic interest this time.

Flame of Stamboul was another proposed Hall-Bey-Montez film but it was postponed.[20] Universal also announced that Montez would play Elisabeth of Austria in The Golden Fleece, based on a story by Bertita Harding, but it was never made.[21] She did appear in Follow the Boys, Universal's all-star musical, and Bowery to Broadway.

In 1944 Montez said that the secret to her success was that she was "sexy but sweet...I am very easy to get along with. I am very nice. I have changed a lot during the last year. I have outgrown my old publicity. I used to say and do things to shock people. That was how I became famous. But now it is different. First the public likes you because you're spectacular. But after it thinks you are a star it wants you to be nice. Now I am a star, I am nice."[22]

Freelance career

Maria Montez in Argentine magazine.

In 1947 Hedda Hopper announced Montez and her husband would make The Red Feather about Jean Lafitte.[31] She was also announced for Queen of Hearts, this time not the Elizabeth of Austria project but an adaptation of a European play by Louis Verneuil, Cousin from Warsaw.[32] Neither film was made.

Siren of Atlantis ended up requiring re-shoots and was not fully released until 1949. It proved unsuccessful at the box office in the US (although it performed respectfully in France and other parts of Europe). Montez later successfully sued the producer for $38,000 in unpaid contractual funds.[33]

Montez endorsed Max Factor Cosmetics, Jergens Lotion, Deltah Pearls,[34][35] Lux Soap, and Woodbury Powder.[36][37][38][39][40]

Montez was married twice. Her first marriage was to William Gourley Macfeeters,[46][47][48][49] the agent for Barahona of the First National City Bank of New York,[50] and a banker who had served in the British Army.[51] They married 28 November 1932,[52] when Montez was 20 years old, they lived in Barahona, Dominican Republic,[53] and divorced in 1939.[1] Her second husband Jean-Pierre Aumont described him as "an Irishman who was naive enough to think he could lock her up in some frosty castle."[54] For more than a year, Montez was reportedly engaged to Claude Strickland, a flight officer with the RAF whom she met in New York.[55] However, it was later revealed that this was just a publicity stunt.[56]

While working in Hollywood, Montez met French actor Jean-Pierre Aumont. Aumont later wrote "to say that between us it was love at first sight would be an understatement".[54] They married on 14 July 1943 at Montez's home in Beverly Hills.[57] Charles Boyer was Aumont's best man and Jannine Crispin was Montez's matron of honour.[58] According to Aumont "it was a strange house. You didn't answer the phone or read the mail; the doors were always open. Diamonds were left around like ashtrays. Lives of the Saints lay between two issues of movie magazines. An astrologer, a physical culture expert, a priest, a Chinese cook, and two Hungarian masseurs were part of the furnishings. During her massage sessions, Montez granted audiences."[54]

Aumont had to leave a few days after wedding Montez to serve in the Free French Forces which were fighting against Nazi Germany in the European Theatre of World War II. At the end of World War II, the couple had a daughter, Maria Christina (also known as Tina Aumont), born in Hollywood on 14 February 1946.[1] In 1949 Aumont announced that they would get divorced but they remained together until Montez's death.[59]

The 39-year-old Montez died in Suresnes, France, on 7 September 1951 after apparently suffering a heart attack and drowning while taking a hot bath.[60][61] She was buried in the Cimetière du Montparnasse in Paris.

She left the bulk of her $200,000 estate (more than $2 million in 2021 dollars) to her husband and their five-year-old daughter.[62]

Publicity photography of Maria Montez for an Argentine magazine (1944)

From the Dominican Republic, Montez received two decorations: the Juan Pablo Duarte Order of Merit in the Grade of Officer and the Order of Trujillo in the same grade, presented to her by President Rafael Leónidas Trujillo in November, 1943. In 1944, she was named Goodwill Ambassador of Latin American countries to the United States in the so-called Good Neighbor policy.

Shortly after her death, a street in the city of Barahona, Montez's birthplace, was named in her honor.[60] In 1996, the city of Barahona opened the Aeropuerto Internacional María Montez (María Montez International Airport) in her honor. In 2012, a station on Line 2 of the Santo Domingo Metro was named in her honor.

In 1976, Margarita Vicens de Morales published a series of articles in the Dominican newspaper Listín Diario's magazine Suplemento, where she presented the results of her research on Montez's life. The research culminated in 1992 with the publication of the biography Maria Montez, Su Vida. After the first edition, a second edition was published in 1994, and a third followed in 2004.

In 1995, Montez was awarded the International Posthumous Cassandra, which was received by her daughter, Tina Aumont. In March 2012, the Casandra Awards were dedicated to Montez to commemorate the centenary of her birth.

The American underground filmmaker Jack Smith idolized Montez as an icon of camp[63] style. He wrote an aesthetic manifesto titled "The Perfect Filmic Appositeness of Maria Montez", and made elaborate homages to her films in his own, including his notorious Flaming Creatures (1963).[64]

The authors Terenci Moix and Antonio Perez Arnay wrote a book entitled Maria Montez, The Queen of Technicolor that recounted her life and reviewed her films.

The Dominican painter Angel Haché included in his collection Tribute to Film, a trilogy of Maria Montez and another Dominican painter, Adolfo Piantini, who dedicated a 1983 exhibit to her that included 26 paintings made using different techniques.

Dalia Davi, Puerto Rican actress from the Bronx, created the 2011 play The Queen of Technicolor Maria Montez. Davi wrote, directed, and starred in the play.[65]

The journalist and Dominican actress Celinés Toribio stars as Montez in the 2015 film Maria Montez: The Movie, which she also executive produced.

In 1998, the TV show Mysteries and Scandals[66] made an episode about Maria Montez. Montez is a key character in Gore Vidal's 1974 novel Myron, his sequel to Myra Breckenridge. Montez is mentioned by name in The Boys in the Band, both the play (1968) and the film (1970).

• Aumont, Jean-Pierre (1977). Sun and Shadow: an Autobiography. W.W. Aumont.

• Maria Montez at IMDb
• Maria Montez at AllMovie
• Maria Montez at Find a Grave
• A short montage on YouTube of clips of Montez, including her snake dance from Cobra Woman
• An appreciative essay comparing Maria Montez and her namesake, Warhol Superstar Mario Montez