Born 1904 as Josephine Constance Woodruff in Provo, Utah, American actress Edwina Booth got her first part in 1926 in a silent film. In 1928, she was cast in the Dorothy Arzner-directed Manhattan Cocktail. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) was impressed with her, and cast Booth in supporting roles.
Her chance for stardom came when the studio cast her in its new jungle epic Trader Horn opposite Harry Carey. MGM gave the production a fairly large budget, and sent cast and crew on location in East Africa. The crew was inexperienced and ill-equipped for filming in Africa, a problem exacerbated by MGM’s last-minute decision to shoot the film with sound.
When Booth left the United States, she had a fever of 104. Her role in the film as “The White Goddess” required her to be scantily clad, likely increasing her susceptibility. Production went on for several months (much longer than average production time in those days), and the film wasn’t released until 1931. Despite many problems with the film’s production, Trader Horn was a success, securing an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture.
Booth fared much worse; it took her six years to fully recover physically. She sued MGM for over a million dollars, claiming she had been provided with inadequate protection and inadequate clothing during the African shoot. She claimed she had been forced to sunbathe nude for extended periods during filming. The case received a lot of attention in the tabloids and was eventually settled out of court. According to some sources, the terms were not disclosed; however, Brigham Young University archives indicate she settled for $35,000. amounting to at least $600,000 in today’s money.
Booth’s acting career never recovered from the MGM debacle. She died of heart failure in 1991 in Long Beach, California, aged 86. Take a look at these gorgeous photos to see the beauty of young Edwina Booth in the early 1930s.
0 comments:
Post a Comment