Nancy Gertrude Guild (October 11, 1925 – August 16, 1999) was an American film actress of the 1940s and 1950s. She appeared in Somewhere in the Night (1946), The Brasher Doubloon (1947), and the comedy Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man (1951). Although appearing in major films, Guild never achieved as much fame at 20th Century Fox, the studio that had signed her to a seven-year contract, as she had hoped, and eventually stopped acting.
Nancy Guild | |
|---|---|
 Nancy Guild in the trailer for The Brasher Doubloon (1947) | |
| Born | Nancy Gertrude Guild[1] October 11, 1925 Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Died | August 16, 1999 (aged 73) East Hampton, New York, U.S. |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1946–1971 |
| Spouses |
|
| Children | 3 |
Early life
editGuild was born at Hollywood Hospital on October 11, 1925, the third child and only daughter of Herbert Hamilton Guild and the former Zilpah Hebert.[2]
Career
editGuild was a freshman at the University of Arizona when a photographer from Life magazine noticed her.[3] After her picture was published in a spread on campus fashions, Guild received screen tests at five Hollywood studios, and she was signed by 20th Century Fox. The studio's publicity writers declared "Guild rhymes with wild!" when hyping her in Somewhere in the Night (1946), her first film, directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz.[4]
Guild and then-husband Charles Russell appeared together in the musical Give My Regards to Broadway (1948). She played a dual role as Marie Antoinette and the hypnotized love interest of Orson Welles in the 1949 adaptation of Alexandre Dumas’ historical novel about Count Cagliostro and the Affair of the Diamond Necklace. After leaving Fox, she appeared in movies as a freelance and as a contract star at Universal-International, where she appeared in Little Egypt, Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man picture and the Francis the Talking Mule movie Francis Covers the Big Town (1953).
Guild was a panelist on the DuMont network's Where Was I?, a game show, in 1952-1953.[5] She appeared occasionally on television and briefly returned to the movies in Otto Preminger's Such Good Friends (1971).
Personal life
editGuild's first husband was actor Charles Russell, whom she married on April 26, 1947. They divorced in November 1949, eight months after their daughter Elizabeth was born.[6] On August 14, 1951, she married producer Ernest H. Martin.[6] They had two daughters, Cecilia (born 1954) and Polly (1957–2004),[7] and divorced in 1975.[8] On April 5, 1983, Guild married photojournalist John Bryson;[9] they divorced in 1995.[4]
Death
editOn August 16, 1999, she died of emphysema in East Hampton, New York at the age of 73.[10]
Filmography
edit| Year | Title | Role |
|---|---|---|
| 1946 | Somewhere in the Night | Christy Smith |
| 1947 | The Brasher Doubloon | Merle Davis |
| 1948 | Give My Regards to Broadway | Helen Wallace |
| 1949 | Black Magic | Marie Antoinette / Lorenza |
| 1951 | Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man | Helen Gray |
| 1951 | Little Egypt | Sylvia Graydon |
| 1953 | Francis Covers the Big Town | Alberta Ames |
| 1971 | Such Good Friends | Molly |
References
edit- ^ birth registration from the California Birth Index
- ^ "Births". Illustrated Daily News. October 18, 1925.
- ^ Parsons, Louella O. (June 17, 1945). "Life Magazine Model Paged For 'Concerto' Test". St. Petersburg Times. International News Service. Retrieved December 4, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
- ^ a b "Nancy Guild, 73, Insouciant 40's Actress". The New York Times. Retrieved 31 January 2012.
- ^ Terrace, Vincent (2011). Encyclopedia of Television Shows, 1925 through 2010 (2nd ed.). Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. p. 1170. ISBN 978-0-7864-6477-7.
- ^ a b "Nancy Guild - The Private Life and Times of Nancy Guild. Nancy Guild Pictures". www.glamourgirlsofthesilverscreen.com.
- ^ https://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/28/classified/paid-notice-deaths-martin-polly-d.html
- ^ Vallance, Tom (August 27, 1999). "Obituary: Nancy Guild". The Independent. Retrieved 30 September 2024.
- ^ "Tipoff". The Ledger. April 8, 1983.
- ^ Lentz, Harris M. III (2008). Obituaries in the Performing Arts, 1999: Film, Television, Radio, Theatre, Dance, Music, Cartoons and Pop Culture. McFarland. ISBN 978-0-7864-5204-0. Retrieved 4 December 2018.
External links
edit- Nancy Guild at IMDb