Billie Burke

At 85 years old, Billie Burke has this physical status:

Mary William Ethelbert Appleton Burke (August 7, 1884 – May 14, 1970), generally known as Billie Burke, was an American actress who was famous on Broadway, on radio, early silent film, and subsequently in sound film.

She is best known to modern audiences as Glinda the Good Witch of the North in the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer movie musical The Wizard of Oz (1939). Burke was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1938 for her performance as Emily Kilbourne in Merrily We Live and is also remembered for her appearances in the Topper film series.

Her high-pitched, wavering, aristocratic voice was her trademark, which made her a frequent choice to play dim-witted, spoiled society types. She was married to Broadway producer and impresario Florenz Ziegfeld Jr. founder of dance troupe and theatrical revue (and adapted to a radio program from 1932 and 1936), the Ziegfeld Follies which operated from 1914 until his death in 1932.

Early life

Burke was born in Washington, D.C., the daughter of Blanche (née Beatty) and her second husband, William "Billy" Ethelbert Burke. She toured the United States and Europe with her father, a singer and clown who worked for the Barnum & Bailey Circus. Her family settled in London where she attended plays in the West End. She began acting on stage in 1903, making her debut in London in The School Girl. Her other London shows included The Duchess of Dantzic (1903) and The Blue Moon (1904). She eventually returned to America to star in Broadway musical comedies.

Personal life

Among Burke's early suitors was the operatic tenor Enrico Caruso.

In 1910, Burke bought the Kirkham estate on Broadway in Hastings, New York, and renamed the mansion, Burkeley Crest.

In April 1914, Burke married Ziegfeld.

In 1921, Burke retired to raise her daughter Patricia, but resumed work after the Wall Street Crash of 1929.

In 1932, Burke moved from New York to Beverly Hills, California after the death of Ziegfeld.

She died in Los Angeles of natural causes on May 14, 1970, at the age of 85, and she and Ziegfeld were interred at Kensico Cemetery, Valhalla, Westchester County, New York.

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Career

In Mrs. Burke, the actor went on to play leads on Broadway. Dot, Suzanne, The Runaway, The "Mind-Paint" Girl, and The Land of Promise from 1910 to 1913, as well as a supporting role in Sir Arthur Wing Pinero's The Amazons revival. Florenz Ziegfeld, a French immigrant, married her in 1914. Patricia Ziegfeld Stephenson, 1916–2008), was their daughter two years old.

Burke was signed to the films and made her cinematic debut in Peggy (1915). Her success was meteoric, and she was soon earning what was reportedly the highest salary of any film actress up to that point. Gloria's Romance (1916), another famous and critically acclaimed vehicle, was she followed in her debut with the 15-part serial Gloria's Romance (1916). By 1917, she was a favorite with silent-movie enthusiasts, defeating Mary Pickford, Lillian Gish, Clara Kimball Young, and Irene Castle. She appeared in provocative society dramas and comedies, many of which were related to The "Mind-the-Paint" Girl, her most popular American play. Her childish charm surpassed her acting abilities, and her fashion sense infused her with the lust of female audiences. Arms and the Girl (1917), The Mysterious Miss Terry, Let's Get a Divorce (1918), Good Gracious, Annabelle (1920), and The Frisky Mrs. Johnson (1920). Ziegfeld maintained that as a nod to himself for his wife's appearance on Zukor and Lasky, as the film's 'By Special Arrangement with Florenz Ziegfeld'.

Burke's beauty and taste made her a major trendsetter during the 1910s and 1920s. As early as 1909, following her Broadway appearance in My Wife (1909), department stores began carrying the "Billie Burke Dress" with a distinctive flat collar and lace trim." A significant portion of Burke's on- and off-screen wardrobe was provided by the leading European couturier Lucile (in private life, Lady Duff Gordon), whose New York branch was the fashion Mecca of socialites and entertainment stars during this period. Burke spoke out about her work as "a new kind of actress, carefree, and red-headed, and she had beautiful clothing."

Burke had a daughter in 1916. Burke supported Pond's Vanishing Cream in 1917.

Given her fame in film, Burke returned to stage, appearing in Caesar's Wife (1921) and The Happy Husband (1928). As her family's investments were wiped out in the Wall Street Crash the following year, she resumed screen acting to assist her husband.

Burke made her Hollywood debut in 1932 as Margaret Fairfield in A Bill of Divorce, which was directed by George Cukor. In the film, which was Hepburn's first appearance, she played Katharine Hepburn's mother. Given the death of her husband Florenz Ziegfeld during the film's making, she returned to acting shortly after his funeral.

Burke was cast as Millicent Jordan, a scatterbrained high-society woman hosting a dinner party in the comedy Dinner at Eight, directed by George Cukor, with Lionel Barrymore, Marie Dressler, John Barrymore, Jean Harlow, and Wallace Beery. The film was a huge success and restarted her career. She appeared in several comedies and musicals, first being cast as a tetchy, feathered upper-class matron with her high-pitched voice.

MGM produced a biopic of Florenz Ziegfeld (The Great Ziegfeld), a film that received Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best Actress (Luise Rainer as Ziegfeld's common-law wife, Anna Held) in 1936. William Powell played Burke in Ziegfeld and Myrna Loy, an indignation by Burke, who was under studio contract and thought she should have performed herself, but MGM rejected her because she was too old to play in the role of her younger self.

Burke appeared in Topper (1937), in which she played twittering and puritan Clara Topper, who is married to a man haunted by socialite ghosts played by Cary Grant and Constance Bennett. She reprised her role in the film's sequels. Emily Kilbourne's debut in Merrily We Live (1938) earned her her only Oscar nomination. In 1938, she was selected to appear in The Wizard of Oz (1939), directed by Victor Fleming, starring Judy Garland. She appeared in Everybody Sing, where she portrayed Judy's histrionically hysterical actress-mother. Aunt Pittypat in Gone With the Wind (1939), but she declined and it was played by Laura Hope Crews, a character that Cukor wanted to be played in a "Billie Burke-ish" sense with "the same zany feeling." Father of the Bride (1950) and Father's Little Dividend (1951), both directed by Vincente Minnelli and starring Spencer Tracy, Joan Bennett, and Elizabeth Taylor, was another hit film series followed by another successful film series. In the 1942 film The Man Who Came to Dinner, Burke also portrayed Mrs. Ernest (Daisy) Stanley.

Burke wrote two autobiographies, two with Cameron Shipp. (Appleton 1949) and With Powder on My Nose (Coward McCann, 1959).

The Billie Burke Show appeared on CBS Radio from April 3, 1943, to September 21, 1946. This situation comedy, titled Fashions in Rations in the first year, was initially sponsored by Listerine. Portraying herself as a feathered Good Samaritan who lived "in the little white house on Sunnyview Lane," she always extended a helping hand to those in her neighborhood. She appeared on early television, often appearing in the short-lived sitcom Doc Corkle (1952). She appeared on numerous television and radio shows, including Duffy's Tavern.

Burke appeared on television in her own talk show At Home With Billie Burke, which aired on the DuMont Television Network from June 1951 to 1952. She was one of the first female talk show hosts after the hostesses of the earlier DuMont series And Everything Nice (1949–50) and Fashions on Parade (1948–49), which both had some talk show segments included.

On the TV version of Lights Out on November 20, 1950, Billie Burke appeared in an adaptation of Dr. Heidegger's Experiment.

Burke attempted to make a comeback on the New York stage. This Rock and Mrs. January and Mr. X were two short-lived productions. Although she received laudatory feedback, the plays were not. She appeared in several plays in California, but her mind became clouded and she had trouble recalling lines. "Acting wasn't much fun" in the late 1950s brought her out of show business, but she denied it.

Burke made her last film appearance in Sergeant Rutledge (1960), a western directed by John Ford.

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