Lupe Vélez

Lupe Vélez

Born: July 18, 1908
Died: December 13, 1944
in San Luis Potosí, San Luis Potosí, Mexico
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Lupe Vélez (July 18, 1908 – December 13, 1944), was a Mexican and American stage and film actress, comedian, dancer and vedette.

Vélez began her career as a performer in Mexican vaudeville in the early 1920s. After moving to the United States, she made her first film appearance in a short film in 1927. By the end of the decade, in the last years of American silent films, she had progressed to leading roles in numerous movies like El Gaucho (1927), Lady of the Pavements (1928) and Wolf Song (1929), among others. She was one of the first successful Latin American actresses in the United States. During the 1930s, her well-known explosive screen persona was exploited in a series of successful films like Hot Pepper (1933), Strictly Dynamite (1934) and Hollywood Party (1934). In the 1940s, Vélez's popularity peaked after appearing in the Mexican Spitfire films, a series created to capitalize on Vélez's well-documented fiery personality.

Nicknamed The Mexican Spitfire by the media, Vélez's personal life was as colorful as her screen persona. She had several highly publicized romances and a stormy marriage. In December 1944, Vélez died of an intentional overdose of Seconal. Her death, and the circumstances surrounding it, have been the subject of speculation and controversy.

 

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Movies for Lupe Vélez...

The Casting Couch
Title: The Casting Couch
Character: (archive footage)
Released: January 1, 1995
Type: Movie
An unprecedented anthology of never-before-told true stories by and about some of Hollywood's most interesting stars, legends, and wannabes, and takes readers inside Hollywood's inner sanctum to show how casting decisions are made, who makes them, and who has the final word.
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That's Entertainment! III
Title: That's Entertainment! III
Character: (archive footage)
Released: July 1, 1994
Type: Movie
Some of MGM'S musical stars review the studios history of musicals. From The Hollywood Revue of 1929 to Brigadoon, from the first musical talkies to Gene Kelly in Singin' in the Rain.
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The Big Parade of Comedy
Title: The Big Parade of Comedy
Character: Self in 'Hollywood Party' (archive footage)
Released: September 2, 1964
Type: Movie
Film clips highlight the funniest scenes and brightest comic stars in MGM's history.
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Naná
Title: Naná
Character: Naná
Released: June 2, 1944
Type: Movie
Based in the Émile Zola novel of the same name, which details the life of Nana, a French prostitute of the 19th century.
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Mexican Spitfire's Blessed Event
Title: Mexican Spitfire's Blessed Event
Character: Carmelita Lindsay
Released: July 14, 1943
Type: Movie
Dennis mistakenly believes Carmelita is going to have a baby. Little does he know that the blessed event is her cat's new kittens.
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Redhead from Manhattan
Title: Redhead from Manhattan
Character: Rita Manners / Elaine Manners
Released: May 6, 1943
Type: Movie
Lupe Vélez plays a dual role, twin sisters Rita and Elaine. After escaping a torpedoed ship, Rita shows up in Manhattan, where she takes the place of her Broadway-star twin sister Elaine, who's having problems with her marriage and needs to make a getaway. Neither Elaine's husband or Rita's saxophone-player boyfriend are aware of the switch.
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Ladies' Day
Title: Ladies' Day
Character: Pepita Zorita
Released: April 9, 1943
Type: Movie
A top baseball pitcher "loses" his pitching skills whenever he falls in love. After marrying a movie star extreme measures are taken for the benefit of the team.
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Mexican Spitfire's Elephant
Title: Mexican Spitfire's Elephant
Character: Carmelita Lindsay
Released: September 17, 1942
Type: Movie
A pair of shipboard smugglers have a large diamond hidden inside a small elephant statuette, which they plant on absentminded Lord Epping to get it past customs. Now, his lordship is visiting Uncle Matt Lindsay who looks just like him. Thanks to flirtatious Diana's efforts to get the elephant back, the comic confusion proliferates, with 'spitfire' Carmelita (now a blonde) playing a prominent part.
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Mexican Spitfire Sees a Ghost
Title: Mexican Spitfire Sees a Ghost
Character: Carmelita Lindsay
Released: June 26, 1942
Type: Movie
Carmelita and Uncle Matt find themselves in a haunted house, but the "ghosts" are actually enemy agents who are trying to frighten away visitors in order to develop a nitroglycerin bomb.
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Mexican Spitfire at Sea
Title: Mexican Spitfire at Sea
Character: Carmelita Lindsay
Released: March 13, 1942
Type: Movie
An advertising executive and his temperamental wife sail to Hawaii in search of business. The fifth entry (of eight) in the "Mexican Spitfire" comedy series.
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Playmates
Title: Playmates
Character: Carmen del Toro
Released: December 26, 1941
Type: Movie
Lulu Monahan, the press agent for John Barrymore, is attempting to get a sponsor for a radio program. To that end, she and the agent for bandleader Kay Kyser, plant a story that the great Shakespearean actor, over his heartfelt objections, will teach Kyser how to play Shakespeare, which isn't the same as playing Paducah, which soon becomes evident.
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Honolulu Lu
Title: Honolulu Lu
Character: Consuelo Cordoba aka Honolulu Lu
Released: December 11, 1941
Type: Movie
While in Hawaii, Velez begins the film as a risque nightclub act and due to her involvement with a group of sailors becomes a beauty queen.
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The Mexican Spitfire's Baby
Title: The Mexican Spitfire's Baby
Character: Carmelita Lindsay
Released: November 28, 1941
Type: Movie
An advertising executive and his temperamental wife adopt a war orphan who turns out to be a beautiful woman.
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Screen Snapshots Series 21 No. 1
Title: Screen Snapshots Series 21 No. 1
Character: Self
Released: August 15, 1941
Type: Movie
This edition of Screen Snapshots has more of a vaudeville flavor as opposed to Ralph Staub's usual candid-camera at home with the stars offerings. Ken Murray, assisted by the Brewer Twins, is the MC, while the Andrews Sisters sing "In Apple Blossom Time" and the pre-"Uncle Miltie" Milton Berle plays his clarinet. The rest of the players, with contract-player faces belonging to 20th-Century Fox, RKO Radio, Universal and Columbia, just pass through. Production Number 3851.
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Six Lessons From Madame La Zonga
Title: Six Lessons From Madame La Zonga
Character: Madame La Zonga
Released: January 17, 1941
Type: Movie
The brash, opinionated owner of a nightclub manages to drive everybody crazy on a boat trip to Havana.
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Mexican Spitfire Out West
Title: Mexican Spitfire Out West
Character: Carmelita Lindsay
Released: October 29, 1940
Type: Movie
Dennis heads west to work on an important business deal minus the Mexican Spitfire, Carmelita. His hot-tempered spouse decides to surprise him, but ends up as the surprised one when she sees him with another woman. Instead of a second honeymoon, Carmelita begins divorce proceedings
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Mexican Spitfire
Title: Mexican Spitfire
Character: Carmelita Lindsay
Released: January 12, 1940
Type: Movie
Newlyweds Dennis and Carmelita have several obstacles to deal with in their new marriage: Carmelita's fiery Latin temper, a meddling aunt and a conniving ex-fiancee who's determined to break up their marriage.
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The Girl from Mexico
Title: The Girl from Mexico
Character: Carmelita Fuentes
Released: June 1, 1939
Type: Movie
Carmelita Fuentes is a fiery-Latin singer/dancer in Mexico City who has designs on Dennis Lindsay, an American publicity agent, for unclear reasons, while Lindsay's shiftless uncle Matthew Lindsay aids and abets her every step of the way to the marriage altar.
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Stardust
Title: Stardust
Character: Carla de Huelva
Released: March 25, 1938
Type: Movie
Carla de Hulvea is a rumba dancer who makes news by posing as a South-American heiress. She is doing fine with her hoax until she meets American Peter Jackson, a high-pressure promoter who is looking for movie-producing money. He does some big-time bluffing on his own in order to get Carla to invest in a film he is making with his partner, Roy Harley. Through Carla, Roy meets actress Diana West, who is given a role in the movie, and Roy falls in love with her.
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La zandunga
Title: La zandunga
Character: Lupe
Released: March 18, 1938
Type: Movie
It is the story of a beautiful Tehuana woman who falls in love with a sailor who leaves with the promise of returning, but due to her delay she decides to accept a former suitor as her husband. Finally, when the marriage is about to materialize, the sailor returns creating an emotional conflict in her that is resolved thanks to her fiancé who, by intuiting her true feelings, leaves her free to stay with the sailor
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High Flyers
Title: High Flyers
Character: Juanita - the Maid
Released: November 7, 1937
Type: Movie
Two men running a carnival airplane ride are hired to fly to retrieve what they think are photos for a reporter. Actually, they are retrieving diamonds stolen from a noted gem dealer. As it turns out, their plane crashes on the very estate of the dealer. Thinking the duo are police officers, the dealer offers his home for their convalescence from the accident. Meanwhile, the diamonds have been snatched by a kleptomaniac dog and buried on the estate. When the smugglers track down the pair, they try to convince the dealer that they are officials from an institution from which the two have escaped. Before long, the carnival fellows, the crooks, the gem dealer and his family, along with a platoon of cops, are tearing up the grounds to find where the dog has buried the diamonds.
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Gypsy Melody
Title: Gypsy Melody
Character: Mila
Released: July 27, 1936
Type: Movie
Due to a complex series of events a Guards Officer in a small European country is imprisoned. He manages to escape in the company of an idiotic milliner and they briefly take shelter with some gypsies, where the Captain falls in love with a young woman. Having been discovered by an American promoter while performing with gypsy orchestra in a tavern, the three accompany him to London as the latest new musical sensation. A great success, they begin a European-wide tour when their plane is forced down by bad weather in their homeland. Here events are satisfactorily resolved.
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The Morals of Marcus
Title: The Morals of Marcus
Character: Carlotta
Released: February 11, 1935
Type: Movie
A confirmed bachelor takes pity on a young woman and takes her to London.
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Hollywood Party
Title: Hollywood Party
Character: Lupe Vélez
Released: May 24, 1934
Type: Movie
Jimmy Durante is jungle movie star Schnarzan the Conqueror, but the public is tiring of his fake lions. When Baron Munchausen comes to town with real man-eating lions, Durante throws him a big Hollywood star-studded party so that he might use the lions in his next movie. But, his film rival sneaks into the party to buy the lions before Durante.
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Strictly Dynamite
Title: Strictly Dynamite
Character: Vera
Released: May 11, 1934
Type: Movie
A failed poet ends up becoming a gag writer for a bombastic comedian.
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Laughing Boy
Title: Laughing Boy
Character: Slim Girl
Released: April 13, 1934
Type: Movie
A young Navajo defies tribal custom to marry an outcast.
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Hollywood on Parade No. B-1
Title: Hollywood on Parade No. B-1
Released: March 2, 1934
Type: Movie
Short film in which Frankie Darro as a Telegram delivery boy visits various Hollywood locations to make deliveries. He visits the Los Angeles Pier and a Gala Hollywood Premiere.
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Palooka
Title: Palooka
Character: Nina Madero
Released: January 26, 1934
Type: Movie
Joe Palooka is a naive young man whose father Pete was a champion boxer, but his lifestyle caused Joe's mother Mayme to leave him and to take young Joe to the country to raise him.
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Mr. Broadway
Title: Mr. Broadway
Character: Lupe Vélez
Released: September 12, 1933
Type: Movie
Ed Sullivan shows night spots all over New York in this movie, joking and listening to stories the patrons tell.
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Hot Pepper
Title: Hot Pepper
Character: Pepper
Released: January 15, 1933
Type: Movie
In this comedy, a pair of ex-Marines team up and get involved in a nightclub. Trouble ensues when they both fall in love with a feisty woman and begin fighting over her.
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The Half-Naked Truth
Title: The Half-Naked Truth
Character: Teresita
Released: December 16, 1932
Type: Movie
A barker at a down-at-the-heels carnival becomes a powerhouse New York publicity man as he transforms a sideshow dancer into a Broadway sensation.
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Kongo
Title: Kongo
Character: Tula
Released: October 1, 1932
Type: Movie
The ruthless Flint, a disabled man, rules an isolated region of Kongo like an omnipotent god, through superstition and sadism, living only for the day when he can get revenge on the man who ruined his life.
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The Broken Wing
Title: The Broken Wing
Character: Lolita
Released: March 25, 1932
Type: Movie
In a little Mexican village by the American border. However powerful big shot Captain Innocencio (a misnomer indeed!)is, he proves unable to charm Lolita, the shapely daughter of his neighbor, a big-time rancher. Lolita expects better than this awkward unprepossessing showoff! Besides the fortune-teller she consults tells her her true love will get into her life after a terrible storm. This very night a violent storm does break out and an American pilot, whose plane is caught in it, is forced to make an emergency landing next to where she lives. The gringo - by the name of Phil Marvin - is both dashing and good-looking. Good news for Lolita but bad news for Innocencio who is not ready to bow that easily...
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The men in my life
Title: The men in my life
Character: Julia Clark
Released: February 13, 1932
Type: Movie
Alternate-language version of Men in Her Life (1931)
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The Cuban Love Song
Title: The Cuban Love Song
Character: Nenita
Released: November 18, 1931
Type: Movie
A guilt-ridden U.S. Marine returns to Cuba to try to find the woman he promised to marry.
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The Squaw Man
Title: The Squaw Man
Character: Naturich
Released: July 21, 1931
Type: Movie
Jim Wyngate, an English aristocrat, comes to the American West under a cloud of suspicion for embezzlement actually committed by his cousin Lord Henry. In Wyoming, Wyngate runs afoul of cattle rustler Cash Hawkins by rescuing the Indian girl Naturich from Hawkins. Wyngate marries Naturich, but then learns that his cousin Lord Henry has been killed and has cleared his name before dying. As Wyngate has long loved Lady Diana, Lord Henry's wife, he is perplexed at his situation. But fate takes a hand and resolves matters as Wyngate could not have predicted.
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Resurrection
Title: Resurrection
Character: Katyusha Maslova
Released: March 6, 1931
Type: Movie
Simultaneously shot Spanish version of Tolstoy adaptation: After a woman he has formerly mistreated is sentenced for a crime a man who was part of her jury joins her on the trip to Siberia to expatiate his guilt.
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Resurrection
Title: Resurrection
Character: Katyusha Maslova
Released: January 27, 1931
Type: Movie
Katusha, a country girl, is seduced and abandoned by Prince Nekludov. Nekludov finds himself, years later, on a jury trying the same Katusha for a crime he now realizes his actions drove her to. He follows her to imprisonment in Siberia, intent on redeeming her and himself as well.
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East is West
Title: East is West
Character: Ming Toy
Released: November 30, 1930
Type: Movie
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East Is West
Title: East Is West
Character: Ming Toy
Released: October 23, 1930
Type: Movie
Ming Toy is on the auction block in China. She is saved by Billy and taken to San Francisco by Lo Sang Kee. To save her from deportation she is sold to Charlie Yong, the Chop Suey King. Billy kidnaps her with plans of marriage.
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The Storm
Title: The Storm
Character: Manette Fachard
Released: August 17, 1930
Type: Movie
Burr and Dave, two close friends who have backed each other up in countless difficulties, are torn apart by the arrival of a woman, Manette, who becomes stranded with them in their cabin during a raging blizzard.
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Hell Harbor
Title: Hell Harbor
Character: Anita Morgan
Released: March 14, 1930
Type: Movie
Lovely Anita dreams of escaping the monotony of her island home and sailing to bustling Havana. But when her abusive father promises her to the greasy local merchant, Anita does everything in her power to make her dream a reality.
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Tiger Rose
Title: Tiger Rose
Character: Rose
Released: December 21, 1929
Type: Movie
A mountie pursues a man wanted for murder.
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Where East Is East
Title: Where East Is East
Character: Toyo Haynes
Released: May 4, 1929
Type: Movie
A Chinese wife returns to the American family she left behind in Southeast Asia and then moves in on her daughter's (Lupe Velez) beau (Lloyd Hughes).
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Wolf Song
Title: Wolf Song
Character: Lola Salazar
Released: March 29, 1929
Type: Movie
In 1840, Sam Lash heads west for adventure. He meets up with some Mountain Men, and they head for the Rockies to trap beavers and cats. In Taos he meets Lola, a beautiful Mexican girl from a proud and rich family. They fall in love and he persuades her to elope with him. After they get married, Sam is torn between his love for Lola and his yearn for traveling.
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Lady of the Pavements
Title: Lady of the Pavements
Character: Nanon del Rayon
Released: January 22, 1929
Type: Movie
Karl, a German diplomat in Paris, discovers that his fiancee, Diane, has been cheating on him. He tells her that he would rather marry a "girl of the streets" than her. Outraged, Diane decides to grant his wish, and enlists the services of a Spanish singer/dancer from a disreputable nightclub to pose as a sophisticated, convent-educated singer, and surreptitiously arranges for her to meet Karl.
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Fashion News
Title: Fashion News
Character: Self (1929)
Released: November 6, 1928
Type: Movie
Hollywood actresses including Jeanette Loff and Raquel Torres modeling Spring fashions in color.
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Stand and Deliver
Title: Stand and Deliver
Character: Jania - a Peasant Girl
Released: February 18, 1928
Type: Movie
Our heroine, Miss Velez (despite the fact that she seems to be just along for the ride) is much her usual over-eloquent self (how fortunate she has no sound track!), while Warner Oland makes such an impressive and villainously seedy bandit, he needs no sound track at all. We can just imagine his oily, purring accents all too well.
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The Gaucho
Title: The Gaucho
Character: The Mountain Girl
Released: November 21, 1927
Type: Movie
A girl is saved by a miracle after she falls from a cliff in the Argentine Andes, and is blessed with healing powers. A shrine is built on the site, and a whole city grows around it, rich with gold from the grateful worshipers. Ruiz, an evil and sadistic general, captures the city, confiscates the gold, and closes the shrine. But the Gaucho, the charismatic leader of a band of outlaws, comes to the rescue.
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Sailors, Beware!
Title: Sailors, Beware!
Character: Baroness Behr (uncredited)
Released: September 25, 1927
Type: Movie
A con artist and a midget dressed as her infant son, are unmasked aboard a ship by a steward.
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What Women Did for Me
Title: What Women Did for Me
Character: The Dean's Daughter
Released: August 14, 1927
Type: Movie
A girl-shy professor runs into trouble at -- a ladies' seminary.