Background
Elizabeth Ruth Grable was born on December 18, 1916, in Saint Louis, Missouri, United States, to John Conn Grable and Lillian Rose Hofmann. She was the youngest of three children.
1940
Full-length shot of Betty Grable (1916-1973), American actress, dancer and singer, wearing a yellow playsuit, circa 1940.
1940
Betty Grable (1916-1973), American actress, dancer and singer, wearing a yellow bikini as she leans against a fish ornament in a studio portrait, against a grey background, circa 1940.
1940
Betty Grable (1916-1973), American actress, dancer and singer, wearing a plaid shirt, sitting behind a child's drum kit, which has Mrs. James Jivin' Jills written on the bass drum, circa 1940.
1942
United States
American actress, pin-up girl, dancer, model, and singer Betty Grable traveling with her dog on a car, as a man peeks from the car's window, United States, 13th August 1942.
1945
American actress Betty Grable (1916-1973) wearing a short, white, pleated dress, circa 1945.
1950
American actress Betty Grable (1916-1973), circa 1950.
1950
American actress Betty Grable (1916-1973) as Kitty Moran in the 20th Century Fox film My Blue Heaven, 1950. (Photo by Frank Powolny)
1950
American actress Betty Grable (1916-1973), circa 1950.
1950
American actress Betty Grable (1916-1973), circa 1950.
1950
American actress Betty Grable (1916-1973) with a baseball bat, circa 1950.
1953
Los Angeles, California, United States
(L-R) Marilyn Monroe, Lauren Bacall and Betty Grable pose for a portrait on the set of the 20th Century-Fox film How to Marry a Millionaire in 1953 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Earl Theisen)
Los Angeles, California, United States
Actress Betty Grable at the Cocoanut Grove in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Earl Leaf)
Betty Grable posing with one leg up and arms behind her head.
Betty Grable holds up legs-laying down.
(Betty Grable and Don Ameche fall in love but their father...)
Betty Grable and Don Ameche fall in love but their fathers intervene. Includes classic performances by Carmen Miranda.
https://www.amazon.com/Down-Argentine-Way-Irving-Cummings/dp/B074TRVJCC/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=Betty+Grable&qid=1612529064&sr=8-2
1940
(An assortment of George and Ira Gershwin tunes enliven th...)
An assortment of George and Ira Gershwin tunes enliven this tale of a shipping clerk typist who shocks 1870's Boston with her outspoken advocacy of women's rights.
https://www.amazon.com/Shocking-Miss-Pilgrim-George-Seaton/dp/B074TT4V4H/ref=sr_1_5?dchild=1&keywords=Betty+Grable&qid=1612529064&sr=8-5
1947
(Betty Grable and Dan Dailey are a married song and dance ...)
Betty Grable and Dan Dailey are a married song and dance team who cannot have children. The movie follows the travails as they try and adopt and keep the kids they adopt while performing on their TV show.
https://www.amazon.com/My-Blue-Heaven-Betty-Grable/dp/B00AQ4IDXG/ref=sr_1_8?dchild=1&keywords=Betty+Grable&qid=1612529064&sr=8-8
1950
(They're three beautiful models, looking for the man and t...)
They're three beautiful models, looking for the man and the money of their dreams! Almost broke, they pool their funds to rent a posh Manhattan penthouse in which they plan to lure their victims. But the gold digger's plans suddenly go awry when two of them fall for men who appear to be poor!
https://www.amazon.com/How-Marry-Millionaire-Marilyn-Monroe/dp/B00IQ3YS6A/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=Betty+Grable&qid=1612529064&sr=8-1
1953
(Jack Lemmon and Betty Grable are paired in this musical r...)
Jack Lemmon and Betty Grable are paired in this musical remake of Too Many Husbands which infuses the original story of a marital mix-up with the backstage action of a musical-comedy.
https://www.amazon.com/Three-Show-Jack-Lemmon/dp/B0094LZEPM/ref=sr_1_12?dchild=1&keywords=Betty+Grable&qid=1612529064&sr=8-12
1955
Elizabeth Ruth Grable was born on December 18, 1916, in Saint Louis, Missouri, United States, to John Conn Grable and Lillian Rose Hofmann. She was the youngest of three children.
Her mother groomed Betty Grable for a career in show business from an early age. She motivated her daughter to sing, dance and act. Betty made her debut as a chorus girl in the film Happy Days in 1929 when she was 12 years old.
Her mother made her attend the Hollywood Professional School and learned dancing from the Ernest Blecher Academy.
She was chosen for the chorus in Let's Go Places. The law at that time required the girls to be over 15 to dance in the chorus. Betty was just 13 but her mother arranged for her false identification papers so that she could perform. However, the deception was found out and she was disqualified.
In 1930, Betty Grable made her first film appearance as a Goldwyn Girl in Whoopee!. She led the opening number, Cowboys. This was followed by small roles in a number of films over the decade.
She signed a contract with Paramount Pictures in the late 1930s. She appeared in a number of B-movies like Pigskin Parade (1936), This Way Please (1937), College Swing (1938). She played college students in most of these films and was thus typecast in this role.
It was in 1940 that Grable landed her first leading role - she was chosen to play Glenda Crawford - in the musical film Down Argentine Way which also had Don Ameche, Charlotte Greenwood, and Carmen Miranda in the star cast.
She played the title role in the musical film, Sweet Rosie O'Grady in 1943. The story was about a singer who hopes for a better future when she marries an English duke. The movie was a big commercial hit. In 1947, Grable starred in the highly popular film, Mother Wore Tights in which she was cast opposite Dan Dailey. She played a vaudeville performer whose daughter is embarrassed of her mother's profession. It was one of the highest-grossing films of that year.
She played Ruby Summers in the Wabash Avenue in 1950. The film was a remake of the 1943 film Coney island. She portrayed a burlesque queen in a dance hall in Chicago. Her 1951 film Meet Me After the Show was one of the last musicals she appeared in. The movie was about a Broadway actress who is so successful that her husband considers her more of an asset than a wife.
Grable starred along with Marilyn Monroe and Lauren Bacall as gold-diggers in the 1953 romantic comedy How to Marry a Millionaire. The screenplay was based upon two plays by Zoe Akins and Dale Eunson and Katherine Albert.
Her final movie appearance was in the 1955 comedy How to Be Very, Very Popular which was produced and directed by Nunnally Johnson. The plot revolved around two showgirls who witness the murder of their fellow performer but do not want to get involved in the investigation.
(They're three beautiful models, looking for the man and t...)
1953(Jack Lemmon and Betty Grable are paired in this musical r...)
1955(An assortment of George and Ira Gershwin tunes enliven th...)
1947(Betty Grable and Dan Dailey are a married song and dance ...)
1950(Betty Grable and Don Ameche fall in love but their father...)
1940Betty Grable was a Christian.
Betty Grable was a lifelong Republican and conservative. She supported the campaign of Dwight Eisenhower during the 1952 presidential election.
Quotations:
"The woman's vision is deep-reaching, the man's far-reaching. With the man the world is his heart, with the woman the heart is her world."
"The practice of putting women on pedestals began to die out when it was discovered that they could give orders better from there."
Betty Grable suffered from "demophobia" (fear of crowds) and was a somnambulist.
Physical Characteristics: Height: 5' 4" (1,63 m)
Betty Grable tied the knot with actor Jackie Coogan in 1937 and divorced him in 1939. Her second marriage was to trumpeter Harry James in 1943. The couple had two daughters. After enduring a difficult marriage plagued by alcoholism and infidelity, the couple divorced in 1965.
She was in a relationship with the much younger dancer Bob Remick which lasted till her death.