Gertrude Michael
Acting
Gertrude Michael (June 1, 1911, Talladega, Alabama – December 31, 1964, Beverly Hills, California) was an American film, stage and television actress. Born as Lillian Gertrude Michael in Talladega, Alabama, she reportedly graduated from high school at the age of 14. She became a radio singer on the radio. She attended the University of Alabama and Converse College, Cincinnati. Her childhood home in Talladega, Alabama was destroyed by fire in 2007. In 1929 in Cincinnati she made her stage debut in a stock company. She subsequently appeared on Broadway in Rachel Crothers' Caught Wet (1931). She entered the movies playing Richard Arlen's finaceé in Wayward (1932), but her best-remembered role is probably as Rita Ross in Murder at the Vanities (1934), one of the last pre-Code films, in which she sang an ode to marijuana (Sweet Marijuana). She had an affair with writer Paul Cain (aka Peter Ruric).After they broke up, Cain wrote the role of the alcoholic lover (based on Michael) in his only novel published during his lifetime, Fast One. Gertrude Michael died, aged 53, from undisclosed causes, in Beverly Hills, California. Description above from the Wikipedia article Gertrude Michael,licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
TV Shows(8)
Movies(54)
The Continental Twist
Letitia Clunker
1961
Women's Prison
Chief Matron Sturgess
1955
No Escape
Olga Valerie Lewis
1953
Bugles in the Afternoon
May
1952
Darling, How Could You!
Mrs. Rossiter
1951
Caged
Georgia Harrison
1950
Flamingo Road
Millie
1949
Club Havana
Hetty - Powder Room Attendant
1945
Allotment Wives
Gladys Smith
1945
Three's a Crowd
Sophie Whipple
1945
Faces in the Fog
Nora Brooks
1944
Women in Bondage
District Director Schneider
1943
Where Are Your Children?
Nell Wilson
1943
Behind Prison Walls
Elinor Cantwell
1943
Prisoner of Japan
Toni Chase
1942
Slightly Tempted
Duchess
1940
I Can't Give You Anything But Love, Baby
Magda Delys
1940
The Farmer's Daughter
Clarice Sheldon
1940
Parole Fixer
Collette Menthe
1940
Pound Foolish
Mrs. Irene Reynolds
1940
Just like a Woman
Ann Heston
1939
Hidden Power
Virginia Garfield
1939
Star of the Circus
Yester
1938
Sophie Lang Goes West
Sophie Lang
1937
Mr. Dodd Takes the Air
Jessica Stafford
1937
Make Way for a Lady
Miss Eleanor Emerson
1936
Second Wife
Virginia Howard
1936
The Return of Sophie Lang
Sophie Lang
1936
Forgotten Faces
Cleo / Harry's wife
1936
Till We Meet Again
Elsa Duranyi
1936
Woman Trap
Barbara 'Buff' Andrews
1936
The Last Outpost
Rosemary Haydon
1935
Four Hours to Kill!
Mrs. Sylvia Temple
1935
It Happened in New York
Vania Nardi
1935
Father Brown, Detective
Evelyn Fischer
1934
Menace
Helen Chalmers
1934
Cleopatra
Calpurnia
1934
The Notorious Sophie Lang
Sophie Lang
1934
Murder on the Blackboard
Jane Davis
1934
Murder at the Vanities
Rita Ross
1934
The Witching Hour
Margaret Price
1934
I Believed in You
Pamela Banks
1934
Hold That Girl
Dorothy Lamont
1934
George White's Scandals
Miss Lee
1934
Bolero
Lady D'Argon
1934
Search for Beauty
Jean Strange
1934
Cradle Song
Marcella
1933
I'm No Angel
Alicia Hatton
1933
Ann Vickers
Mona Dolphin
1933
Night of Terror
Sarah Rinehart
1933
A Bedtime Story
Louise
1933
Sailor Be Good
Kay Whitney
1933
Unashamed
Marjorie
1932
Wayward
Mary Morton
1932