Barbara Hale
Active - 1943 - 1993 | Born - Apr 18, 1922 in DeKalb, Illinois | Genres - Mystery, Crime, Comedy, Western | Height: 5’ 5”
Barbara Hale was born in DeKalb, Illinois to Wilma (née Colvin) and Luther Ezra Hale, a landscape gardener. She had one sister, Juanita, for whom Hale's younger daughter was named. The family was of Scots-Irish ancestry. In 1940, Hale was a member of the final graduating class[1] from Rockford High School in Rockford, Illinois, then attended the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts, planning to be an artist. Her performing career began in Chicago, when she started modeling to pay for her education.
Hale moved to Hollywood in 1943, and under contract to RKO Radio Pictures, made her first screen appearance (uncredited) in Gildersleeve's Bad Day. She continued to make small uncredited appearances in films, until her first credited role alongside Frank Sinatra in Higher and Higher (1943) (even singing with him in the film). Hale had leading roles in movies including West of the Pecos (1945), Lady Luck (1946) — opposite Robert Young in what she described as her first "full stardom" and "her fifth A picture" — and The Window (1949). She received excellent notices for her co-starring performance opposite Larry Parks in the musical biography Jolson Sings Again (1949). She and Parks were teamed for subsequent films.
Her roles in 1950s films such as the adventure Lorna Doone (1951); the comedy The Jackpot (with James Stewart) (also 1951); the drama A Lion Is in the Streets (1953), and the Westerns Seminole (also 1953) and The Oklahoman (1957) continued Hale's run of successful movies during that decade. The latter film, co-starring Joel McCrea, would mark Hale's last leading role in a motion picture. She seldom appeared in film after this time, but was part of an all-star cast in the 1970 movie Airport, playing the wife of an airline pilot (played by Dean Martin). Hale's final appearance in a feature film was in the 1978 drama Big Wednesday as Mrs. Barlow, the mother of the character played by Hale's real-life son William Katt.
- Biography from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Barbara Hale was born in DeKalb, Illinois to Wilma (née Colvin) and Luther Ezra Hale, a landscape gardener. She had one sister, Juanita, for whom Hale's younger daughter was named. The family was of Scots-Irish ancestry. In 1940, Hale was a member of the final graduating class[1] from Rockford High School in Rockford, Illinois, then attended the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts, planning to be an artist. Her performing career began in Chicago, when she started modeling to pay for her education.
Hale moved to Hollywood in 1943, and under contract to RKO Radio Pictures, made her first screen appearance (uncredited) in Gildersleeve's Bad Day. She continued to make small uncredited appearances in films, until her first credited role alongside Frank Sinatra in Higher and Higher (1943) (even singing with him in the film). Hale had leading roles in movies including West of the Pecos (1945), Lady Luck (1946) — opposite Robert Young in what she described as her first "full stardom" and "her fifth A picture" — and The Window (1949). She received excellent notices for her co-starring performance opposite Larry Parks in the musical biography Jolson Sings Again (1949). She and Parks were teamed for subsequent films.
Her roles in 1950s films such as the adventure Lorna Doone (1951); the comedy The Jackpot (with James Stewart) (also 1951); the drama A Lion Is in the Streets (1953), and the Westerns Seminole (also 1953) and The Oklahoman (1957) continued Hale's run of successful movies during that decade. The latter film, co-starring Joel McCrea, would mark Hale's last leading role in a motion picture. She seldom appeared in film after this time, but was part of an all-star cast in the 1970 movie Airport, playing the wife of an airline pilot (played by Dean Martin). Hale's final appearance in a feature film was in the 1978 drama Big Wednesday as Mrs. Barlow, the mother of the character played by Hale's real-life son William Katt.
- Biography from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[about making West of the Pecos (1945)] " I told the director, Edward Killy, about casting a smaller role in the film for Bill Williams [her future husband]. Killy was sort of a stocky man, and had a cigar. He was a short man, and that cigar was about as big as he was . . . He smoked all the time! But he said, "Sure, Barb, I'll get Bill Williams up here in Lone Pine". He knew I had a crush on Bill. So Killy said, "I'll give him one scene at the beginning of the shoot and another at the end of the picture, so Bill can stay the whole time!. That was so nice of him."
"I'm proud that Della was sort of a prototype for TV secretaries. There really was no such established character on TV when 'Perry Mason' came along."
- Barbara Hale
