Saturday, April 16, 2011

Saturday Scream Queen: Gloria Stuart


Beautiful blond Gloria Stuart was lured away from the stage to Hollywood with a contract at Universal Studios and a promise of great things. While she was one of the key faces (and figures) to grace some of the horror genre's cornerstones--like "The Invisible Man" and "The Old, Dark House"--her career never amounted to much. Casting directors and studio executives never really seemed to find a proper use for the mix of delicate beauty and spunk she brought to the screen. By 1946, dissapointed by the lack of traction in her film career, Stuart returned briefly to the stage but then retired from acting.

Three decades later, in 1975, she returned to acting, starting with a role in the made-for-TV horror movie "The Legend of Lizzie Borden." She spent the next twenty-five years playing small and supporting roles in a wide variety of films, with her most famous late-career part coming in 1997's "Titanic".

Stuart passed away in 2010, at the age of 100.