Charlotte Greenwood

Charlotte Greenwood

Born: June 24, 1890
Died: December 28, 1977
in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
​From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  

Frances Charlotte Greenwood (25 June 1890 - 28 December 1977) was an American actress and dancer. Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Greenwood started in vaudeville, and eventually starred on Broadway, movies and radio. Standing around six feet tall, she was best known for her long legs and high kicks. She earned the unique praise of being, in her words, the "...only woman in the world who could kick a giraffe in the eye."

In 1913, Oliver Morosco cast her as Queen Ann Soforth of Oogaboo late in the run of L. Frank Baum and Louis F. Gottschalk's The Tik-Tok Man of Oz (better known in its novelization as Tik-Tok of Oz), then commissioned a successful star vehicle titled So Long Letty, which is the role that made her a star.

She starred with such luminaries as Charles Ruggles, Betty Grable, Jimmy Durante, Eddie Cantor, Buster Keaton, and Carmen Miranda. Most of Greenwood's best work was done on the stage, and was lauded by such critics as James Agate, Alexander Woollcott and Claudia Cassidy. One of her most successful roles was that of Juno in Cole Porter's Out of This World in which she introduced the Porter classic "I Sleep Easier Now."

Although the role was written with her in mind, film commitments prevented her from playing "Aunt Eller" in the Rodgers and Hammerstein Broadway hit Oklahoma! (1943). She got her chance in the 1955 film version, just prior to retiring in 1956.

Charlotte Greenwood died in Los Angeles, California of undisclosed causes, aged 87.

She was married twice, first, unsuccessfully to actor Cyril Ring, brother of actress Blanche Ring, and secondly and happily to composer Martin Broones.

Description above from the Wikipedia article Charlotte Greenwood, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

Movies for Charlotte Greenwood...

Title: The Best of the Post
Released: October 22, 1960
Type: TV
Anthology. Dramas based on short stories in the "Saturday Evening Post".
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The Opposite Sex
Title: The Opposite Sex
Character: Lucy
Released: November 15, 1956
Type: Movie
Former radio singer Kay learns from her gossipy friends that her husband, Steve, has had an affair with chorus girl Crystal. Devastated, Kay tries to ignore the information, but when Crystal performs one of her musical numbers at a charity benefit, she breaks down and goes to Reno to file for divorce. However, when she hears that gold-digging Crystal is making Steve unhappy, Kay resolves to get her husband back. The Opposite Sex is a remake of the 1939 comedy The Women.
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Glory
Title: Glory
Character: Miz Agnes Tilbee
Released: January 11, 1956
Type: Movie
A lovesick girl and her grandfather groom their filly for the Kentucky Derby.
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Oklahoma!
Title: Oklahoma!
Character: Aunt Eller
Released: October 10, 1955
Type: Movie
In the Oklahoma territory at the turn of the twentieth century, two young cowboys vie with a violent ranch hand and a traveling peddler for the hearts of the women they love.
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Dangerous When Wet
Title: Dangerous When Wet
Character: Ma Higgins
Released: June 18, 1953
Type: Movie
The health conscious, dairy-farming Higgins family begin each day with an invigorating swim. One day, traveling health-tonic salesman, Windy Weebe, comes to town and suggests they could swim the English Channel. Sponsored by "Liquapep" and coached by Windy, the family arrive in Europe. There it is decided that daughter Katie is the only one strong enough to enter the contest. But while she should be focused on the difficult and risky task ahead, Katie is pursed by dashing Frenchman, André Lanet... This comedic musical is well remembered for the scene when Katie dreams she is swimming with cartoon characters Tom & Jerry!
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Peggy
Title: Peggy
Character: Mrs. Emilia Fielding
Released: July 1, 1950
Type: Movie
Professor Brookfield along with daughters Peggy and Susan move to small town Pasadena, California. Their new neighbor Mrs. Fielding helps them move in, and urges the girls to participate in the annual Rose Bowl beauty pageant. Meanwhile Mrs. Fielding's son Tom makes eyes at Peggy but she's smitten with a famous football star so she tries to redirect his interest to Susan.
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Oh, You Beautiful Doll
Title: Oh, You Beautiful Doll
Character: Anna
Released: November 11, 1949
Type: Movie
Period musical about a song plugger who vows to turn an opera composer's music into popular hits.
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The Great Dan Patch
Title: The Great Dan Patch
Character: Aunt Netty
Released: July 22, 1949
Type: Movie
David Palmer, a young chemist, returns to his father's Indiana farm, to marry a local school teacher, Ruth Treadwell. David meets again his father's horse-trainer, Ben Lathrop, whose daughter, Cissy, has left high school to help her father. Palmer marries and becomes wealthy through an invention, and is able to indulge his socially-ambitious wife. His father dies and Palmer returns to Indiana, where his interest in harness-racing is rekindled, as is his interest in Cissy Lathrop.
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Driftwood
Title: Driftwood
Character: Mathilda
Released: September 15, 1947
Type: Movie
An orphan helps a doctor fight an epidemic in a small western town, in one of Allan Dwan’s closely observed studies in Americana.
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Wake Up and Dream
Title: Wake Up and Dream
Character: Sara March
Released: December 2, 1946
Type: Movie
Aided by her eccentric friends, a young woman goes looking for her missing brother.
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Up in Mabel's Room
Title: Up in Mabel's Room
Character: Martha
Released: September 12, 1944
Type: Movie
Newly-married Gary Ainsworth (Dennis O'Keefe) once gave his former sweetheart Mabel (Gail Patrick) a sexy negligee with his initials embroidered in the lacework. It is Gary's unenviable task to retrieve the incriminating undergarment from Mabel's room before his wife Geraldine (Marjorie Reynolds) gets wise.
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Home in Indiana
Title: Home in Indiana
Character: Penelope 'Penny' Bolt
Released: June 15, 1944
Type: Movie
'Sparke' Thorton, a lad with a penchant for trouble, is sent to live with his Uncle and Aunt Bolt in Indiana after his Aunt Henrietta Bolt dies. Though he's not happy about the arrangement at first, his love of horses and his affection for a young filly that he plans to race make life bearable. He also finds romance with tomboyish 'Char' Bruce who shares his love for horses.
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The Gang's All Here
Title: The Gang's All Here
Character: Mrs. Peyton Potter
Released: December 24, 1943
Type: Movie
A soldier falls for a chorus girl and then experiences trouble when he is posted to the Pacific.
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Dixie Dugan
Title: Dixie Dugan
Character: Mrs. Dugan
Released: March 12, 1943
Type: Movie
Roger Hudson, a wealthy businessman who has moved to Washington to work for the government as a "dollar a year man," is late for a radio broadcast about his new department, the Mobilization of Woman Power for War. He takes a cab driven by Dixie Dugan, who hopes that being a cabbie while the country's men are away fighting will help the war effort. Her incompetent driving, however, results in an accident for which Roger must take responsibility in order to reach the radio station in time. Dixie then returns home, where she lives with her father Timothy, who is constantly practicing his air raid warden duties, her mother Gladys, an aspiring Red Cross worker, and cousin Imogene, who studies incessantly to become a "quiz kid." The Dugans rent out their spare rooms to Dixie's fiancé, Matt Hogan, and to blustering Judge J. J. Lawson. Matt, who works in a munitions factory, wants Dixie to settle down and marry him, but Dixie is determined to help her country.
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Springtime in the Rockies
Title: Springtime in the Rockies
Character: Phoebe Gray
Released: November 6, 1942
Type: Movie
Broadway partners Vicky Lane and Dan Christy have a tiff over Christy's womanizing. Jealous Vicky takes up with her old flame and former dance partner, Victor Price, and Dan's career takes a nosedive. In hopes of rekindling their romance and getting Vicky back on the boards with him, Dan follows her to a ritzy resort in the Canadian Rockies, where she and Victor are about to open their new act. But things get complicated when Dan wakes after a bender to find that he's hired an outlandish Latin secretary, Rosita Murphy, which makes Vicky think he's just up to his old tricks again.
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The Perfect Snob
Title: The Perfect Snob
Character: Martha Mason
Released: December 19, 1941
Type: Movie
When a small town veterinarian discovers that his just-graduated daughter is a gold-digging elitist, he devises a plan to help her rediscover old-fashioned family values.
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Moon Over Miami
Title: Moon Over Miami
Character: Aunt Susan 'Sue' Latimer
Released: July 4, 1941
Type: Movie
After losing nearly all of an inheritance to taxes, sisters Kay and Barbara Latimer, waitresses at a drive-in restaurant in Texas, scheme to find rich husbands. With the aid of their aunt Susan, the sisters take the last of their money and head to a well-known Miami resort where they soon meet two wealthy young men, Phil and Jeff, who begin a fierce rivalry for Kay, not realizing that Barbara has fallen in love with one of them.
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Tall, Dark and Handsome
Title: Tall, Dark and Handsome
Character: Winnie Sage
Released: January 24, 1941
Type: Movie
Robin Hoodish gangster in 1929 Chicago is an object of affection, kind to New York hood and bad to a bad crook.
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Down Argentine Way
Title: Down Argentine Way
Character: Binnie Crawford
Released: October 11, 1940
Type: Movie
The story—in which an American heiress on holiday in South America falls in love with an Argentine horse breeder against the wishes of their families—takes a backseat to the spectacular location shooting and parade of extravagant musical numbers, which include the larger-than-life Carmen Miranda singing the hit “South American Way” and a showstopping dance routine by the always amazing Nicholas Brothers.
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Young People
Title: Young People
Character: Kit Ballantine
Released: August 30, 1940
Type: Movie
Wendy Ballantine's parents decide to retire from show biz so she can have a normal life. They are unwelcome in the small town until a storm lets the family show their stuff.
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Star Dust
Title: Star Dust
Character: Lola Langdon
Released: April 6, 1940
Type: Movie
When Hollywood film studios reject her because she's too young, an Arkansas woman sets out to build a career as an actress on her own.
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Orders Is Orders
Title: Orders Is Orders
Character: Wanda Sinclair
Released: July 18, 1933
Type: Movie
A brash American movie producer arrives at an army base in England wanting to shoot a movie and use the soldiers as extras. The base commander doesn't want any part of it, but the producer and his secretary cook up a scheme to trick the officer into letting him use the base and its men. Their plan succeeds, but things don't turn out quite the way they were expecting.
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Cheaters at Play
Title: Cheaters at Play
Character: Mrs. Crozier
Released: January 27, 1932
Type: Movie
Modest picture centering on a blunderous jewel heist aboard an ocean liner.
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The Christmas Party
Title: The Christmas Party
Character: Herself
Released: December 17, 1931
Type: Movie
In this holiday short, Jackie Cooper wants to throw a Christmas party for his friends on his football team but doesn't know how to go about it. His fellow stars at MGM help him out.
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Flying High
Title: Flying High
Character: Pansy Potts
Released: November 14, 1931
Type: Movie
An inventor and his lanky girlfriend set an altitude record in his winged contraption.
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Palmy Days
Title: Palmy Days
Character: Helen Martin
Released: September 23, 1931
Type: Movie
Musical comedy antics in an art deco bakery (motto: "Glorifying the American Doughnut") where Eddie Cantor, the overworked assistant to a phony psychic, is mistaken for an efficiency expert and placed in charge. Complications ensue when the psychic and his gang attempt to rob the payroll.
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The Man in Possession
Title: The Man in Possession
Character: Clara
Released: July 4, 1931
Type: Movie
A deeply in debt heiress tries to land a rich man while a collector from the Sheriff's office is guarding the assets in her house.
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Stepping Out
Title: Stepping Out
Character: Sally Smith
Released: April 11, 1931
Type: Movie
After catching their husbands with other women, two wives go on a girls-only vacation.
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Parlor, Bedroom and Bath
Title: Parlor, Bedroom and Bath
Character: Polly Hathaway
Released: February 28, 1931
Type: Movie
Jeffrey Haywood wants to marry to Virginia Embrey. However, Virginia refused to marry unless her older sister, the hard-to-please Angelica gets married first. Angelica, in turn, finds every man she knows too dull and predictable, and for this reason prefers to stay single. Jeff then tries to make Angelica interested in the mild-mannered and timid Reggie Irving passing him off as a notorious playboy to intrigue her. He asks his friend Polly to teach Reggie "how to treat a woman right", but he turns to be a disastrous learner.
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Girls Will Be Boys
Title: Girls Will Be Boys
Released: January 21, 1931
Type: Movie
A wife demands that her husband take over the household responsibilities, while she does his job, unaware that he is a piano mover. They both land in the hospital, sadder and sicker as a result of their experience.
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Love Your Neighbor
Title: Love Your Neighbor
Released: October 12, 1930
Type: Movie
After a woman experiences what happens to her when she joins the "Do a Good Deed a Day" Club, she feels like murdering the president of the organization.
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So Long Letty
Title: So Long Letty
Character: Letty Robbins
Released: October 16, 1929
Type: Movie
Uncle Claude comes to the Ardmore Beach Hotel to see Tommy and his wife. At the hotel, with his two granddaughters Ruth and Sally, Uncle Claude meets a wise talking employee named Letty, which causes him to leave the hotel. When he finds Tommy, he mistakes Grace for his wife and likes her and the way she keeps a clean house. To get a big check from Uncle Claude and to see how life is with the other, the two couples switch spouses for a week.
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Baby Mine
Title: Baby Mine
Character: Emma
Released: January 8, 1928
Type: Movie
Remake of the 1917 film of the same name. A young chiropractor is tricked by a tall, homely girl into marriage, but he ducks out the morning after the honeymoon. Months go by and he learns that his bride has become a mother. Obliged to his responsibilities, he returns. however, it's just another ruse, with three borrowed babies and a midget dressed as one standing in for his new children.