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Marguerite Chapman

Marguerite Chapman – a real trooper

Lady of mystery – Marguerite Chapman in The Walls Came Tumbling Down. Photo by Bob Coburn.
1946. Lady of mystery – Marguerite Chapman in The Walls Came Tumbling Down. Photo by Bob Coburn. Read more.

Marguerite Chapman wasn’t just a beautiful, blue-eyed brunette. She was a fun, sassy actress who put in a shift to graduate from ‘B’-star to ‘A’-star status – no mean achievement.

Age 21, at the behest of Howard Hughes, movie mogul, business tycoon, aviator and all-round eccentric, she arrives in Hollywood on the afternoon of Christmas Eve, 1939  ‘lonelier than I had ever been in my life’.

Hughes had arranged for Pat di Cicco, Cubby Broccoli and Bruce Cabot to squire me here and there. When I met Ruth and Hoagy Carmichael, they gave me advice appropriate for a young girl visiting Hollywood for the first time. They told me to keep away from my three escorts and to stay at the Beverly Hills Hotel. I did everything they told me not to…

Cubby Broccoli will go on to produce many of the James Bond films.

Things don’t work out with Hughes, and Marguerite moves to 20th Century Fox. Her stint there lasts just six months. This might have something to do with her first encounter with the studio’s production chief, Darryl Zanuck. The venue is Ciro’s, a nightclub on Sunset Boulevard opened in January 1940. With its luxe baroque interior, it is one of ‘the’ places to be seen and guaranteed being written about in the gossip columns of Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons.

Zanuck, who was short, asked me to dance. I said, ‘I’m sorry, I don’t like to dance with men who are shorter than I am.’ That was a mistake.

Later Marguerite is signed by Columbia and, like most Columbia employees, is not happy with her pay. The night the film Pardon My Past is finished, she attends a dinner party thrown by Harry Cohn, head of Columbia, at his house.

I was wearing this cute little dress and Harry asked me where I got it and then asked, `How much did you pay for it?’ In front of the other guests I replied, `I paid $75, my week’s salary. Aren’t you ashamed?’ I always talked like that to Harry. He was always calling me into his office. I think he enjoyed sparring with me.


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Symphony in black satin

Symphony in black satin

1947. Marguerite Chapman and her stand-in, Mary Ann Featherstone – a symphony in black satin on the Columbia Pictures lot during the filming of Mr...

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With a couple of admirers…

With a couple of admirers…

1947. Marguerite Chapman and two admirers on the set of Mr District Attorney. Wonder if she’s wearing Perc Westmore’s panchromatic base for when that...

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Foxy lady

Foxy lady

1945. Modelling a seductive black creation and a scheming look on her face accentuated by atmospheric lighting, Marguerite Chapman looks more like a femme fatale...

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Baroque beauty

Baroque beauty

Around 1945. Great diagonal composition that highlights Marguerite Chapman's striking profile. She must have learned all about make-up during her days as a model; and...

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A touch of the orient

A touch of the orient

1945. The camera tilt, emphasised by the vase, lends this shot a real tension. Perhaps Robert Coburn was remembering his early experience as a boy...

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Heavenly houri

Heavenly houri

1944. Probably a publicity photo for A Thousand and One Nights in which Marguerite Chapman starred as ‘a heavenly houri’. With its exotic ensemble and...

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Packing for the weekend

Packing for the weekend

Around 1943. Part of a fashion shoot to keep up the morale of the troops and their girls. The caption on the back of the...

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Something in the air

Something in the air

Around 1947. Ostrich feathers are a great prop that Bud Graybill used to particularly stunning effect with Hazel Brooks in the most provocative still...

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Marguerite Chapman’s career in short

Like Hazel Brooks, Marguerite worked as a John Powers model before decamping to Hollywood.

During World War II, she entertained troops, kissed purchasers of large war bonds and helped churn out movies about the war as well as appearing in a variety of films.

Marguerite Chapman by George Hurrell
1942. Marguerite Chapman vamps it up. Photo by George Hurrell. Read more.

In 1943, Los Angeles Times columnist Jerry Mason said dismissively of those early films:

I saw none of them, and you probably didn’t either. Her chances of getting up into the A-picture class were – roughly – one in 200. But she made it.

Her big break came in Destroyer (1943) starring Edward G Robinson and Glenn Ford. She went on to become a leading lady for Columbia, starring in a string of movies.

With this film, my career finally took off. Robinson was a charming man, but I remember that he grew increasingly concerned because he was shorter than I, and he spoke to the director about it. If you look at the film, you’ll notice that I’m sitting down a lot.

During the 1950s she continued to perform, mostly in secondary film roles including in Billy Wilder’s 1955 Marilyn Monroe vehicle, The Seven Year Itch. She also appeared on TV and on the stage.

Want to know more about Marguerite Chapman?

  • Obituary: Marguerite Chapman
  • Glamour Girls of the Silver Screen
  • Marguerite Chapman; Movie Actress

Other topics you may be interested in…

Dusty Anderson as Sandra in The Phantom Thief
Dusty Anderson – the life of a starlet
Hazel Brooks – the human heat wave
Perc Westmore – makeup king of Hollywood

Filed Under: Stars Tagged With: Bruce Cabot, Ciro's, Cubby Broccoli, Darryl Zanuck, Edward G Robinson, Hoagy Carmichael, Howard Hughes, Marguerite Chapman, Pat di Cicco, Ruth Carmichael

Perc Westmore – makeup king of Hollywood

Perc Westmore, Marguerite Chapman and acolytes
Perc Westmore, Marguerite Chapman and acolytes. Read more.

If you’re going to create heroes and heroines, villains and villainesses who look credible under the camera’s unrelenting gaze, you need fantastic raw material.

You also need brilliant make-up. And when it comes to make-up, Perc Westmore is the best in the business.

Perc (pronounced ‘Purse’) is the son of an English wigmaker and just one of a whole family of Hollywood make-up artists. He is Head of Warner Brothers’ make-up department and the highest-paid make-up artist in the world with a salary of $50,000 a year (well over half a million dollars in today’s money).

Of course he works with leading actresses such as Lauren Bacall and Bette Davis. So when he speaks, starlets (and indeed stars) listen – as the starlets gathered round him are doing in this picture.
He’s a real innovator, who has revolutionized make-up. To his credit are:

  • The panchromatic base – a tan cream that keeps faces and lips from fading out by evenly reflecting all lights.
  • A systematic approach to make-up based on a rigorous categorization of hair colour and facial type. For example, prior to Perc, studios described actresses simply as blonde or brunette. His system involves a chart of thirty five shades of blonde alone.
  • The ‘hair lace wig’, which adds years of professional life to the likes of Bing Crosby, Charles Boyer and Fred Astaire.

And he’s formidable too. According to his nephew, Mike:

There are makeup people who didn’t work if they wronged Perc. Perc was a powerful guy in the business. Very creative and nice, but you didn’t cross him. He was a tidy guy. I remember he used to wear these white suits and never got anything on them.

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The science of the lungs

The science of the lungs

1941. Perc Westmore lectures Warner Bros starlets on the science of the lungs assisted by Marguerite Chapman. The caption on the back of the...

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The art of applying rouge

The art of applying rouge

1941. Perc Westmore lectures Warner Bros starlets on the art of applying rouge, assisted by Mary Brodel The caption on the back of the print...

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The art of arching the eyebrow

The art of arching the eyebrow

1941. Perc Westmore lectures Warner Bros starlets on the art of arching the eyebrow, assisted by Faith Dorn. The caption on the back of the...

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Want to know more about Perc Westmore?

Look no further than Tattered and Lost.

Filed Under: Behind the scenes, Crew, Stars, Studios Tagged With: make-up, Marguerite Chapman, Perc Westmore, Warner Brothers

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