Jean Arthur was an American actress and a film star of the 1930s and 1940s.
Background
Arthur was born Gladys Georgianna Greene on October 17, 1900, in Plattsburgh, New York, to Protestant parents, Johanna Augusta Nelson (1874–1959) and Hubert Sidney Greene (1863–1944). Her Lutheran maternal grandparents were immigrants from Norway who settled in the American West after the Civil War. Her Congregationalist paternal ancestors immigrated from England to Rhode Island in the 17th century, and in the 1790s, Hubert Greene's great-grandfather, Nathaniel, helped found the town of St. Albans, Vermont. Gladys had three older brothers: Donald Hubert (1890–1967), Robert B. (1892–1955) and Albert Sidney (1894–1926).
Johanna and Hubert had met and married in Billings, Montana. Hubert moved his wife and three sons from Billings to Plattsburgh in 1896 so he could work as a photographer at the Woodward Studios on Clinton Street. The product of a nomadic childhood, Gladys lived at times in Saranac Lake, New York; Jacksonville, Florida, where George Woodward, the owner of Plattsburgh's Woodward Studios, had opened a store; and Schenectady, New York, where relatives from her father's family had settled. The Greenes lived on and off in Westbrook, Maine, from 1908 to 1915 while Hubert worked at Lamson Studios in Portland, Maine, again as a photographer.
Education
During a portion of her high school years, the family came together in the Washington Heights neighborhood – at 573 West 159th Street – of upper Manhattan. The family's relocation to New York City occurred in 1915, where Gladys dropped out of George Washington High School in her junior year due to a "change in family circumstances."
She began working as a stenographer during the World War I, an occupation she continued in the early 1920s as well. During this time she also began to do commercial modeling in New York City where she was noticed by the Fox Film Studios and offered a one-year contract. She began her film career appearing in silent comedies in minor roles. During this time she adopted her stage name from two of her greatest heroes, Joan of Arc (Jeanne d'Arc) and King Arthur. She struggled a lot in the beginning of her career and even received scathing reviews from critics.
She finally received some prominence after playing a gold digging chorus girl in ‘Husband Hunters’ in 1927. Her film, ‘Horse Shoes,’ released the same year, was both a commercial and critical success and her appearance in ‘The Poor Nut’ soon after exposed her to wider audiences. Even though she was initially not very enthusiastic about sound films, she soon began to enjoy greater success in her career.
The 1930s was a highly productive time for her. She played major roles in movies such as ‘The Past of Mary Holmes’ (1933), ‘The Whole Town's Talking’ (1935), and ‘Mr. Deeds Goes to Town’ (1936) which were notable films from this era. ‘Mr. Deeds Goes to Town’ was critically acclaimed and propelled her to international stardom. She also ventured into theater during this time.
Her string of successes continued throughout the late 1930s. Her film ‘You Can't Take It with You’ (1936) in which she starred along with Lionel Barrymore, James Stewart, and Edward Arnold was a super hit and the highest-grossing picture of the year.
She began the 1940s on a high note. Two of her films: The Talk of the Town’ (1942) and ‘The More the Merrier’ (1943), released early on in the decade, were big hits. A reclusive person, she took up fewer movie roles over the following years and appeared as a homesteader's wife in the classic Western ‘Shane’ (1953) in what was one of her prominent non-comedic roles.
She did score a major triumph on Broadway in 1950, starring in Leonard Bernstein's adaptation of Peter Pan, playing the title character, when she was almost 50. She tackled the role of her namesake, Joan of Arc, in a 1954 stage production of George Bernard Shaw's Saint Joan, but she left the play after a nervous breakdown and battles with director Harold Clurman.
After Shane and the Broadway play Joan of Arc, Arthur went into retirement for 12 years. In 1965, she returned to show business in an episode of Gunsmoke. In 1966, the extremely reclusive Arthur took on the role of Patricia Marshall, an attorney, on her own television sitcom, The Jean Arthur Show, which was canceled mid-season by CBS after only 12 episodes. Ron Harper played her son, attorney Paul Marshall.
In 1967, Arthur was coaxed back to Broadway to appear as a midwestern spinster who falls in with a group of hippies in the play The Freaking Out of Stephanie Blake. In his book The Season, William Goldman reconstructed the disastrous production, which eventually closed during previews when Arthur refused to go on.
Arthur next decided to teach drama, first at Vassar College and then the North Carolina School of the Arts.
Arthur turned down the role of the female missionary in Lost Horizon (1973), the unsuccessful musical remake of the 1937 Frank Capra film of the same name. Then, in 1975, the Broadway play First Monday in October, about the first woman to be a Supreme Court justice, was written especially with Arthur in mind, but once again she succumbed to extreme stage fright, and quit the production shortly into its out-of-town run after leaving the Cleveland Play House. The play went on with Jane Alexander playing the role intended for Arthur.
Arthur died from heart failure June 19, 1991, at the age of 90. No funeral service was held. She was cremated, and her remains were scattered off the coast of Point Lobos, California.
Jean Arthur was an American actress counted amongst the topmost actresses of the 1930s and 1940s. Popularly referred to as "the quintessential comedic leading lady,” she was someone closely identified with the genre of screwball comedy. Among her highly popular films are ‘Mr. Deeds Goes to Town’, ‘You Can't Take It With You’, and ‘Mr. Smith Goes to Washington’, all directed by Frank Capra.
For her contribution to the motion picture industry, Jean Arthur has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6333 Hollywood Blvd. On May 2, 2015, the city of Plattsburgh, New York, honored her with a plaque in front of the house where she was born (94 Oak Street).
She was a very reclusive person who preferred to guard her personal life from the media glare. She kept to herself and hated giving interviews.
Physical Characteristics:
With the growing popularity of the talkies in the late 1920s, Jean Arthur received the chance to showcase her best asset—her throaty, high-pitched squeaky voice—which was perfectly suited for the comedic roles she was used to playing.
Quotes from others about the person
Upon her death, film reviewer Charles Champlin wrote the following in the Los Angeles Times: "To at least one teenager in a small town (though I’m sure we were a multitude), Jean Arthur suggested strongly that the ideal woman could be – ought to be – judged by her spirit as well as her beauty … The notion of the woman as a friend and confidante, as well as someone you courted and were nuts about, someone whose true beauty was internal rather than external, became a full-blown possibility as we watched Jean Arthur."
Interests
An animal lover her entire life, Arthur said she trusted them more than people.
Connections
Arthur's first marriage, to photographer Julian Anker in 1928, was annulled after one day.
She married producer Frank Ross, Jr., in 1932. The couple divorced in 1949. They did not have any children.
Father:
Hubert Sidney Greene
(1863–1944)
Mother:
Johanna Augusta Nelson
(1874–1959)
Brother:
Donald Hubert Greene
(b. 1891)
Brother:
Robert B. Greene
(b.1892)
Brother:
Albert Sidney Greene
(b.1894)
Spouse (1):
Julian Aster Ancker
Spouse (2):
Frank Ross
(August 4, 1904, Boston, Massachusetts - February 8, 1990, Los Angeles, California)
