Flashback: Hollywood Valentine
Deanna Durbin
Hidden Hollywood: Deanna Durbin and Ann Frank
There was a time when Hollywood stars gave hope to those victims who were trapped in the whirlwind of oppression, intolerance and genocide.
Such a star was the radiant Deanna Durbin, who passed away in 2013 at the age of 91.
Durbin (b. Edna Mae Durbin December 4, 1921 – c. April 20, 2013) was a Canadian child singer turned actress who starred in a series of hugely popular and successful light musical comedies from 1936 to 1948. Durbin, at the peak of her career, was the highest paid actress in Hollywood, getting $400,000 per film. Her movies rescued Universal, her financially strapped studio, from a looming bankruptcy.
[Read more…] about Hidden Hollywood: Deanna Durbin and Ann Frank
In Memoriam: Deanna Durbin, 1921-2013
There was a time when Hollywood and Hollywood stars represented hope and liberty.
Such a star was the radiant Deanna Durbin, who passed away a few days ago at the age of 91.
Deanna Durbin: Night and Day
While hiding from the Nazis in the secret annex in Holland, Anne Frank pinned a photo of her favorite movie star to the wall abover her bed.
That Hollywood star was Deanna Durbin.
The picture can still be seen there today. When I saw it, I wept.
Durbin’s light and optimistic musicals rescued Universal Studio from bankruptcy. In 1945 and 1947 Deanna Durbin made more money than any other woman in the United States. While she was active her fan club was the world’s largest.
But Durbin grew disenchanted with her Hollywood career and retired in 1948 at the age of 27. Her career lasted thirteen years in which she starred in twenty-one films.
With her husband she moved to a small French village outside Paris where she continues—she is now 81—to maintain her privacy. In 1983 she granted an interview to film historian David Shipman.
Here, from Three Smart Girls Grow Up Lady on a Train (1945) a very odd noir-comedy, Durbin sings Cole Porter’s Night and Day, originally written for the 1932 musical play, Gay Divorce.
Enjoy.
It’s hard to believe but once upon a time Hollywood stars gave hope to the hopeless; once upon a time Hollywood stars represented freedom to the enslaved.