Marjorie Rambeau

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Born: 15 July 1889 Died: 6 July 1970

Country of origin: United States

Height: 5' 6"

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Actors with Most Oscar Nominations But Zero Wins (147 items)
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Hollywood Walk of Fame - R (95 items)
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Description: Marjorie Rambeau (July 15, 1889 – July 6, 1970) was an American film and stage actress. Rambeau was born in San Francisco, California to Marcel and Lilian Garlinda (née Kindelberger) Rambeau. Her parents separated when she was a child. She and her mother went to Nome, Alaska where young Marjorie dressed as a boy, sang and played the banjo in saloons and music halls. Her mother insisted she dress as a boy to thwart amorous attention from drunken grown men in such a wild and woolly outpost as Nome. She began performing on the stage at the age of 12. She attained theatrical experience in a rambling early life as a strolling p Marjorie Rambeau (July 15, 1889 – July 6, 1970) was an American film and stage actress.

Rambeau was born in San Francisco, California to Marcel and Lilian Garlinda (née Kindelberger) Rambeau. Her parents separated when she was a child. She and her mother went to Nome, Alaska where young Marjorie dressed as a boy, sang and played the banjo in saloons and music halls. Her mother insisted she dress as a boy to thwart amorous attention from drunken grown men in such a wild and woolly outpost as Nome. She began performing on the stage at the age of 12. She attained theatrical experience in a rambling early life as a strolling player. Finally she made her Broadway debut on March 10, 1913 in a tryout of Willard Mack's play, Kick In.

In her youth she was a Broadway leading lady. In 1921, Dorothy Parker memorialized her in verse:

If all the tears you shed so lavishly / Were gathered, as they left each brimming eye. / And were collected in a crystal sea, / The envious ocean would curl up and dry— / So awful in its mightiness, that lake, / So fathomless, that clear and salty deep. / For, oh, it seems your gentle heart must break, / To see you weep. ...

Her silent films with the Mutual company included Mary Moreland and The Greater Woman (1917). The films were not major successes but did expose Rambeau to film audiences. By the time talkies came along she was in her early forties and she began to take on character roles in films such as Min and Bill, The Secret Six, Laughing Sinners, Grand Canary, Joe Palooka, and Primrose Path, for which she was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.

In 1940, Rambeau had the title role in Tugboat Annie Sails Again as well as second billing under Wallace Beery (the co-star of the original Tugboat Annie) in 20 Mule Team. Other films included Tobacco Road, A Man Called Peter, and Broadway. In 1953, she was again nominated for an Oscar, this time for Torch Song. In 1957, she appeared in a supporting role in Man of a Thousand Faces about the life of Lon Chaney, although she never worked with the real Chaney in silent films.

For her contribution to the motion picture industry, Rambeau has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6336 Hollywood Blvd. ... (more)