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Mary Pickford
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Mary Pickford
Gladys Louise Smith (April 8, 1892 – May 29, 1979), known professionally as Mary Pickford, was a Canadian American film actress and producer. A pioneer in the American film industry with a Hollywood career that spanned five decades, Pickford was one of the most popular actresses of the silent film era. Beginning her film career in 1909, Pickford became Hollywood's first millionaire by 1916, and, at the height of her career, had complete creative control of her films and was one of the most recognizable women in the world. Due to her popularity, unprecedented international fame, and success as an actress and businesswoman, she was known as the "Queen of the Movies". She was a significant figure in the development of film acting and is credited with having defined the ingénue type in cinema, a persona that also earned her the nickname "America's Sweetheart".
In 1919, she co-founded United Artists alongside Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, and D. W. Griffith, and was also one of the 36 founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1927. She was awarded the second Academy Award for Best Actress for her first sound film role in Coquette (1929) and received an Academy Honorary Award in 1976 in consideration of her contributions to American cinema. In 1999, the American Film Institute named Pickford as the 24th-greatest female star of Classical Hollywood Cinema.
Mary Pickford was born Gladys Louise Smith in 1892, at 211 (later 561) University Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, now the location of the Hospital for Sick Children. Her father, John Charles Smith, was the son of English Methodist immigrants, and worked a variety of odd jobs. Her mother, Charlotte Hennessey, was of Irish Catholic descent and worked for a time as a seamstress. She had two younger siblings, both actors. Charlotte was billed as "Lottie Pickford" (born 1893) and John Charles Jr. was billed as "Jack Pickford" (born 1896). To please her husband's relatives, Pickford's mother baptized her children as Methodists, the religion of their father. John Charles Sr. was an alcoholic. He died on February 11, 1898, from a fatal blood clot caused by a workplace accident when he was a purser with Niagara Steamship.
The house was situated in a poor district of Toronto known as "The Ward" where disease was prevalent. When Gladys was four years old, her household was under infectious quarantine as a public health measure. Their devoutly Catholic maternal grandmother (Catherine Faeley Hennessey) asked a visiting Roman Catholic priest to baptize the children. Pickford was at this time baptized as Gladys Marie Smith. Gladys attended McCaul School on University Avenue.
After being widowed in 1898, Charlotte Smith began taking in boarders, one of whom was a Mr. Murphy, the theatrical stage manager for Cummings Stock Company, who soon suggested that Gladys, then age seven, and Lottie, then age six, be given two small theatrical roles—Gladys portrayed a girl and a boy, while Lottie was cast in a silent part in the company's production of The Silver King at Toronto's Princess Theatre (destroyed by fire in 1915, rebuilt, demolished in 1931), while their mother played the organ. Pickford subsequently acted in many melodramas with Toronto's Valentine Stock Company, ultimately playing the major child role in its version of The Silver King. She concluded her early career in Toronto with the starring role of Little Eva in the Valentine production of Uncle Tom's Cabin, adapted from the 1852 novel.
By the early 1900s, theatre had become a family enterprise. Gladys, her mother, and two younger siblings toured the United States by rail, performing in third-rate companies and plays. After six impoverished years, Pickford allowed one more summer to land a leading role on Broadway, planning to quit acting if she failed. In 1905, she played the boy Freckles in Hal Reid's The Gypsy Girl on tour, and at the Star Theatre on Broadway. In 1906, Gladys, Lottie, and Jack Smith supported singer Chauncey Olcott on Broadway in Edmund Burke. Gladys finally landed a supporting role in a 1907 Broadway play, The Warrens of Virginia. The play was written by William C. deMille, whose brother, Cecil, appeared in the cast. David Belasco, the producer of the play, insisted that Gladys Smith assume the stage name Mary Pickford. After completing the Broadway run the play toured, including a stop in her home town of Toronto. It played at the Royal Alexandra Theatre in January 1909.
On April 19, 1909, the Biograph Company director D. W. Griffith screen-tested her at the company's New York studio for a role in the nickelodeon film Pippa Passes. The role went to someone else but Griffith was immediately taken with Pickford. She quickly grasped that movie acting was simpler than the stylized stage acting of the day. Most Biograph actors earned $5 a day but, after Pickford's single day in the studio, Griffith agreed to pay her $10 a day against a guarantee of $40 a week.
Pickford, like all actors at Biograph, played both leading roles and bit parts, including mothers, ingénues, charwomen, spitfires, slaves, Native Americans, spurned women, and a prostitute. As Pickford said of her success at Biograph:
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Mary Pickford
Gladys Louise Smith (April 8, 1892 – May 29, 1979), known professionally as Mary Pickford, was a Canadian American film actress and producer. A pioneer in the American film industry with a Hollywood career that spanned five decades, Pickford was one of the most popular actresses of the silent film era. Beginning her film career in 1909, Pickford became Hollywood's first millionaire by 1916, and, at the height of her career, had complete creative control of her films and was one of the most recognizable women in the world. Due to her popularity, unprecedented international fame, and success as an actress and businesswoman, she was known as the "Queen of the Movies". She was a significant figure in the development of film acting and is credited with having defined the ingénue type in cinema, a persona that also earned her the nickname "America's Sweetheart".
In 1919, she co-founded United Artists alongside Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, and D. W. Griffith, and was also one of the 36 founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1927. She was awarded the second Academy Award for Best Actress for her first sound film role in Coquette (1929) and received an Academy Honorary Award in 1976 in consideration of her contributions to American cinema. In 1999, the American Film Institute named Pickford as the 24th-greatest female star of Classical Hollywood Cinema.
Mary Pickford was born Gladys Louise Smith in 1892, at 211 (later 561) University Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, now the location of the Hospital for Sick Children. Her father, John Charles Smith, was the son of English Methodist immigrants, and worked a variety of odd jobs. Her mother, Charlotte Hennessey, was of Irish Catholic descent and worked for a time as a seamstress. She had two younger siblings, both actors. Charlotte was billed as "Lottie Pickford" (born 1893) and John Charles Jr. was billed as "Jack Pickford" (born 1896). To please her husband's relatives, Pickford's mother baptized her children as Methodists, the religion of their father. John Charles Sr. was an alcoholic. He died on February 11, 1898, from a fatal blood clot caused by a workplace accident when he was a purser with Niagara Steamship.
The house was situated in a poor district of Toronto known as "The Ward" where disease was prevalent. When Gladys was four years old, her household was under infectious quarantine as a public health measure. Their devoutly Catholic maternal grandmother (Catherine Faeley Hennessey) asked a visiting Roman Catholic priest to baptize the children. Pickford was at this time baptized as Gladys Marie Smith. Gladys attended McCaul School on University Avenue.
After being widowed in 1898, Charlotte Smith began taking in boarders, one of whom was a Mr. Murphy, the theatrical stage manager for Cummings Stock Company, who soon suggested that Gladys, then age seven, and Lottie, then age six, be given two small theatrical roles—Gladys portrayed a girl and a boy, while Lottie was cast in a silent part in the company's production of The Silver King at Toronto's Princess Theatre (destroyed by fire in 1915, rebuilt, demolished in 1931), while their mother played the organ. Pickford subsequently acted in many melodramas with Toronto's Valentine Stock Company, ultimately playing the major child role in its version of The Silver King. She concluded her early career in Toronto with the starring role of Little Eva in the Valentine production of Uncle Tom's Cabin, adapted from the 1852 novel.
By the early 1900s, theatre had become a family enterprise. Gladys, her mother, and two younger siblings toured the United States by rail, performing in third-rate companies and plays. After six impoverished years, Pickford allowed one more summer to land a leading role on Broadway, planning to quit acting if she failed. In 1905, she played the boy Freckles in Hal Reid's The Gypsy Girl on tour, and at the Star Theatre on Broadway. In 1906, Gladys, Lottie, and Jack Smith supported singer Chauncey Olcott on Broadway in Edmund Burke. Gladys finally landed a supporting role in a 1907 Broadway play, The Warrens of Virginia. The play was written by William C. deMille, whose brother, Cecil, appeared in the cast. David Belasco, the producer of the play, insisted that Gladys Smith assume the stage name Mary Pickford. After completing the Broadway run the play toured, including a stop in her home town of Toronto. It played at the Royal Alexandra Theatre in January 1909.
On April 19, 1909, the Biograph Company director D. W. Griffith screen-tested her at the company's New York studio for a role in the nickelodeon film Pippa Passes. The role went to someone else but Griffith was immediately taken with Pickford. She quickly grasped that movie acting was simpler than the stylized stage acting of the day. Most Biograph actors earned $5 a day but, after Pickford's single day in the studio, Griffith agreed to pay her $10 a day against a guarantee of $40 a week.
Pickford, like all actors at Biograph, played both leading roles and bit parts, including mothers, ingénues, charwomen, spitfires, slaves, Native Americans, spurned women, and a prostitute. As Pickford said of her success at Biograph:
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