Eve Arden
Active - 1929 - 1990 | Born - Apr 30, 1908 in Mill Valley, California, United States | Died - Nov 12, 1990 in Beverly Hills, CA | Genres - Comedy, Drama, Romance, Musical | Height: 5' 7½"
Little Eunice Quedens' first brush with the performing arts came at age seven, when she won a WCTU medal for her recital of the pro-temperance poem "No Kicka My Dog." After graduating from high school, she became a professional actress on the California stock company circuit. Still using her given name, she played a blonde seductress in the 1929 Columbia talkie Song of Love then joined a touring repertory theater.
After another brief film appearance in 1933's Dancing Lady, she was urged by a producer to change her name for professional purposes. Allegedly inspired by a container of Elizabeth Arden cold cream, Eunice Quedens reinvented herself as Eve Arden. Several successful appearances in the annual Ziegfeld Follies followed, and in 1937 Arden returned to films as a young character actress.
From Stage Door (1937) onward, she was effectively typecast as the all-knowing witheringly sarcastic "best friend" who seldom got the leading man but always got the best lines. Her film roles in the 1940s ranged from such typical assignments as sophisticated magazine editor "Stonewall" Jackson in Cover Girl (1944) to such hilariously atypical performances as athletic Russian sniper Natalia Moskoroff in The Doughgirls (1944). In 1945, she earned an Oscar nomination for her portrayal of Joan Crawford's sardonic but sympathetic business partner in Mildred Pierce.
In July of 1948, she launched the popular radio situation comedy Our Miss Brooks, earning a place in the hearts of schoolteachers (and sitcom fans) everywhere with her award-winning portrayal of long-suffering but ebullient high school teacher Connie Brooks. Our Miss Brooks was transferred to television in 1952, running five successful seasons. Less successful was the 1957 TVer The Eve Arden Show, in which the star played authoress Liza Hammond. This failure was neutralized by her subsequent stage tours in such plays as Auntie Mame and Hello, Dolly! and her well-received film appearances in Anatomy of a Murder (1959) and Dark at the Top of the Stairs (1960).
In 1967, she returned to TV to co-star with Kaye Ballard on the chucklesome The Mothers-in-Law which lasted two years. And in 1978, she became a favorite of a new generation with her performance as Principal McGee in the phenomenally successful film version of Broadway's Grease. In 1985, Eve Arden came out with her autobiography, The Three Phases of Eve.
Available Films:
Active - 1929 - 1990 | Born - Apr 30, 1908 in Mill Valley, California, United States | Died - Nov 12, 1990 in Beverly Hills, CA | Genres - Comedy, Drama, Romance, Musical | Height: 5' 7½"
Little Eunice Quedens' first brush with the performing arts came at age seven, when she won a WCTU medal for her recital of the pro-temperance poem "No Kicka My Dog." After graduating from high school, she became a professional actress on the California stock company circuit. Still using her given name, she played a blonde seductress in the 1929 Columbia talkie Song of Love then joined a touring repertory theater.
After another brief film appearance in 1933's Dancing Lady, she was urged by a producer to change her name for professional purposes. Allegedly inspired by a container of Elizabeth Arden cold cream, Eunice Quedens reinvented herself as Eve Arden. Several successful appearances in the annual Ziegfeld Follies followed, and in 1937 Arden returned to films as a young character actress.
From Stage Door (1937) onward, she was effectively typecast as the all-knowing witheringly sarcastic "best friend" who seldom got the leading man but always got the best lines. Her film roles in the 1940s ranged from such typical assignments as sophisticated magazine editor "Stonewall" Jackson in Cover Girl (1944) to such hilariously atypical performances as athletic Russian sniper Natalia Moskoroff in The Doughgirls (1944). In 1945, she earned an Oscar nomination for her portrayal of Joan Crawford's sardonic but sympathetic business partner in Mildred Pierce.
In July of 1948, she launched the popular radio situation comedy Our Miss Brooks, earning a place in the hearts of schoolteachers (and sitcom fans) everywhere with her award-winning portrayal of long-suffering but ebullient high school teacher Connie Brooks. Our Miss Brooks was transferred to television in 1952, running five successful seasons. Less successful was the 1957 TVer The Eve Arden Show, in which the star played authoress Liza Hammond. This failure was neutralized by her subsequent stage tours in such plays as Auntie Mame and Hello, Dolly! and her well-received film appearances in Anatomy of a Murder (1959) and Dark at the Top of the Stairs (1960).
In 1967, she returned to TV to co-star with Kaye Ballard on the chucklesome The Mothers-in-Law which lasted two years. And in 1978, she became a favorite of a new generation with her performance as Principal McGee in the phenomenally successful film version of Broadway's Grease. In 1985, Eve Arden came out with her autobiography, The Three Phases of Eve.
Available Films:
Trivia:
Adopted her stage name while looking over some cosmetics and spotting the names "Evening in Paris" and "Elizabeth Arden".
In the film Anatomy of a Murder (1959), her real-life husband, Brooks West, plays the local prosecutor who goes up against defense attorney James Stewart.
While appearing in a stage play, during one performance she was about to launch into her big speech, as a wife berating her husband, when the prop telephone on the set rang. Correctly deducing that this was a practical joke arranged by the actor playing the husband, she grabbed up the phone, and without missing a beat ad-libbed along the lines of "Well, he's busy ... He really can't ... oh, very well ..." and then turned to her grinning cohort and wiped the smile off his face by snapping "It's for you!" and handing him the phone.
She stood there tapping her foot while he ad-libbed a rather unconvincing conversation, and then, after he hung up, went on with the scene as if nothing had happened.
"I've worked with a lot of great glamorous girls in movies and the theater. And I'll admit, I've often thought it would be wonderful to be a femme fatale. But then I'd always come back to thinking that if they only had what I've had - a family, real love, an anchor - they would have been so much happier during all the hours when the marquees and the floodlights are dark."
Adopted her stage name while looking over some cosmetics and spotting the names "Evening in Paris" and "Elizabeth Arden".
In the film Anatomy of a Murder (1959), her real-life husband, Brooks West, plays the local prosecutor who goes up against defense attorney James Stewart.
While appearing in a stage play, during one performance she was about to launch into her big speech, as a wife berating her husband, when the prop telephone on the set rang. Correctly deducing that this was a practical joke arranged by the actor playing the husband, she grabbed up the phone, and without missing a beat ad-libbed along the lines of "Well, he's busy ... He really can't ... oh, very well ..." and then turned to her grinning cohort and wiped the smile off his face by snapping "It's for you!" and handing him the phone.
She stood there tapping her foot while he ad-libbed a rather unconvincing conversation, and then, after he hung up, went on with the scene as if nothing had happened.
"I've worked with a lot of great glamorous girls in movies and the theater. And I'll admit, I've often thought it would be wonderful to be a femme fatale. But then I'd always come back to thinking that if they only had what I've had - a family, real love, an anchor - they would have been so much happier during all the hours when the marquees and the floodlights are dark."
