Pearl White
Pearl Fay White, (✦March 4, 1889, Green Ridge, Missouri - August 4, 1938, Neuilly-sur-Seine, France) was a star of silent film.
Early life
The daughter of a poor Missouri farmer, Pearl White grew up in Springfield, Missouri, where in high school she became interested in acting and participated in a local theatre company. At age 18, she joined the Trousedale Stock Company as a part-time performer, working the evening shows while keeping her day job to help support her family. Before long she was able to join the company full time, touring with the group throughout the American Midwest. In 1907 she married fellow actor Victor Sutherland (1889-1968), but they soon separated and eventually divorced.
Career Rise
In 1910, Pearl White was offered a chance by Pathé Frères to perform in The Girl From Arizona, the French company's first American film produced at their new studio in Bound Brook, New Jersey. She then worked at Lubin Studios and several other of the independents until the Crystal Film Company in Manhattan, gave her top billing in numerous short films.
Having gained some degree of public recognition, in 1914 the Pathé director Louis J. Gasnier (1875-1963) offered Pearl White the starring role in The Perils of Pauline, a film based on a story by playwright, Charles W. Goddard (1879-1951). The film was not about a helpless woman, but one where "Pauline" was the central character in a story involving considerable action, to which the athletic and unblinking Pearl White proved ideally suited.
The Perils of Pauline consisted of twenty episodes that enlarged upon the damsel in distress / heroine-in-jeopardy cliffhanger style of film. An enormous box-office success, it made Pearl White a major celebrity and she was soon earning the astronomical sum of $3,000 a week. She followed this major achievement with an even bigger box-office winner, The Exploits of Elaine.
While flying airplanes, racing cars, swimming across rivers, and other assorted feats, she did four more successful serials based on the same theme. For these action-packed films, Pearl White did much of her own dangerous stunt work and as a result she suffered a number of injuries that forced her to use a stunt double in her later films.
Fame
By 1919, Pearl White was a wealthy young woman when she met and married World War I veteran Major Wallace McCutcheon, Jr. (1880-1928), who had become an actor, director and cinematographer. However, this marriage also did not last and they divorced in 1921. Two years later White made her last American film.
Influenced by the French friends she made while working for Pathé, and as one who appreciated different cultures, Pearl White was drawn to the gathering of artistic genius in the Montparnasse Quarter of Paris, France. While living there, she made her last film for her friend, the Belgian-born director Edward José (1880-1930), who had directed her in several serials. silent filmss could be made in any country, and because White was a highly recognizable star worldwide, she was offered many roles in France but chose to perform live on stage in a Montmartre production called, "Tu Perds la Boule" (You Lost the Ball). Enjoying this type of performance, in 1925 she accepted an offer to star with comedian Max Wall in the "London Review" at the Lyceum Theatre in London.
Pearl White's childhood poverty made her frugal with money. A shrewd businesswoman, she invested in a successful Parisian nightclub, a Biarritz resort hotel/casino, plus a profitable stable of thoroughbred race horses. Living in a fashionable town house in the exclusive Parisian suburb of Passy, she also owned a villa in Rambouillet.
The former 'poor girl' from Missouri hobnobbed with the elite of European society, and in time became involved with Greek businessman, Theodore Cossika, who shared her interest in travel. Together they acquired a home near Cairo, Egypt and White further expanded her cultural horizons by touring with her companion throughout the Middle East and the Orient.
Alcoholism
Over the years, White's alcohol use increased substantially, possibly in an attempt to numb the chronic pain from the injuries resulting from her film stunts. In 1933 she had to be hospitalized, which led to an addiction to the drugs used to lessen her suffering. Her last few years were spent in a painful alcoholic haze, and she died from cirrhosis of the liver at age 49 in the American Hospital in the Paris suburb of Neuilly. She was buried in the Cimetière de Passy.
Pearl White's place in film history is seen as a benchmark in the evolution of both cinema genres and the role of women. The Perils of Pauline is only known to exist in a reduced 9-reel version released in Europe in 1916, but The Exploits of Elaine still exists and has been selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry. All her films were made at East Coast studios, and it is believed White never visited Hollywood, which would honor her contributions to the film industry with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Selected filmography:
*''[[The Perils of Pauline]]'' (1914) *''[[The Exploits of Elaine]]'' (1914) *''[[The New Exploits of Elaine]]'' (1915) *''[[The Romance of Elaine]]'' (1915) *''[[The Iron Claw]]'' (1916) *''[[Pearl of the Army]]'' (1916) *''[[The Fatal Ring]]'' (1917) *''[[The House of Hate]]'' (1918) *''[[The Lightning Raider]]'' (1919) *''[[Plunder (film)|Plunder]]'' (1923) *''[[Perils of Paris]]'' (1924)
Info from www.filmreference.com Films as Actress: (in one- and two-reelers directed by Joseph Golden—partial listing) 1910 The Life of Buffalo Bill (three reels); The New Magdalene; The Maid of Niagara; The Yankee Girl; Sunshine in Poverty Row 1910–11 Tommy Gets His Sister Married; Her Photograph; The Motor Friend; A Summer Flirtation; The Hoodoo; How Rastus Gets His Turkey; Home, Sweet Home; His Birthday; Pearl White The Stepsisters; The Dressmaker's Bill; The Girl Next Room; Oh! Such a Night; Love's Renunciation; Her Little Slipper; Mayblossom (directed by Donald Mackenzie) 1911 The Lost Necklace; The Unforeseen Complication; Angel Out of the Slums; For Honor of the Name; Helping Him Out; Locked Out; The Quarrel (Westerns directed by James Young Deer) 1911 The Coward; Honoring a Hero; Winonah's Vengeance; The Flaming Arrow; Message of the Arrow; For Massa's Sake; Love Molds Labor; A Daughter of the South; The Rival Brother's Patriotism; Gun o' Gunga Din; Prisoner of the Mohican; The Compact; The Governor's Double 1912 (series of about 20 films for Lubin Company, under direction of Joseph Smiley, John Ince, or Wilbert Melville) (directed by Joseph Golden) 1912–13 The Chorus Girl; A Tangled Marriage; The Mind Cure; His Wife's Stratagem; The Visitor; Belle's Beau; Heroic Harold; Her Kid Sister; Pearl's Admirers; With Her Rival's Help; Accident Insurance; Strictly Business; That Other Girl; A Night in Town; Knights and Ladies; Who Was the Goat?; Lovers Three; The Drummer's Notebook; Pearl asa Clairvoyant; Her Twin Brother; The Veiled Lady; Our Parents-in-Law; Two Lunatics; Pearl as a Detective; When Love Is Young; His Awful Daughter; Where Charity Begins; Mary's Romance; The New Typist; A Call from Home; Will Power; The Girl Reporter; Who Is in the Box?; An Hour of Terror; True Chivalry; Muchly Engaged; Pearl's Dilemma; College Chums; The Hallroom Girls; The Broken Spell; What Papa Got; Oh! You Scotch Lassie!; A Child Influence; Starving for Love; Pearl and the Tramp; Caught in the Act; A Greater Influence; His Aunt Emma; That Crying Baby; Pearl's Hero; The Convict's Daughter; A Woman's Revenge; Girls Will Be Boys; The Cabaret Singer; Her Secretary; Oh! You Pearl!; His Rich Uncle; Robert's Lesson; Willie's Great Scheme; Pearl and the Poet; Pearl's Mistake; The Ring; Oh! You Puppy!; A Father's Devotion; A Grateful Outcast; Getting Reuben Back; Mr. Sweeney's Master-piece; Lizzie and the Iceman; Willie's Disguise; Oh! You Mummy!; Going Some; Her New Hat; Pearl and the Burglars; Easy Money; A Telephone Engagement; The Bunch That Failed; Cops Is a Business; What Pearl's Pearl Did; A Lady in Distress; The Dancing Craze; Her Necklace; The Book Agents; Some Collectors; The Maniac's Desire; East Lynne in Bugville; The Lady Doctor; The Tell Tale Brother; The Masher; A Girl in Pants; Shadowed (directed by Donald Mackenzie) 1914 The Perils of Pauline (serial); Detective Swift; Ticket of Leave Man; The Stolen Birthright; The Warning; The Phantom Thief; The Hand of Destiny; The House of Mystery; Detective Craig's Coup; A Pearl of the Punjab 1915 The Exploits of Elaine (serial); The New Exploits of Elaine (serial); The Romance of Elaine (serial) 1916 The Iron Claw (José and Seitz—serial); The King's Game (Seitz); Annabel's Romance (Gasnier); Hazel Kirke (Gasnier); Pearl of the Army (José—serial) 1917 The Fatal Ring (Seitz—serial) 1918 The House of Hate (Seitz—serial); The Lightning Raider (Seitz—serial) 1919 Black Secret (Seitz—serial) 1920 The White Moll (Millarde); The Dark Mirror (Giblyn); Black Is White (Giblyn); The Thief (Giblyn); A Virgin Paradise (Dawley) 1921 The Mountain Woman (Giblyn); Tiger's Cub (Giblyn and Millarde); Know Your Men (Giblyn); Singing River (Giblyn) 1922 Plunder (Seitz—serial) 1924 Terreur (José—serial)
External link
- Pearl White - Biography on (re)Search my Trash
- Pearl White at the Internet Movie Database
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