Born 1905 as Augusta Wilhelmena Fredericka Appel in Union Hill, New Jersey, American actress Lila Lee performed in vaudeville for eight years. In 1918, she was chosen for a film contract by Hollywood film mogul Jesse Lasky for Famous Players–Lasky Corporation, which later became Paramount Pictures. She quickly rose to the ranks of leading lady and often starred opposite such matinee heavies as Conrad Nagel, Gloria Swanson, Wallace Reid, Roscoe ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle, and Rudolph Valentino.
In 1922, Lee was cast as Carmen in the enormously popular film Blood and Sand, opposite matinee idol Rudolph Valentino and silent screen vamp Nita Naldi; she subsequently won the first WAMPAS Baby Stars award that year. Lee continued to be a highly popular leading lady throughout the 1920s and made scores of critically praised and widely watched films.
As the Roaring Twenties drew to a close, Lee’s popularity began to wane and Lee positioned herself for the transition to talkies. She is one of the few leading ladies of the silent screen whose popularity did not nosedive with the coming of sound. However, a series of bad career choices and bouts of recurring tuberculosis and alcoholism hindered further projects and Lee was relegated to taking parts in mostly grade B-movies.
After the Reid Russell scandal in 1936, Lee’s career was completely over. She would not act in another film until 1967’s Cottonpickin’ Chickenpickers, which was also her final film.
In 1973, Lee died of a stroke at Saranac Lake, New York, aged 68. Take a look at these gorgeous photos to see the beauty of young Lila Lee in the 1920s and 1930s.
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A doll!
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