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Iris Adrian

 
Actor: Iris Adrian
Home > Library > Entertainment & Arts > Actors
  • Born: May 29, 1913 in Los Angeles, California
  • Died: Sep 21, 1994
  • Occupation: Actor
  • Active: '30s-'60s
  • Major Genres: Comedy, Crime
  • Career Highlights: Juke Box Jenny, The Paleface, The Stork Club
  • First Major Screen Credit: Murder at Glen Athol (1936)

Biography

Trained as a dancer by Marge Champion's father Ernest Belcher, Iris Adrian began her performing career at age 13 by winning a "beautiful back" contest. Working as a New York chorus girl (she briefly billed herself as "Jimmie Joy"), Iris's big break came with the 1931 edition of The Ziegfeld Follies, which led to featured nightclub and comedy revue work in the U.S. and Europe. In the Kaufman/Hart Broadway play The Fabulous Invalid, Adrian raised the temperatures of the tired businessmen in the audiences by performing a strip-tease--this at a time (the late 1930s) when the standard burlesque houses had been banned from New York by Mayor LaGuardia. Brought to films by George Raft, Adrian made her first screen appearance in Raft's 1934 vehicle Rhumba. This led to dozens of supporting roles in subsequent feature films; Iris' standard characterization at this time was the brassy, gold-digging dame who never spoke below a shout. Often appearing in one-scene bits, Adrian received more sizeable roles in Laurel and Hardy's Our Relations (1936), Bob Hope's The Paleface (1948), Milton Berle's Always Leave Them Laughing (1949) and Jerry Lewis' The Errand Boy (1961). Through the auspices of director William Wellman, who had a fondness for elevating character actors to larger roles, Adrian gave a rollicking performance as Bonnie Parker wannabe Two Gun Gertie in 1942's Roxie Hart. She launched her TV career in 1949 on Buster Keaton's LA-based weekly comedy series. Some of her most memorable work for the small screen was on the various TV programs of Jack Benny, Adrian's favorite comedian and co-worker. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Iris Adrian kept very active in the comedy films of the Walt Disney studio, including That Darn Cat (1965) and The Love Bug (1968); and in 1978, she was superbly cast in the regular role of the sarcastic secretary for a New York escort service on The Ted Knight Show. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
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Wikipedia: Iris Adrian
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Iris Adrian

from the film Lady of Burlesque (1943)
Born Iris Adrian Hofstadter
May 29, 1912(1912-05-29)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Died September 17, 1994 (aged 81)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Occupation Actress
Years active 1928–1980
Spouse(s) Charles Over (1935–1936)
George Jay (also divorced)
Ray (Fido) Murphy

Iris Adrian (May 29, 1912 – September 17, 1994) was an American film actress.

Born in Los Angeles, California as Iris Adrian Hofstadter, Adrian won a beauty pageant and worked with the Ziegfeld Follies, before she entered films at the end of the silent era in Chasing Husbands (1928) and appeared as an extra or chorus girl in early sound films like Paramount on Parade (1930).

During the 1930s she specialised in playing glamorous gold-diggers and gangsters' "molls", and played supporting roles in numerous features. She was considered a versatile actress, who could play drama or comedy, and she was also regarded as a capable dancer, dancing in a couple of films with George Raft. She also appeared on several radio programs, including serving as a regular on the Abbott and Costello Show.

She continued to act regularly without achieving star status and by the end of the 1960s had appeared in more than one hundred films. In her later years she appeared in several Walt Disney films, including That Darn Cat!, The Love Bug, The Shaggy D.A. and Freaky Friday. She also played numerous guest roles in such television series as Get Smart, The Beverly Hillbillies, Green Acres, Petticoat Junction, The Munsters, The Love Boat, The Lucy Show and The Jack Benny Show.

She was married three times, the first time to Charles Over in 1935 (divorced in 1936), the second to George Jay (also divorced), and her final marriage was to Ray (Fido) Murphy which lasted over 30 years. She had no children.

Known for sense of humor, she wryly commented in an interview late in her life that the only thing she did not like about aging was that she could no longer attract gangsters.

Adrian died in Los Angeles, from injuries she sustained during the 1994 Northridge earthquake exactly eight months earlier, and was interred in the Forest Lawn - Hollywood Hills Cemetery.

Contents

Filmography

Features

Short subjects

  • Chasing Husbands (1928)
  • Whirls and Girls (1929)
  • The Freshman's Goat (1930)
  • Don't Give Up (1930)
  • College Cuties (1930)
  • Man to Man (1937)
  • How to Clean House (1948)
  • Foy Meets Girl (1950)
  • Heebie Gee-Gees (1952)
  • So You Want to Be Pretty (1956)

References

  • Terrace, Vincent. Radio Programs, 1924-1984. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1999. ISBN 0-7864-0351-9

External links

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