Search results
Mary Louise Brooks (November 14, 1906 – August 8, 1985) was an American film actress during the 1920s and 1930s. She is regarded today as an icon of the flapper culture, in part due to the bob hairstyle that she helped popularize during the prime of her career.
- She Had An Artistic Family
- She Had An Evil Neighbor
- She Carried Her Trauma with Her
- She Had A Disciplined Childhood
- She Was A Born Performer
- She Got Her First Taste of Success
- She Had A Great Rival
- She Got The Chop
- She Never Forgot
- She Bounced Back
From the moment she was born, Louise Brooks had the arts at her fingertips. Her father, Leonard Brooks, was a lawyer with a magnificent library, and her mother, Myra Rude, was an accomplished pianist with an unrivaled passion for music and books. Surrounded by inspiration, little Louise became a pleasure-seeker at a young age. But although this see...
When she was only nine years old, Louise met a neighbor known as "Mr. Flowers." However, he was nowhere near as pleasant as his name suggested. In truth, Mr. Flowers was a vicious predator who targeted Louise and mistreated her. This formative experience scarred her psyche forever, haunting her love life in the most unimaginable ways. Laura Loveday...
Later, Louise cited her horrific run-in with Mr. Flowers as the reason for her inability to find real love and noted that he "must have had a great deal to do with forming my attitude toward...pleasure...For me, nice, soft, easy men were never enough—there had to be an element of domination." Louise earned her hard edges early,but not only because ...
As much as Louise's mother entranced her children with the tranquil melodies of Debussy and Ravel, she also had a strong rational streak that made her eager to foster a sense of independence in them. She said that any "squalling brats she produced could take care of themselves." In fact, by the time she was 10 years old, her mother had already hone...
Louise's road to stardom began on the small stages—but even then, people started taking notice of the young girl's magnetic presence. In the beginning, she stepped into the spotlight at local fairs and clubs, and by the time she turned 11, Louise was dazzling audiences with her performances at the neighborhood opera house. But this was only the beg...
Louise's dancing career truly took off once she moved to New York City—a whole new world that contrasted her small-town upbringing in Kansas. It was here that Louise joined Denishawn, one of America's most renowned modern dance troupes. It thrust a surreal veil over her teenage years as she danced alongside some of the future greats and saw her nam...
During her second year with Denishawn, Louise climbed the rankings and even landed a coveted role opposite one of the troupe's founders, Ted Shawn. She felt every opportunity open up to her as she continued to hone her skills—learning, dancing, and growing up. There was, however, just one problem. Louise had a rivalry with the other founder, Ruth S...
To Ruth, Louise seemed like an entitled little princess. So, just as Louise's career with the dancing troupe took off, Ruth turned around and dealt her a brutal betrayal.In front of the other dancers, she singled out Louise and fired her: "I am dismissing you from the company because you want life handed to you on a silver salver." And like most pi...
Louise never forgot Ruth's insults, and later in her life, while drafting her autobiography, she decided to title the final chapter "Silver Salver." But as disappointing as her banishment from Denishawn was, there were still big things waiting for Louise. Up next? Broadway. Thankfully, Louise managed to bounce back from her dismissal and found some...
Louise landed work as a chorus girl in George White's Scandals, which helped catapult the careers of other huge stars like The Three Stooges and Ray Bolger. But her prospects didn't end there. In 1925, she was also a featured dancer in the Ziegfield Follies. But even as she danced her heart out in the Scandals, Louise herself was about to be embroi...
Jul 14, 2024 · After a whirlwind career in Hollywood, Louise Brooks fell on hard times. She attempted to make it work as a dancer in New York City, but her career on the stage also wasn't what it used to be. With the debt collector knocking on her door, Brooks finally decided to move back to her home state of Kansas and attempted to start over in Wichita ...
Jun 2, 2018 · Watching the newly restored version of Pandora's Box, one can't help but suspect that Louise Brooks, who died in 1985, is some contemporary YouTube star who has been seamlessly photoshopped into...
Brooks returned to the United States in 1930, but her intellectual independence and outspokenness repeatedly brought her into conflict with studio executives there. After appearing in small roles in several Hollywood films during the 1930s, she permanently abandoned the cinema in 1938.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Until she ended her career in film in 1938, she had made only 25 movies. After that, she spent most of her time reading and painting. She also became an accomplished writer, authoring a number of books, including her autobiography. On August 8, 1985, Louise died of a heart attack in Rochester, New York. She was 78 years old.
Nov 14, 2023 · Around the mid-fifties, the miracle happened. She was acclaimed for Pandora as a neglected titan of the screen, and, at last, everything fell into place. Brooks looked back at all the years of hell, twenty years of nothing, and her superiority was confirmed.
