Susan Peters

Susan Peters

Born: July 3, 1921
Died: October 23, 1952
in Spokane, Washington, USA
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Susan Peters (born Suzanne Carnahan; July 3, 1921 – October 23, 1952) was an American film, stage, and television actress who appeared in over twenty films over the course of her decade-long career.

In 1942, the year she signed a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), Peters had a featured role in the Mervyn LeRoy-directed drama Random Harvest. That role earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress and established her as a serious dramatic performer. Peters went on to appear as the lead in numerous films for MGM, including roles in the romantic comedy Young Ideas (1943), and several war films: Assignment in Brittany (1943), Song of Russia (1944), and Keep Your Powder Dry (1945).

On New Year's Day 1945, Peters's spinal cord was damaged from an accidental gunshot wound, leaving her permanently paraplegic. She returned to film portraying a wheelchair-bound villain in The Sign of the Ram (1948). Peters then transitioned to theater, appearing as Laura Wingfield in a critically acclaimed 1949 production of Tennessee Williams's The Glass Menagerie. She followed this with a production of The Barretts of Wimpole Street, in which she portrayed crippled poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

By 1952, however, Peters had been suffering from clinical depression for several years due to the dissolution of her marriage and her limited career options. In late 1952 she began starving herself, which combined with her paralysis led to chronic kidney infections and pneumonia. She died of ensuing health complications that year at age 31.

Movies for Susan Peters...

Title: The Huntress
Released: July 26, 2000
Type: TV
The Huntress is an American TV series that appeared on the USA Network over subsequent summers of the 2000 and 2001 television seasons. It was inspired by a book about the real bounty hunter, Dottie Thorson, and is also a belated sequel to the 1980 Steve McQueen film, The Hunter.
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Title: Miss Susan
Character: Susan Martin
Released: March 12, 1951
Type: TV
Miss Susan is a daytime drama which aired on NBC from March 12 to December 28, 1951. The show, originating from Philadelphia and later retitled Martinsville, U.S.A., aired for fifteen minutes at 3:00 p.m. ET on weekdays. The main writer was William Kendall Clarke.
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The Sign of the Ram
Title: The Sign of the Ram
Character: Leah St. Aubyn
Released: March 3, 1948
Type: Movie
A wheelchair-bound woman manipulates her family to a point where they suspect she may be unhinged.
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Keep Your Powder Dry
Title: Keep Your Powder Dry
Character: Ann Darrison
Released: April 1, 1945
Type: Movie
A debutante, a serviceman's bride and a girl from a military family join the Women's Army Corps.
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Song of Russia
Title: Song of Russia
Character: Nadya Stepanova
Released: February 10, 1944
Type: Movie
American conductor John Meredith and his manager, Hank Higgins, go to Russia shortly before the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union. Meredith falls in love with beautiful Soviet pianist Nadya Stepanova while they travel throughout the country on a 40-city tour. Along the way, they see happy, healthy, smiling, free Soviet citizens, blissfully living the Communist dream. This bliss is destroyed by the German invasion.
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Twenty Years After
Title: Twenty Years After
Character: (archive footage)
Released: January 1, 1944
Type: Movie
This short celebrates the 20th anniversary of MGM. Segments are shown from several early hits, then from a number of 1944 releases.
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Young Ideas
Title: Young Ideas
Character: Susan Evans
Released: August 2, 1943
Type: Movie
A widow's grown children try to break up her romance with a college professor.
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Assignment in Brittany
Title: Assignment in Brittany
Character: Anne Pinot
Released: March 11, 1943
Type: Movie
A French Resistance fighter discovers he's a dead ringer for a Nazi official.
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Random Harvest
Title: Random Harvest
Character: Kitty
Released: December 17, 1942
Type: Movie
An amnesiac World War I vet falls in love with a music hall star, only to suffer an accident which restores his original memories but erases his post-War life.
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Andy Hardy's Double Life
Title: Andy Hardy's Double Life
Character: Sue
Released: December 1, 1942
Type: Movie
Andy is about to head off to college but he's got a few things to take care of before leaving. For starters, he must try and sell his junk car for $20 to pay for a bill and he must convince his father not to go with him to college. Worst of all is that Polly wants to make up but her best friend decides to give Andy a test.
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Dr. Gillespie's New Assistant
Title: Dr. Gillespie's New Assistant
Character: Mrs. Howard Allwinn Young
Released: November 1, 1942
Type: Movie
The doctor (Lionel Barrymore) has a Kansan (Van Johnson), an Australian and an Asian from Brooklyn to choose from.
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Tish
Title: Tish
Character: Cora Edwards Bowser
Released: September 17, 1942
Type: Movie
In this comedy, the town gossip fills her time running the lives of others. Naturally, she is also a matchmaker.
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The Big Shot
Title: The Big Shot
Character: Ruth Carter
Released: June 13, 1942
Type: Movie
Duke Berne, former big shot but now a three-time loser, fears returning to crime because a fourth conviction will mean a life sentence. Finally, haunted by his past and goaded by his cohorts, he joins in planning an armoured car robbery.
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Personalities
Title: Personalities
Character: (uncredited)
Released: January 1, 1942
Type: Movie
In this "Romance of Celluloid", MGM showcases performers whose careers are just starting. Excerpts from their recently released films are included. The narrator says that moviegoers will have to decide whether these fledgling actors and actresses have that certain quality that made superstars out of MGM players Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, and Lana Turner.
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Three Sons o' Guns
Title: Three Sons o' Guns
Character: Mary Tyler
Released: August 2, 1941
Type: Movie
Three reckless brothers dodge the draft then sign up and become men.
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Scattergood Pulls the Strings
Title: Scattergood Pulls the Strings
Character: Ruth Savage
Released: May 23, 1941
Type: Movie
Small-town store owner Scattergood Baines helps a runaway boy find his father, who has escaped after being unjustly imprisoned, and a young chemist who is trying to invent a color television but is being opposed by his girlfriend's father, who wants the girl to marry a pharmacist like himself instead of some crazy inventor.
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Here Comes Happiness
Title: Here Comes Happiness
Character: Miss Brown (uncredited)
Released: March 15, 1941
Type: Movie
Jessica leaves her upper class home to assume an anonymous working class identity. She meets a blue collar guy, Chet and falls in love with the poor but ambitious man. Chet observes a series of suspicious, clandestine meetings with her rich father and his chauffeur which makes him think she is stringing along a "Sugar Daddy" on the side. Financial trickery and sequences of misunderstandings and coincidences culminate with a wedding that turns out much differently than planned.
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Santa Fe Trail
Title: Santa Fe Trail
Character: Charlotte
Released: December 20, 1940
Type: Movie
As a penalty for fighting fellow classmates days before graduating from West Point, J.E.B. Stuart, George Armstrong Custer and four friends are assigned to the 2nd Cavalry, stationed at Fort Leavenworth. While there they aid in the capture and execution of the abolitionist, John Brown following the Battle of Harper's Ferry.
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Always a Bride
Title: Always a Bride
Character: Girl
Released: November 2, 1940
Type: Movie
A young man wants to marry his sweetheart, but her parents will agree to their wedding only on one condition: he must run for mayor--and win. Comedy.
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Money and the Woman
Title: Money and the Woman
Character: Depositor (uncredited)
Released: August 17, 1940
Type: Movie
An embezzler's wife begs his boss for forgiveness, only to fall in love with him.
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Young America Flies
Title: Young America Flies
Character: One of Jack's Girlfriends
Released: July 13, 1940
Type: Movie
World War II propaganda film from Warner Brothers.
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Susan and God
Title: Susan and God
Character: Party Guest (uncredited)
Released: June 7, 1940
Type: Movie
A flighty socialite neglects her family to promote a new religious group.