Anita Page
| Anita Page} | ||
 Anita Page in Our Modern Maidens (1929) | ||
| Background information | ||
| Born as: | Anita Evelyn Pomares | |
| Born | Aug 04, 1910 Flushing, Queens, New York City, NY | |
| Died | Sep 06, 2008 - age 97 Van Nuys, Los Angeles, California Natural death | |
| Buried: | Holy Cross Cemetery, San Diego, California | |
| Spouse(s): |
| |
| Children: | Linda and Sandra | |
| Occupation: | Actress | |
| Years active | 1925–1936; 1961; 1996–2008 | |
Anita Page (born ✦Anita Evelyn Pomares; August 4, 1910 – †September 6, 2008) was an American film actress who reached stardom in the final years of the silent film era.
She was referred to as "a blond, blue-eyed Latin" and "the girl with the most beautiful face in Hollywood" in the 1920s. She retired from acting in 1936 but made a comeback in 1961, and then she retired again. Page returned to acting 35 years later in 1996 and appeared in four films in the 2000s.
Early life
Anita Evelyn Pomares was born on August 4, 1910, in Flushing, Queens, New York. Her parents were Marino Leo Pomares, who was originally from Brooklyn, and Maude Evelyn (née Mullane) Pomares. She had one brother, Marino Pomares Jr., who later worked for her as a gym instructor, and her mother worked as her secretary and her father as her chauffeur. Page's paternal grandfather Salvador Marino Pomares, was from Cuba, and had worked as a consul in El Salvador. Her paternal grandmother Anna Muñoz was Venezuelan, of Castilian Spanish and French descent.
Career
Silent films and early talkies
Page entered films with the help of a friend, actress Betty Bronson. A photo of Page was spotted by a man who handled Bronson's fan mail and was also interested in representing actors. With her mother's encouragement, Page telephoned the man who arranged a meeting for her with a casting director at Paramount Studios. After doing a screen test for Paramount, she became among the first residents of the Chateau Marmont. Page was offered contracts by both studios and selected MGM, "because they were so good for female actresses. If you ask me, MGM was the studio."
Page's first film for MGM was the 1928 comedy-drama Telling the World, opposite William Haines. Her performance in her second MGM film, Our Dancing Daughters (1928), opposite Joan Crawford was a success, and it inspired two similar films in which they also co-starred, Our Modern Maidens and Our Blushing Brides. "I used to say that we're going to be "The Galloping Grandmothers" at the rate we're going with these pictures," she reminisced in 1993.
- Anita Page
Page featured in the Argentinean magazine Cinelandia, January 1929
Anita Page - Publicity photo
The Broadway Melody (1929) is considered among her more successful films and won Best Picture at the Academy Awards. Page transitioned to sound films but criticized the total loss of silent films. "In my opinion, silents were much better than talkies. One thing you had was mood music, which you could have played throughout your scene to inspire you. My favorite song was 'My Heart at Thy Sweet Voice' from Samson and Delilah. I never seemed to tire of it. The trouble with talkies was, they let you have the music, but they'd stop it when you had to talk, and it was always a letdown for me."
When not working on films, she was busy with studio photographer George Hurrell creating publicity shots. She was one of his early subjects, and her photograph was his first to be published. MGM played up her heritage in these press releases such as this 1932 blurb: "She is that rarest and most interesting type of beauty,” ... “A Spanish blonde," and dubbed her "a blonde, blue-eyed Latin."
She was the leading lady to Lon Chaney, Buster Keaton, Robert Montgomery, Clark Gable, and others. During the early 1930s, she was one of Hollywood's busier actresses. She was involved romantically with Gable briefly during that time. At the height of her popularity, she received more fan mail than any other female star, except for Greta Garbo, and received several marriage proposals from Benito Mussolini in the mail.
Retirement
When her contract expired in 1933, she announced her retirement from acting at the age of 23. She retired as she was denied a pay rise. She made one more movie, Hitch Hike to Heaven, in 1936 and then retired fully from acting. Later, Page claimed that Irving Thalberg had offered her the starring role in three movies if she would sleep with him, which she refused.
She married composer Nacio Herb Brown in 1934. The marriage was annulled a year later because Brown's previous divorce was not finalized when they married. She married Navy pilot Lieutenant Hershel A. House on January 9, 1937, in Yuma, Arizona. They moved to Coronado, California, until his death in 1991. They had two daughters, Linda and Sandra.
Return to acting
Page returned to acting and portrayed a nun in The Runaway, completed in 1961, but she cut short her comeback. She returned to acting in 1996 after 35 years of retirement and appeared in several low-budget horror films. Film veteran Margaret O'Brien appeared in two of them.
Later years and death
Page was the last living attendee of the first Academy Awards ceremony in 1929 and frequently gave interviews as the "last star of the silents", appearing in documentaries about the era.
Page died in her sleep at the age of 98 on September 6, 2008, at her home in Los Angeles, where she had lived with long-time companion Randal Malone. She is buried in the Holy Cross Cemetery in San Diego.
Legacy
Anita Page has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6116 Hollywood Boulevard for her contribution to the motion picture industry.
Personal life
Page was a Democrat who supported the campaign of Adlai Stevenson during the 1952 presidential election.
Page was a Catholic.
Anita's second marriage was to Herschel Austin House in 1937. They lived in southern California and were together for 54 years until Herschel died in 1991 at the age of 84. Herschel had retired from the Navy as a rear admiral. They had two daughters, Sandra and Linda, and they were buried together under his last name.
External links
Filmography
- Wikipedia article: Anita Page Filmography
- Anita Page at the Internet Movie Database
- Anita Page Biography and Gallery
- Anita Page Photo Gallery
- Anita Page at Golden Silents
- Guardian Interview with Anita Page
- Photographs of Anita Page
- Anita Page
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