Zeffie Tilbury

Zeffie Tilbury

Born: November 18, 1863
Died: July 24, 1950
in Paddington, London, England, UK
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Zeffie Agnes Lydia Tilbury (November 20, 1863 – July 24, 1950) was an English actress.

Tilbury was known first on the London stage and on Broadway in New York City. In 1881, she debuted on stage in Nine Points of the Law at the Theatre Royal, Brighton, England.

She is today best known for playing wise or evil older characters in films, such as the distinguished lady gambler at dinner with Garbo in The Single Standard, as the pitiful Grandma Joad in The Grapes of Wrath and Grandma Lester in Tobacco Road.

She appeared in over 70 films. Her earliest surviving silent film is the Valentino / Nazimova 1921 production of Camille. Tilbury is probably best remembered as the old lady who is befriended by Spanky and his friends on her birthday and, as a result, is transformed from a lonely, disagreeable recluse to a happy and loving carefree soul in the 1936 Hal Roach Our Gang comedy Second Childhood. In the same year she also portrayed the Gypsy Queen in the Laurel and Hardy film The Bohemian Girl.

Tilbury was married twice. First to Arthur Frederick Lewis in June, 1887, and later to L. E. Woodthorpe, who died on April 8, 1915. She died in Los Angeles, California in 1950 at the age of 86.

Movies for Zeffie Tilbury...

Sheriff of Tombstone
Title: Sheriff of Tombstone
Character: Granny Carson
Released: May 7, 1941
Type: Movie
The mayor has sent for a gunslinger who, though appearing to clean up the town, is really to be the mayor's means of taking the town over. When Roy and Gabby arrive in Tombstone, Roy is mistaken for the gunslinger. Just as Roy is ready to expose the mayor, the real gunslinger shows up.
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Tobacco Road
Title: Tobacco Road
Character: Grandma Lester
Released: February 20, 1941
Type: Movie
Shiftless Jeeter Lester and his family of sharecroppers live in rural Georgia where their ancestors were once wealthy planters. Their slapstick existence is threatened by a bank's plans to take over the land for more profitable farming.
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She Couldn't Say No
Title: She Couldn't Say No
Character: Ma Hawkins
Released: December 7, 1940
Type: Movie
Two big city lawyers are handed an important case but then find it requires them to deal with the oddball and very shrewd characters in a small town.
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The Grapes of Wrath
Title: The Grapes of Wrath
Character: Grandma Joad
Released: March 15, 1940
Type: Movie
Tom Joad returns to his home after a jail sentence to find his family kicked out of their farm due to foreclosure. He catches up with them on his Uncle’s farm, and joins them the next day as they head for California and a new life... Hopefully.
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The Earl of Chicago
Title: The Earl of Chicago
Character: Miss Nana (uncredited)
Released: January 5, 1940
Type: Movie
A behind the times Chicago bootlegger goes to England with his lawyer to claim his estate as the Earl of Gorley.
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Emergency Squad
Title: Emergency Squad
Character: Mrs. Cobb
Released: January 5, 1940
Type: Movie
Betty Bryant is an ambitious newspaper reporter in love with Dan Barton, a member of a big-city Emergency Squad who are trained to deal with riots, cave-in, explosions, fires and other emergencies where lives are at stake. Slade Wiley, an unscrupulous tunnel builder, finds that his low bid on the Newford Tunnel project is causing him to lose a lot of money, and has underworld leader Nick Burton set off blasts to frighten the stockholders into selling their shares at a low price so he can buy up the stock. Betty is investigating the deal when Wiley and Burton take her on a "tour trip" to the tunnel.
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Balalaika
Title: Balalaika
Character: Natalya Petrovna
Released: December 15, 1939
Type: Movie
A Russian prince disguised as a worker and a cafe singer secretly involved in revolutionary activities fall in love.
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Lady of the Tropics
Title: Lady of the Tropics
Character: Woman Congratulating Manon
Released: August 11, 1939
Type: Movie
Playboy Bill Carey woos a half-caste beauty in French Indochina, but her second-class legal status makes a formidable barrier.
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Tell No Tales
Title: Tell No Tales
Character: Miss Mary
Released: June 12, 1939
Type: Movie
A newspaper editor turns a kidnapping into the banner headlines and exclusive story that could save his publication.
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The Story of Alexander Graham Bell
Title: The Story of Alexander Graham Bell
Character: Mrs. Sanders
Released: April 4, 1939
Type: Movie
Alexander Graham Bell falls in love with deaf girl Mabel Hubbard while teaching the deaf and trying to invent means for telegraphing the human voice. She urges him to put off thoughts of marriage until his experiments are complete. He invents the telephone, marries and becomes rich and famous, though his happiness is threatened when a rival company sets out to ruin him.
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Boy Trouble
Title: Boy Trouble
Character: Mrs. Jepson
Released: January 27, 1939
Type: Movie
A fussy shopkeeper's life drastically changes when his wife takes in two homeless boys.
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Arrest Bulldog Drummond
Title: Arrest Bulldog Drummond
Character: Aunt Meg
Released: November 25, 1938
Type: Movie
The invention of a machine that can cause remote explosions brings the attention of Scotland Yard and Bulldog Drummond.
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Marie Antoinette
Title: Marie Antoinette
Character: Dowager at Birth of Dauphin (uncredited)
Released: August 26, 1938
Type: Movie
The young Austrian princess Marie Antoinette is arranged to marry Louis XVI, future king of France, in a politically advantageous marriage for the rival countries. The opulent Marie indulges in various whims and flirtations. When Louis XV passes and Louis XVI ascends the French throne, his queen's extravagant lifestyle earns the hatred of the French people, who despise her Austrian heritage.
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Woman Against Woman
Title: Woman Against Woman
Character: Grandma
Released: June 24, 1938
Type: Movie
A newlywed unhappily discovers that her husband's scheming ex-wife still has a controlling influence in his life and home.
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Kidnapped
Title: Kidnapped
Character: Old Woman
Released: May 27, 1938
Type: Movie
Robert Louis Stevenson's hero David Balfour joins rebel Alan Breck Stewart in 18th-century Scotland.
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Bulldog Drummond's Peril
Title: Bulldog Drummond's Peril
Character: Mrs. Weevens
Released: March 18, 1938
Type: Movie
Drummond's wedding with Phyllis is interrupted when the inspector guarding their gifts is killed. He tries to trace the killers and uncovers the mystery of diamond counterfeiters.
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Federal Bullets
Title: Federal Bullets
Character: Mrs. Crippen
Released: October 29, 1937
Type: Movie
Federal Bullets is a leisurely paced Monogram crime melodrama with not a few clever plot twists. The FBI, represented by Milburn Stone and William Harrigan, investigates a seemingly respectable charitable organization. In fact, the enterprise is a front for a crime ring, headed by Ma Barker clone Zeffie Tilbury (Trivia note: Ms. Tilbury was totally blind, and had to learn her "blocking" by rote).
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The King Without a Crown
Title: The King Without a Crown
Character: Dying Duchess Marie (uncredited)
Released: October 9, 1937
Type: Movie
This short explores the possibility that Louis XVII, son of King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, escaped death during the French Revolution and was raised by Indians in America.
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Bulldog Drummond Comes Back
Title: Bulldog Drummond Comes Back
Character: Zeffie
Released: September 24, 1937
Type: Movie
Drummond's girlfriend is kidnapped by his enemies and he along with his friend Nielsen, an inspector from Scotland Yard, follow the trail and try to rescue her from the kidnappers.
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It Happened in Hollywood
Title: It Happened in Hollywood
Character: Miss Gordon
Released: September 7, 1937
Type: Movie
A silent Western star has trouble adjusting to the coming of sound.
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Hideaway
Title: Hideaway
Character: Mrs. Beamish
Released: August 13, 1937
Type: Movie
A poor family receives unwanted houseguests when they're visited by gangsters looking for a place to hide out.
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Rhythm in the Clouds
Title: Rhythm in the Clouds
Character: The Duchess de Lovely
Released: June 21, 1937
Type: Movie
Judy Walker is a poor songwriter who, through mistaken identity, gets her songs played on the radio.
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Midnight Taxi
Title: Midnight Taxi
Character: Mrs. Lane
Released: April 4, 1937
Type: Movie
A federal agent goes to work for a taxi company believing it to be a front for a gang of counterfeiters.
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Maid of Salem
Title: Maid of Salem
Character: Goody Hodgers
Released: February 12, 1937
Type: Movie
When a young woman named Barbara Clarke has an affair with adventurer Roger Coverman, it causes a scandal in the Puritanical town of Salem, Massachusetts. After a meddling girl arouses their suspicions, the town's elders accuse Barbara of being a witch. She is tried, convicted of sorcery and sentenced to death. As the townspeople prepare to burn Barbara at the stake, Roger tries desperately to save the woman he loves.
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Bulldog Drummond Escapes
Title: Bulldog Drummond Escapes
Character: Drunk in Jail Cell
Released: January 22, 1937
Type: Movie
Drummond manages to save a woman from jumping in front of his car but she runs away with his car. He traces her and she asks him to help her out of a dangerous situation.
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Under Cover of Night
Title: Under Cover of Night
Character: Mrs. Nash
Released: January 8, 1937
Type: Movie
A detective (Edmund Lowe) trails a professor (Henry Daniell) who stole credit for his wife's research, then killed her.
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After the Thin Man
Title: After the Thin Man
Character: Aunt Lucy (uncredited)
Released: December 25, 1936
Type: Movie
Nick and Nora Charles investigate when Nora's cousin reports her disreputable husband is missing, and find themselves in a mystery involving the shady owners of a popular nightclub, a singer and her dark brother, the cousin's forsaken true love, and Nora's bombastic and controlling aunt.
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Grandma's Buoys
Title: Grandma's Buoys
Character: Grandma
Released: December 18, 1936
Type: Movie
Tom and Harry are sailors on a yacht, and go ashore for a few beers and whatever else may come up. What comes up is a brawl between them and the barflies in the waterfront saloon they go to. They are aided by an elderly lady and her knitting needles.
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Give Me Your Heart
Title: Give Me Your Heart
Character: Esther Warren
Released: September 17, 1936
Type: Movie
An American lawyer's wife is reunited with her child and his father, an English nobleman.
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The Gorgeous Hussy
Title: The Gorgeous Hussy
Character: Mrs. Daniel Beall
Released: August 28, 1936
Type: Movie
It's the early nineteenth century Washington. Young adult Margaret O'Neal, Peggy to most that know her, is the daughter of Major William O'Neal, who is the innkeeper of the establishment where most out-of-town politicians and military men stay when they're in Washington. Peggy is pretty and politically aware. She is courted by several of those politicians and military men who all want to marry her, except for the one with who she is truly in love.
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The White Angel
Title: The White Angel
Character: Woman Donating Sheets (uncredited)
Released: June 25, 1936
Type: Movie
In mid-nineteenth century England the medical establishment does not recognize the value of skilled nurses, cleanliness, nutrition and kindness. Florence Nightingale's heroic measures slowly changes all of this.
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Desire
Title: Desire
Character: Aunt Olga
Released: April 11, 1936
Type: Movie
Madeleine steals a string of pearls in Paris and uses US engineer Tom, who is driving on his vacation to Spain, to get the pearls out of France. But getting the pearls back from him proves to be difficult without falling in love.
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Vamp Till Ready
Title: Vamp Till Ready
Character: Woman
Released: March 28, 1936
Type: Movie
Charley's somewhat prudish wife pretends to be a party girl.
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The Last Days of Pompeii
Title: The Last Days of Pompeii
Character: The Wise Woman (uncredited)
Released: October 18, 1935
Type: Movie
In this action-filled spectacle set in ancient Pompeii, a blacksmith becomes a Roman gladiator, though his rise to wealth and power is jeopardized by his son's Christianity and the eruption of Vesuvius.
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Navy Wife
Title: Navy Wife
Character: Bridge Player
Released: September 17, 1935
Type: Movie
A Hawaiian naval nurse weds a widowed officer partly because he has a crippled daughter.
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Alice Adams
Title: Alice Adams
Character: Mrs. Dresser (uncredited)
Released: August 23, 1935
Type: Movie
In the lower-middle-class Adams family, father and son are happy to work in a drugstore, but mother and daughter Alice try every possible social-climbing stratagem despite snubs and embarrassment. When Alice finally meets her dream man Arthur, mother nags father into a risky business venture and plans to impress Alice's beau with an "upscale" family dinner. Will the excruciating results drive Arthur away?
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Stranded
Title: Stranded
Character: Old Hag (uncredited)
Released: June 29, 1935
Type: Movie
A Traveler's Aid worker who delights in solving people's problems gets mixed up with gangsters.
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Public Hero Number 1
Title: Public Hero Number 1
Character: Deaf Woman in Scottsdale Bar (uncredited)
Released: May 31, 1935
Type: Movie
G-Man Jeff Crane poses as a crook to infiltrate the notorious Purple Gang, a band of hoodlums which preys upon other hoodlums. Orchestrating the jailbreak of the gang's leader, Crane joins him in a Dillinger-like flight across the country.
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Werewolf of London
Title: Werewolf of London
Character: Mrs. Moncaster
Released: May 13, 1935
Type: Movie
A strange animal attack turns a botanist into a bloodthirsty monster.
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The Mystery of Edwin Drood
Title: The Mystery of Edwin Drood
Character: The Opium Woman
Released: February 4, 1935
Type: Movie
A choirmaster addicted to opium and obsessed with a beautiful young woman will stop at nothing to possess her.
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Women Must Dress
Title: Women Must Dress
Character: Peg Martin
Released: February 1, 1935
Type: Movie
A divorced woman finds success as a fashion designer.
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The Fuller Gush Man
Title: The Fuller Gush Man
Character: Grandma
Released: August 16, 1934
Type: Movie
Walter goes to his girlfriend's parents to ask their permission to marry her; but the family puts on an act and pretends to be totally loony.
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Ocean Swells
Title: Ocean Swells
Character: Auntie
Released: August 8, 1934
Type: Movie
A old lady and her 2 girls go husband hunting at a luxury resort.
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Bachelor Bait
Title: Bachelor Bait
Character: Miss Turner (uncredited)
Released: July 27, 1934
Type: Movie
After being fired from his job at the Marriage License Bureau, a clerk turns to matchmaking.
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Mystery Liner
Title: Mystery Liner
Character: Granny Plimpton
Released: March 15, 1934
Type: Movie
Police try to solve a murder on board an ocean liner.
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Two Alone
Title: Two Alone
Character: Rogers' Neighbor (uncredited)
Released: January 26, 1934
Type: Movie
Mazie, a poor orphan girl, is mistreated by cruel farmer Slag and his wife for whom she works. Mazie, who is growing into a woman, does not like they way Slag has been looking at her lately.
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Charlie Chan Carries On
Title: Charlie Chan Carries On
Character: Mrs. Luce
Released: April 11, 1931
Type: Movie
Charlie steps in to solve the murder of a wealthy American found dead in a London hotel. Settings include London, Nice, San Remo, Honolulu and Hong Kong. Fast-paced with lots of wisecracking. The first film to star Warner Oland as Charlie Chan.
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The Ship from Shanghai
Title: The Ship from Shanghai
Character: Lady Daley
Released: January 31, 1930
Type: Movie
On a yacht sailing from Shanghai to the United States, the sailors, led by the megalomaniac steward, revolt and take control.
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The Single Standard
Title: The Single Standard
Character: Mrs. Handley
Released: July 27, 1929
Type: Movie
A bored socialite finds fleeting romance with an artist.
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Camille
Title: Camille
Character: Prudence
Released: September 26, 1921
Type: Movie
Camille is a courtesan in Paris. She falls deeply in love with a young man of promise, Armand Duval. When Armand's father begs her not to ruin his hope of a career and position by marrying Armand, she acquiesces and leaves her lover. However, when poverty and terminal illness overwhelm her, Camille discovers that Armand has not lost his love for her.
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Mothers of Men
Title: Mothers of Men
Character: Mrs. De La Motte
Released: March 10, 1920
Type: Movie
Young Austrian girl Marie Helmar, is left penniless by the death of her father and disgraced by Prussian officer Captain Von Pfaffen, she flees to the safety of her French cousins, the De La Mottes. There she falls in love with their eldest son Gerome. On the night before their wedding, Marie sends a letter to Gerome confessing her indiscretion with the Prussian, but the letter is returned unopened. Soon after, she recognizes a new household servant to be Von Pfaffen, who demands that Marie disclose war secrets in return for his silence about her past. Torn, she passes on false information, which disgraces the Prussian. In revenge, he attempts to kill Marie, but she shoots him in self-defense. Shaken by remorse, Marie presents Gerome with her confession, which, he then reveals, he had read the night of their wedding. Their life thus unclouded, Marie announces she is expecting Gerome's child.
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A Society Exile
Title: A Society Exile
Character: Mrs. Stanley Shelby
Released: October 7, 1919
Type: Movie
Nora Shard, a young American girl living in England, is ostracized from society for her presumed part in a scandal which culminated in a murder-suicide by a nobleman and his wife. Nora disguises her identity and goes to Italy, where she finds happiness - until the spectre of the past is raised.
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The Avalanche
Title: The Avalanche
Character: Mrs. Ruyler
Released: June 29, 1919
Type: Movie
A woman with a gambling addiction finds that her daughter is threatened by the same tendencies.