Lana Turner

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Lana Turner, 1941 Lana Turner's signature

Lana Turner (born February 8, 1921 in Wallace , Idaho as Julia Jean Mildred Frances Turner , † June 29, 1995 in Los Angeles ) was an American film actress who celebrated numerous successes in the 1940s and 1950s. Her best-known films include In the Net of Passions , Embers under the Ashes and As long as there are people . She was a popular pin-up girl and sex symbol during World War II, but was also able to establish himself in serious character roles.

Live and act

Lana Turner was the only child of the miner John Virgil Turner and his wife Mildred Frances Turner. She began her career with minor roles at Warner Brothers after being spotted at the Tip Top Soda Shop by Hollywood Reporter's publisher William R. Wilkerson. The attention of the audience attracted Turner in 1937 with the legal drama The Third Degree , in which she was to be seen under the direction of Mervyn LeRoy as a murder victim in a somewhat too tight sweater (English: " sweater "). After the strict censorship regulations of the Production Code in 1934 came into force, a way of presenting female charms without the forbidden nudity was found in actresses in very skimpy or tight costumes. Her bust showed off so well that Turner was soon known as " The Sweater Girl ". When LeRoy moved to MGM , Turner moved to the studio, which took plenty of time to develop her talent. MGM initially wanted to build Turner as the successor to Jean Harlow , who died in 1937 ; therefore the originally auburn hair was dyed blonde. She initially occupied the studio primarily in B-films , including alongside Mickey Rooney in Love Finds Any Hardy , a film from the Andy Hardy series .

Turner played her first leading roles in 1941, alongside Judy Garland and Hedy Lamarr in Girls in the Spotlight and as co-star of Clark Gable in A Great Boy . Gable and Turner made three more films together until 1954. In 1942, Lana Turner, again directed by Mervyn LeRoy, starred in the gangster melodrama The Dead Lives , in which she appeared as the leading lady alongside Robert Taylor . Turner was a popular pin-up girl during World War II. In 1946 she was seen as a murderous adulteress in the film noir In the Net of Passions , the film adaptation of the novel When the Postman Rings Twice by James M. Cain . Directed by Vincente Minnelli , Turner was part of a star cast in City of Illusions in 1952 . The actress ended her 1956 studio contract with MGM and received in 1958 for her performance in Peyton Place , the film adaptation of the novel Peyton Place by Grace Metalious , a nomination for the Oscar in the category Best Actress .

Lana Turner, 1951

She hit the headlines the following year when her lover Johnny Stompanato was stabbed to death on April 4, 1958 by her then 14-year-old daughter from his second marriage, Cheryl Crane . He is said to have previously threatened to kill Turner and her daughter in an argument. In the process it was then also about Turner's possible complicity in the act. Finally, the court ruled that Turner's daughter had acted in self-defense. Harold Robbins used the story only slightly changed in 1964 in his novel Where Love Leads . In the same film played Susan Hayward starring. Shortly after the trial, Turner had the greatest success of her career in 1959 with the melodrama As Long There Are People, directed by Douglas Sirk .

After other successful films, most of which she shot for Universal , Madame X from 1966, one of the numerous film adaptations of the 1909 play of the same name, was her last commercial success. The critics agreed, however, that Constance Bennett, as a vicious mother-in-law, would have granted all acting honors. After that, Turner's career quickly came to an end, occasionally she also appeared in touring theater productions. Her last major role she played in the 1980s in six episodes of the television series Falcon Crest .

Lana Turner died on June 29, 1995 at the age of 74 from complications from cancer.

Private life

Lana Turner had a total of eight marriages with seven different husbands, including her first with bandleader Artie Shaw , followed by her second with restaurant owner Stephen Crane, father of her daughter Cheryl, and between 1953 and 1957 with actor Lex Barker . Cheryl Crane alleged in her autobiography that Barker sexually molested her several times while she was married to her mother.

Filmography

Awards

Autobiography

  • Lana Turner: Lana. The Lady, the Legend, the Truth. New English Library, Sevenoaks 1982, ISBN 0-450-06019-5 .

literature

  • Cheryl Crane, Cliff Year: Astray. A Hollywood story. Goldmann, Munich 1988, ISBN 3-442-09225-6 .
  • Ernst Probst: Lana Turner - the first "glamor girl". GRIN Verlag, Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-656-19353-1 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The story has been misrepresented over and over again, according to a German film magazine in 1946: "Among the names of America's great actresses, one of those actresses appears again and again who we have not yet seen, but will soon get to know in 'Manhattan Ballade' It's Lana Turner, and her artistic personality is interesting for the reason that 'the film here achieved the almost unbelievable transformation of a young person. When Lana Turner appeared in Hollywood' she was unanimously christened 'Cinderella' […]. That was in 1938 and she was 16. The director Mervyn le Roy had seen her one day in her mother's small beauty salon. Amazed by her beauty, he gave her a small role on a trial basis - and that was the beginning of a great career. …] When she made her debut, she was gentle, sentimental and naive. Today her auburn hair has been dyed white blonde, her soft smile is hard and their eyes have learned to express greed and contempt. Cinderella has become a vamp ". Article in Mein Film , 1946 issue 18.
  2. ↑ a b Cheryl Crane ( Memento from March 23, 2018 in the Internet Archive ). In: Biography.com. Retrieved March 1, 2020.
  3. ^ Lana Turner in the Find a Grave database

Remarks


Web links

Commons : Lana Turner  - collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Turner, Lana
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Turner, Julia Jean Mildred Frances (maiden name)
SHORT DESCRIPTION US-american actress
DATE OF BIRTH February 8, 1921
PLACE OF BIRTH Wallace, Idaho
DATE OF DEATH June 29, 1995
Place of death los Angeles