Gold Rush - Era Glamour Girl Betty Compson 1930 The Spoilers Western Photograph
Item History & Price
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ITEM: This is a vintage and original production still photograph from the 1930 Paramount Pictures pre-Code Western film The Spoilers. This Earl Crowley character study features Betty Compson in an alluring soft focus as she models one of the beautiful Gold Rush-era costumes that she wears during the film.
The press snipe reads: FASHION HINTS FOR 1935? --- Betty Compson, appearing in Paramount's production "THE SPOILERS, " starring Gary Cooper, believes the modes of twenty-five years ago are staging a revival. Miss Compson illustrates the similarity of her shirred and flowered costume and the 1930 fashions.
An actress and a film producer, Betty Compson was most famous during the silent film and early sound era. She is best known for her performances in The Docks of New York and The Barker, the latter earning her a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress.
Measures 8" x 10.25" on a glossy, single weight paper stock.
Crowley's Paramount Pictures ink stamp and studio paper caption on verso.
CONDITION: This photograph is in fine condition with corner wear and light storage/handling wear. Please use the included images as a conditional guide.
Guaranteed to be 100% vintage and original from Grapefruit Moon Gallery.
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A mining engineer's daughter, blond, blue-eyed Betty Compson began in show business playing violin in a Salt Lake City vaudeville establishment for $15 a week. Following that, she went on tour, accompanied by her mother, with an act called 'the Vagabond Violinist'. Aged eighteen, she appeared on the Alexander Pantages Theatre Circuit, again doing her violin solo vaudeville routine, and was spotted there by comedy producer Al Christie. Christie quickly changed her stage name from Eleanor to Betty. For the next few years, she turned out a steady stream of one-reel and two-reel slapstick comedies, frequently paired with Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle.
In 1919, Betty was signed by writer-director George Loane Tucker to co-star opposite Lon Chaney as Rose in The Miracle Man (1919). The film was a huge critical and financial success and established Betty Compson as a major star at Paramount (under contract from 1921 to 1925). One of the more highly paid performers of the silent screen, her weekly earnings exceeded $5000 a week at the peak of her career. She came to own a fleet of luxury limousines and was able to move from a bungalow in the hills overlooking Hollywood to an expensive mansion on Hollywood Boulevard. From 1921, Betty also owned her own production company. She went on to make several films in England between 1923 and 1924 for the director Graham Cutts.
During the late 1920's, Betty appeared in a variety of dramatic and comedic roles. She received good reviews acting opposite George Bancroft as a waterfront prostitute in The Docks of New York (1928), and was even nominated for an Academy Award for her portrayal of a carnival girl in The Barker (1928). She gave a touching performance in The Great Gabbo (1929), directed by her then husband James Cruze, as the assistant of a demented ventriloquist (Erich von Stroheim), with whom she is unhappily in love. That same year, she appeared in RKO's first sound film, Street Girl (1929), and was briefly under contract to that studio, cast in so-called 'women's pictures' such as The Lady Refuses (1931) and Three Who Loved (1931).
The stature of her roles began to diminish from the mid 1930s, though she continued to act in character parts until 1948. Betty's personal fortunes also declined. This came about primarily as a result of her marital contract to the alcoholic Cruze, whom she had divorced in 1929. For several years, Cruze had failed to pay his income tax and Betty (linked financially to Cruze) ended up being sued by the federal government to the tune of $150, 000. This forced her to sell her Hollywood villa, her cars and her antiques. In later years, Betty Compson developed her own cosmetics label and ran a business in California producing personalized ashtrays for the hospitality industry.
- IMDb Mini Biography By: I.S.Mowis
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