Joan Blondell

Joan Blondell (born Rose Joan Bluestein; August 30, 1906 – December 25, 1979) was an American actress[1] who performed in film and television for half a century.

Joan Blondell
Publicity photograph of Blondell, c. 1930
Born
Rose Joan Bluestein

(1906-08-30)August 30, 1906
Manhattan, New York City, U.S.
DiedDecember 25, 1979(1979-12-25) (aged 73)
Santa Monica, California, U.S.
Resting placeForest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale
OccupationActress
Years active1927–1979
Spouses
  • George Barnes
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1933; div. 1936)​
  • Dick Powell
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1936; div. 1944)​
  • Mike Todd
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1947; div. 1950)​
Children2, including Norman Powell
RelativesGloria Blondell (sister)

Blondell began her career in vaudeville. After winning a beauty pageant, she embarked on a film career, establishing herself as a Pre-Code staple of Warner Bros. Pictures in wisecracking, sexy roles, appearing in more than 100 films and television productions. She was most active in film during the 1930s and early 1940s, and during that time co-starred with Glenda Farrell, a colleague and close friend, in nine films. Blondell continued acting on film and television for the rest of her life, often in small, supporting roles. She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in The Blue Veil (1951).

Near the end of her life, Blondell was nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in Opening Night (1977). She was featured in two more films, the blockbuster musical Grease (1978) and Franco Zeffirelli's The Champ (1979), which was released shortly before her death from leukemia.

Early life

Rose Joan Blondell was born in New York to a vaudeville family; she gave her birthdate as August 30, 1906.[2] Her father, Levi Bluestein, a vaudeville comedian known as Ed Blondell,[3][4] was born in Poland to a Jewish family in 1866. He toured for many years starring in Blondell and Fennessy's stage version of The Katzenjammer Kids.[5][6][7][8] Blondell's mother was Catherine (known as "Kathryn" or "Katie") Caine, born in Brooklyn, Kings County, New York (later Brooklyn, New York City) on April 13, 1884, to Irish-American parents. Joan's younger sister, Gloria Blondell, also an actress, was briefly married to film producer Albert R. Broccoli. Joan also had a brother, Ed Blondell, Jr.

Joan's cradle was a property trunk as her parents moved from place to place. She made her first appearance on stage at the age of four months when she was carried on in a cradle as the daughter of Peggy Astaire in The Greatest Love. Her family comprised a vaudeville troupe, the Bouncing Blondells.[9]

Joan had spent a year in Honolulu (1914–15)[10] and six years in Australia and had seen much of the world by the time her family stopped touring and settled in Dallas, Texas when she was a teenager. Using the name Rosebud Blondell, she won the 1926 Miss Dallas pageant, was a finalist in an early version of the Miss Universe pageant in May 1926, and placed fourth for Miss America 1926 in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in September of that year. She attended Santa Monica High School, where she acted in school plays and edited the school yearbook.[11] While there, she gave her name as Rosebud Blondell,[12] and when she attended North Texas State Teacher's College (now the University of North Texas) in Denton in 1926–1927[13] where her mother was a local stage actress.

Career
Blondell in trailer for Three on a Match (1932)

Around 1927, she returned to New York, worked as a fashion model, a circus hand, a clerk in a store, joined a stock company to become an actress, and performed on Broadway. In 1930, she starred with James Cagney in Penny Arcade on Broadway.[14] Penny Arcade lasted only three weeks, but Al Jolson saw it and bought the rights to the play for $20,000. He then sold the rights to Warner Bros., with the proviso that Blondell and Cagney be cast in the film version, named Sinners' Holiday (1930). Placed under contract by Warner Bros., she moved to Hollywood, where studio boss Jack L. Warner wanted her to change her name to "Inez Holmes",[7]: 34  but Blondell refused. She began to appear in short subjects and was named as one of the WAMPAS Baby Stars in 1931.

Blondell was paired several more times with James Cagney in films, including The Public Enemy (1931) and Footlight Parade (1933), and was one-half of a gold-digging duo with Glenda Farrell in nine films. During the Great Depression, Blondell was one of the highest-paid individuals in the United States. Her stirring rendition of "Remember My Forgotten Man" in the Busby Berkeley production of Gold Diggers of 1933, in which she co-starred with Dick Powell and Ruby Keeler, became an anthem for the frustrations of unemployed people and the government's failed economic policies.[15] In 1937, she starred opposite Errol Flynn in The Perfect Specimen. By the end of the decade, she had made nearly 50 films. She left Warner Bros. in 1939.

This 1932 promotional photo of Blondell was later banned under the Motion Picture Production Code.

In 1943, Blondell returned to Broadway as the star of Mike Todd's short-lived production of The Naked Genius, a comedy written by Gypsy Rose Lee.[2] She was well received in her later films, despite being relegated to character and supporting roles after 1945, when she was billed below the title for the first time in 14 years in Adventure, which starred Clark Gable and Greer Garson. She was also featured prominently in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945) and Nightmare Alley (1947). In 1948, she left the screen for three years and concentrated on theater, performing in summer stock and touring with Cole Porter's musical, Something for the Boys.[2] She later reprised her role of Aunt Sissy in the musical version of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn for the national tour and played the nagging mother, Mae Peterson, in the national tour of Bye Bye Birdie.

Blondell returned to Hollywood in 1950. Her performance in her next film, The Blue Veil (1951), earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress in a Supporting Role.[2] She played supporting roles in The Opposite Sex (1956), Desk Set (1957), and Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (1957). She received considerable acclaim for her performance as Lady Fingers in Norman Jewison's The Cincinnati Kid (1965), garnering a Golden Globe nomination and National Board of Review win for Best Supporting Actress. John Cassavetes cast her as a cynical, aging playwright in his film Opening Night (1977). Blondell was widely seen in two films released not long before her death – Grease (1978), and the remake of The Champ (1979) with Jon Voight and Rick Schroder. She also appeared in two films released after her death – The Glove (1979), and The Woman Inside (1981).

With James Cagney in Footlight Parade (1933)

Blondell also guest-starred in various television programs, including three 1963 episodes as the character Aunt Win in the CBS sitcom The Real McCoys, starring Walter Brennan and Richard Crenna.

Also in 1963, Blondell was cast as the widowed Lucy Tutaine in the episode, "The Train and Lucy Tutaine", on the syndicated anthology series, Death Valley Days, hosted by Stanley Andrews. In the story line, Lucy sues a railroad company, against great odds, for causing the death of her cow. Noah Beery Jr., was cast as Abel.

In 1964, she appeared in the episode "What's in the Box?" of The Twilight Zone. She guest-starred in the episode "You're All Right, Ivy" on Jack Palance's circus drama, The Greatest Show on Earth, which aired on ABC in the 1963–64 television season. Her co-stars in the segment were Joe E. Brown and Buster Keaton. In 1965, she was in the running to replace Vivian Vance as Lucille Ball's sidekick on the hit CBS television comedy series The Lucy Show. Unfortunately, after filming her second guest appearance as Joan Brenner (Lucy's new friend from California), Blondell walked off the set right after the episode had completed filming when Ball humiliated her by harshly criticizing her performance in front of the studio audience and technicians.

Blondell continued working on television. In 1968, she guest-starred on the CBS sitcom Family Affair, starring Brian Keith. She replaced Bea Benaderet, who was ill, for one episode on the CBS series Petticoat Junction. In that installment, Blondell played FloraBelle Campbell, a lady visitor to Hooterville, who had once dated Uncle Joe (Edgar Buchanan) and Sam Drucker (Frank Cady). That same year, Blondell co-starred in all 52 episodes of the ABC Western series Here Come the Brides, set in the Pacific Northwest of the 19th century. Her co-stars included singer Bobby Sherman and actor-singer David Soul. Blondell received two consecutive Emmy nominations for outstanding continued performance by an actress in a dramatic series for her role as Lottie Hatfield.

In 1971, she followed Sada Thompson in the off-Broadway hit The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, with a young Swoosie Kurtz playing one of her daughters.[16]

Blondell with Elvis Presley in Stay Away, Joe (1967)

In 1972, she had an ongoing supporting role in the NBC series Banyon as Peggy Revere, who operated a secretarial school in the same building as Banyon's detective agency. This was a 1930s period action drama starring Robert Forster in the title role. Her students worked in Banyon's office, providing fresh faces for the show weekly. The series was replaced midseason.

Blondell has a motion pictures star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her contributions to the film industry. Her star is located at 6311 Hollywood Boulevard.[17] In December 2007, the Museum of Modern Art in New York City mounted a retrospective of Blondell's films in connection with a new biography by film professor Matthew Kennedy, and theatrical revival houses such as Film Forum in Manhattan have also projected many of her films recently.

She wrote a novel titled Center Door Fancy (New York: Delacorte Press, 1972), which was a thinly disguised autobiography with veiled references to June Allyson and Dick Powell.[7]: 10 

Personal life
Blondell with daughter Ellen Powell and son Norman S. Powell, 1944

Blondell was married three times, first to cinematographer George Barnes in a private wedding ceremony on January 4, 1933, at the First Presbyterian Church in Phoenix, Arizona. They had one child, Norman Scott Barnes, who became an accomplished producer, director, and television executive known as Norman Powell. Joan and George divorced in 1936.

On September 19, 1936, she married Dick Powell, an actor, director, and singer. They had a daughter, Ellen Powell, who became a studio hair stylist, and Powell adopted her son by her previous marriage under the name Norman Scott Powell. Blondell and Powell were divorced on July 14, 1944. Blondell was less than friendly with Powell's next wife, June Allyson, although the two women later appeared together in The Opposite Sex (1956).

Blondell's niche in the columbarium at Forest Lawn Glendale

On July 5, 1947, Blondell married producer Mike Todd. Her marriage to Todd was an emotional and financial disaster that ended in divorce in 1950. She once accused him of holding her outside a hotel window by her ankles.[7] He was also a heavy spender who lost hundreds of thousands of dollars gambling (high-stakes bridge was one of his weaknesses) and went through a controversial bankruptcy during their marriage. An often-repeated myth is that Mike Todd left Blondell for Elizabeth Taylor, when in fact, she had left Todd of her own accord years before he met Taylor.[18][19]

Blondell died of leukemia in Santa Monica, California, on Christmas Day, 1979, with her children and her sister at her bedside.[2] She was cremated and her ashes interred in a columbarium at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California.[20] She was 73.

Filmography

Feature films
Year Title Role Notes
1930 The Office Wife Katherine Mudcock [21]
1930 Sinners' Holiday Myrtle [21]
1931 Other Men's Women Marie [21]
1931 Millie Angie Wickerstaff [21]
1931 Illicit Helen Dukie Childers [21]
1931 God's Gift to Women Fifi [21]
1931 The Public Enemy Mamie [21]
1931 My Past Marian Moore [21]
1931 Big Business Girl Pearl [21]
1931 Night Nurse Maloney [21]
1931 The Reckless Hour Myrtle Nichols [21]
1931 Blonde Crazy Ann Roberts [21]
1932 Union Depot Ruth Collins [21]
1932 The Greeks Had a Word for Them Schatze Citroux [21]
1932 The Crowd Roars Anne Scott [21]
1932 The Famous Ferguson Case Maizie Dickson [21]
1932 Make Me a Star Flips Montague [21]
1932 Miss Pinkerton Miss Adams [21]
1932 Big City Blues Vida Fleet [21]
1932 Three on a Match Mary Keaton [21]
1932 Central Park Dot [21]
1933 Lawyer Man Olga Michaels [21]
1933 Broadway Bad Tony Landers [21]
1933 Blondie Johnson Blondie Johnson [21]
1933 Gold Diggers of 1933 Carol King [21]
1933 Goodbye Again Anne Rogers [21]
1933 Footlight Parade Nan Prescott [21]
1933 Havana Widows Mae Knight [21]
1933 Convention City Nancy Lorraine Lost film[21]
1934 I've Got Your Number Marie Lawson [21]
1934 He Was Her Man Rose Lawrence [21]
1934 Smarty Vickie Wallace [21]
1934 Dames Mabel Anderson [21]
1934 Kansas City Princess Rosie Sturges [21]
1935 Traveling Saleslady Angela Twitchell [21]
1935 Broadway Gondolier Alice Hughes [21]
1935 We're in the Money Ginger Stewart [21]
1935 Miss Pacific Fleet Gloria Fay [21]
1936 Colleen Minnie Hawkins [21]
1936 Sons o' Guns Yvonne [21]
1936 Bullets or Ballots Lee Morgan [21]
1936 Stage Struck Peggy Revere [21]
1936 Three Men on a Horse Mabel [21]
1936 Gold Diggers of 1937 Norma Perry [21]
1937 The King and the Chorus Girl Dorothy Ellis [21]
1937 Back in Circulation Timmy Blake [21]
1937 The Perfect Specimen Mona Carter [21]
1937 Stand-In Lester Plum [21]
1938 There's Always a Woman Sally Reardon [21]
1939 Off the Record Jane Morgan [21]
1939 East Side of Heaven Mary Wilson [21]
1939 The Kid from Kokomo Doris Harvey [21]
1939 Good Girls Go to Paris Jenny Swanson [21]
1939 The Amazing Mr. Williams Maxine Carroll [21]
1940 Two Girls on Broadway Molly Mahoney [21]
1940 I Want a Divorce Geraldine Brokaw [21]
1941 Topper Returns Gail Richards [21]
1941 Model Wife Joan Keathing Chambers [21]
1941 Three Girls About Town Hope Banner [21]
1942 Lady for a Night Jenny Blake [21]
1942 Cry 'Havoc' Grace Lambert [21]
1945 A Tree Grows In Brooklyn Aunt Sissy [21]
1945 Don Juan Quilligan Margie Mossrock [21]
1945 Adventure Helen Melohn [21]
1947 The Corpse Came C.O.D. Rosemary Durant [21]
1947 Nightmare Alley Zeena [21]
1947 Christmas Eve Ann Nelson [21]
1950 For Heaven's Sake Daphne [21]
1951 The Blue Veil Annie Rawlins Nominated—Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress[21]
1956 The Opposite Sex Edith Potter [21]
1957 Lizzie Aunt Morgan [21]
1957 Desk Set Peg Costello [21]
1957 This Could Be the Night Crystal [21]
1957 Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? Violet [21]
1961 Angel Baby Mollie Hays [21]
1964 Advance to the Rear Easy Jenny [21]
1965 The Cincinnati Kid Lady Fingers National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actress
Nominated—Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture[21]
1966 Ride Beyond Vengeance Mrs. Lavender [21]
1967 Waterhole #3 Lavinia [21]
1967 Winchester '73 Larouge TV movie
1967 The Spy in the Green Hat Mrs. "Fingers" Steletto
1968 Stay Away, Joe Glenda Callahan [21]
1968 Kona Coast Kittibelle Lightfoot [21]
1969 Big Daddy [21]
1970 The Phynx Ruby [21]
1971 Support Your Local Gunfighter! Jenny [21]
1975 The Dead Don't Die Levinia TV movie
1976 Won Ton Ton, the Dog Who Saved Hollywood Landlady [21]
1976 Death at Love House Marcella Geffenhart
1977 The Baron
1977 Opening Night Sarah Goode Nominated—Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture[21]
1978 Grease Vi [21]
1979 Battered Edna Thompson NBC TV movie
1979 The Champ Dolly Kenyon [21]
1979 The Glove Mrs. Fitzgerald
1981 The Woman Inside Aunt Coll Posthumous release (final film role)

Short films
Year Title Notes
1929 Broadway's Like That Vitaphone Varieties release 960 (December 1929)
Cast: Ruth Etting, Humphrey Bogart, Mary Philips[22]: 50 
1930 The Devil's Parade Vitaphone Varieties release 992 (February 1930)
Cast: Sidney Toler[22]: 52 
1930 The Heart Breaker Vitaphone Varieties release 1012–1013 (March 1930)
Cast: Eddie Foy, Jr.[22]: 53 
1930 An Intimate Dinner in Celebration of Warner Bros. Silver Jubilee
1931 How I Play Golf, number 10, "Trouble Shots" Vitaphone release 4801
Cast: Bobby Jones, Joe E. Brown, Edward G. Robinson, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.[22]: 226 
1933 Just Around the Corner
1934 Hollywood Newsreel
1941 Meet the Stars #2: Baby Stars
1965 The Cincinnati Kid Plays According to Hoyle

Television
YearTitleRoleNotes
1961 The Untouchables Hannah 'Lucy' Wagnall Episode: "The Underground Court"
1963 The Virginian Rosanna Dobie Episode: "To Make This Place Remember"
1963 Wagon Train Ma Bleecker Episode: "The Bleecker Story"
1963 The Real McCoys Aunt Winn season 6, episodes 21 & 22
1964 The Twilight Zone Phyllis Britt Episode: "What's in the Box"
1964 Bonanza Lillian Manfred Episode: "The Pressure Game"
1965 Petticoat Junction Florabelle Campbell season 5 episode 22
1965 The Lucy Show Joan Brenner Episodes: "Lucy and Joan" & “Lucy the Stunt Man”
1965 My Three Sons Harriet Blanchard Episode: "Office Mother"
1968–1970 Here Come the Brides Lottie Hatfield 52 episodes[23][24]
Nominated—Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series (1969–70)
1971 McCloud Ernestine White Episode: "Top of the World, Ma"
1972–1973 Banyon Peggy Revere 8 episodes
1973 The Rookies Mrs. Louise Darrin Episode: "Cry Wolf"
1976 Starsky & Hutch Mrs Pruitt Episode "The Las Vegas Strangler"
1978 The Love Boat Ramona Bevans Episode: "Ship of Ghouls"
1979 The Rebels Mrs. Brumple TV movie

Radio broadcasts
YearProgramEpisode/source
1946Hollywood Star TimeThe Lady Eve[25]
  • David Manners, Joan Blondell, Ina Claire, Madge Evans from The Greeks Had a Word for Them, 1932
  • David Manners, Madge Evans, Joan Blondell, Ina Claire from The Greeks Had a Word for Them, 1932
  • James Cagney, Ann Dvorak, and Joan Blondell in The Crowd Roars, 1932
  • Joan Blondell, Eric Linden, and James Cagney in The Crowd Roars, 1932
  • Gold Diggers of 1933 : Ruby Keeler, Dick Powell, Joan Blondell, Guy Kibbee, and Aline MacMahon
  • Footlight Parade, 1933
  • Footlight Parade, 1933
  • circa 1936
  • With her Children, 1944
  • Here Come the Brides, 1969

References
  1. Obituary Variety, December 26, 1979.
  2. "Joan Blondell, Actress, Dies at 70; Often Played Wisecracking Blonde". The New York Times. December 26, 1979. Archived from the original on November 20, 2015. Retrieved August 30, 2015.
  3. "[Unknown]". The Republic. Columbus, Indiana. October 7, 1971. p. 26. Archived from the original on February 16, 2018. The Katzenjammer Kids will be presented in Franklin this evening, the company having passed through here this morning on the way to that place. "Eddie Blondell's true name is Levi Bluestein, and he was a resident of Columbus many years ago, living with his father at the foot of Washington street
  4. "[Unknown]". The Republic. Columbus, Indiana. January 29, 1906. p. 1. Archived from the original on February 16, 2018. No allowance was made for alimony, but Mrs. Blondell seemed to be satisfied. The Blondells, who in private life were Mr. and Mrs. Levi Bluestein, have been annoyed by a case of incompatibility of temper for a long time. They were formerly a member of Katzenjammer Kids' company....
  5. "Blondell and Fennessy's hurricane of fun and frolic, The Katzenjammer Kids". loc.gov. United States Library of Congress. Archived from the original on February 16, 2018. Retrieved May 5, 2018.
  6. "[Unknown]". Variety. November 1916. Rowland & Clifford, a western producing firm, have also a production in preparation under the title of 'The Katzenjammer Kids', securing the rights from Blondell & Fennessy. Both shows are scheduled to play over the International, with the Hill production to be ready by Jan. 1.
  7. Kennedy, Matthew (2009). Joan Blondell: A Life Between Takes. University Press of Mississippi. ISBN 978-1628461817 – via Google Books.
  8. "Grave Spotlight – Joan Blondell". cemeteryguide.com. Archived from the original on January 2, 2016. Retrieved May 5, 2018.
  9. Rathbun, Joe (December 10, 1944). "Joe's Radio Parade". Sunday Times Signal. p. 23. Archived from the original on May 4, 2015. Retrieved May 1, 2015 – via Newspapers.com.
  10. Punahou School Alumni Directory, 1841–1991. White Plains, New York: Harris Publishing Company, 1991.
  11. Santa Monica High School Yearbook, 1925
  12. "[Unknown]". The Yucca. North Texas State Teacher's College. 1927. p. 68. Retrieved December 2, 2019 – via texashistory.com.
  13. "Lights! Camera! University of North Texas!: Joan Blondell (1906–1979)". library.unt.edu. University of North Texas. August 27, 2015. Retrieved December 2, 2019.
  14. Joan Blondell at the Internet Broadway Database
  15. Abbott, M. and Harper, P., 2000. "The Street Was Mine": White Masculinity And Urban Space In Hardboiled Fiction And Film Noir. Springer, pp.23-24.
  16. "Joan Blondell". iobdb.com.
  17. "Hollywood Walk of Fame - Joan Blondell". walkoffame.com. Hollywood Chamber of Commerce. Archived from the original on December 1, 2017. Retrieved November 21, 2017.
  18. United Press (June 7, 1950). "Blondell Divorce Bid Slated for Tomorrow". The Los Angeles Times. p. 20. Retrieved January 7, 2022.
  19. Associated Press (September 23, 1956). "Liz Taylor Dates Mike Todd". The Spokane Spokesman-Review. p. 22. Retrieved January 7, 2022.
  20. Wilson, Scott (2016). Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons (3rd ed.). Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc. p. 69. ISBN 978-0-7864-7992-4. Retrieved August 2, 2018.
  21. "Joan Blondell". AFI Catalog of Feature Films. American Film Institute. Retrieved August 30, 2015.
  22. Liebman, Roy (2003). Vitaphone Films: A Catalogue of the Features and Shorts. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc. ISBN 978-0786446971.
  23. Here Come the Brides - 'The Complete 2nd Season': Shout!'s Street Date, Cost, Packaging Archived November 12, 2011, at the Wayback Machine TVShowsonDVD.com November 7, 2001
  24. Here Come the Brides - Official Press Release, Plus Rear Box Art & Revised Front Art Archived November 14, 2011, at the Wayback Machine TVShowsonDVD.com March 7, 2006
  25. "Joan Blondell In 'Lady Eve' On WHP 'Star Time'". Harrisburg Telegraph. September 21, 1946. p. 17. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved October 7, 2015 – via Newspapers.com.

Further reading
  • Oderman, Stuart. Talking to the Piano Player 2. BearManor Media, 2009. ISBN 1-59393-320-7
  • Grabman, Sandra. Plain Beautiful: The Life of Peggy Ann Garner. BearManor Media, 2005. ISBN 1-59393-017-8
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