Marie Dressler: The Unlikeliest Star [Hardcover]

Betty Lee (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 28, 1997

" She was homely, overweight, and over the hill, but there was a time when Marie Dressler outdrew such cinema sex symbols as Garbo, Dietrich, and Harlow. To movie audiences suffering the hardships of the Great Depression, she was Everywoman, and in the early 1930s her charming mixture of pathos and comedy packed movie theaters everywhere. In the early days of the century, Dressler was constantly in the headlines. She took up the cause of the "ponies" in the chorus lines, earning them better pay and benefits. She played in productions organized to raise money for the women's suffrage movement. And during World War I she claimed she sold more liberty bonds than any other individual in the United States. Dressler was an astute observer of public mood and taste. When she was lucky enough to find work in the newly minted Hollywood talkies, she grabbed the brass ring with fierce enthusiasm, even making three films in the year before her death, when she was so sick she had to rest between scenes on a sofa just out of camera range. The two-hundred-pound actress's remarkable stage presence captivated audiences even though her roles were not Hollywood beauties. She played tough, practical characters such as the old wharf rat in Anna Christie (1930), the waterfront innkeeper in Min and Bill (1931) -- for which she won the Academy Award for best actress -- the aging housekeeper in Emma (1932), and the title role in Tugboat Annie (1933). She spoke honestly to her audiences, and troubled people in the comforting darkness of the Depression-era movie theaters embraced her as one of themselves.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Marie Dressler was overweight and older than 60 when she made the most spectacular comeback of her roller-coaster career, outshining Greta Garbo in the 1930 film Anna Christie. Marie Dressler (1869-1934) was no beauty, but her perfect comic timing and Everywoman appeal to theater- and movie-goers ensured a popularity that began in vaudeville and climaxed with Min and Bill, Tugboat Annie, and her legendary delivery of the classic closing line in Dinner at Eight. Toronto journalist Betty Lee's meticulously researched biography gives a thorough account of Dressler's life and appreciative evocation of her art.

From Library Journal

Toronto Globe feature writer/reporter Lee's biography of actress Dressler gives the reader a vivid view of the life of her subject and a social history of theater and film in the early 20th century. Canadian-born Dressler began a life on the stage at age 14, playing bit parts for paltry sums. Her inauspicious beginning led to Broadway, failures, comebacks, and then an Academy AwardR for her leading role in the 1931 film Min and Bill. In a time of glamorous stars such as Greta Garbo, her costar in Anna Christie, Dressler, a large, homely woman, stole the spotlight as an everywoman, giving hope to moviegoers in the Great Depression. Lee uses personal anecdotes from Dressler's two autobiographies and the unpublished manuscript of Claire Dunphy, an actress who was Dressler's closest companion at the end of her life, to illustrate the story of an actress and the history of American theater and film from 1880 until 1934, when Dressler died of cancer. Recommended for theater and film collections.?Lisa N. Johnston, Sweet Briar Coll. Lib., Va.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: The University Press of Kentucky (August 28, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0813120365
• ISBN-13: 978-0813120362
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.4 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,699,230 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Insufficient research mars commendable effort, August 19, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Marie Dressler: The Unlikeliest Star (Hardcover)

The problem with this book becomes regrettably clear if one also reads Matthew Kennedy's biography of the wonderful Marie Dressler. Lee, despite her obvious effort, is not as assiduous a researcher as one would desire. Films she has not seen in fact exist for viewing; aspects of Dressler's personal life Lee implies are lost to history are in fact recoverable; Lee cannot ascertain what became of Dressler's faithful maid while Kennedy tracks her neatly to the end of her life; etc. Furthermore, Lee makes a welcome attempt to situate Dressler within theatrical history -- which was most of her career -- but appears to have essentially boned up on the subject before writing the book. Bringing turn-of-the-century theatre to life is challenging given that virtually all we have left are photographs, reviews, and sketchy comments, but people immersed in the subject by nature have accomplished this in varous books in a way that Lee cannot quite match. The main value of Lee's book is her access to the diary of Dressler's longtime companion and her thorough coverage of Dressler's battle with cancer. Otherwise, however, Kennedy's book is much more thorough and gives more of a sense of what made Dressler such a phenomenon.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Enjoyable and Informative, June 16, 2005

By 

Lisa Burks (Burbank, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Marie Dressler: The Unlikeliest Star (Hardcover)

I'm unable to compare "Marie Dressler: The Unlikeliest Star" to the other biography in print because frankly Matthew Kennedy's book is too expensive for my fun-money budget (a problem I have with most books published by McFarland in general, and has no reflection on the author.) So as far as this is the only book I've ever read about Marie Dressler, I can tell you that I found it to be completely enjoyable and informative. I read it cover to cover in one evening, and it was time well spent. Betty Lee's warmhearted storytelling skills gave me what I was looking for: a better understanding of Miss Dressler's life, career and personality.

5.0 out of 5 stars Marie Dressler's Life--What a great one Indeed!, June 26, 2011

By 

Patrick J. Shea "katehep" (NYC) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Marie Dressler: The Unlikeliest Star (Hardcover)

Thanks to TCM, we see a glimpse of this interesting lady's performances.

She had quite a fascinating life beginning in the late 19th century, ultimately

peaking just before her 1934 death, when she was the No 1 favorite film star

in America! What a way to go!