Gertrude Michael

Born: 1911-06-01

Gertrude Michael (June 1, 1911, Talladega, Alabama – December 31, 1964, Beverly Hills, California) was an American film, stage and television actress. Born as Lillian Gertrude Michael in Talladega, Alabama, she reportedly graduated from high school at the age of 14. She became a radio singer on the radio. She attended the University of Alabama and Converse College, Cincinnati. Her childhood home in Talladega, Alabama was destroyed by fire in 2007. In 1929 in Cincinnati she made her stage debut in a stock company. She subsequently appeared on Broadway in Rachel Crothers' Caught Wet (1931). She entered the movies playing Richard Arlen's finaceé in Wayward (1932), but her best-remembered role is probably as Rita Ross in Murder at the Vanities (1934), one of the last pre-Code films, in which she sang an ode to marijuana (Sweet Marijuana). She had an affair with writer Paul Cain (aka Peter Ruric).After they broke up, Cain wrote the role of the alcoholic lover (based on Michael) in his only novel published during his lifetime, Fast One. Gertrude Michael died, aged 53, from undisclosed causes, in Beverly Hills, California. Description above from the Wikipedia article Gertrude Michael,licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.


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Caged

as Georgia Harrison
Released: 1950-05-19

A single mistake puts a 19-year old girl behind bars, where she experiences the terrors and...

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Cleopatra

as Calpurnia
Released: 1934-10-05

The queen of Egypt barges the Nile and flirts with Mark Antony and Julius Caesar.

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I'm No Angel

as Alicia Hatton
Released: 1933-10-06

The bold Tira works as dancing beauty and lion tamer at a fair. Out of an urgent need of money,...

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Flamingo Road

as Millie
Released: 1949-04-30

A stranded carnival dancer takes on a corrupt political boss when she marries into small-town...

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Murder at the Vanities

as Rita Ross
Released: 1934-05-18

Shortly before the curtain goes up the first time at the latest performance of Earl Carroll's...

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Sailor Be Good

as Kay Whitney
Released: 1933-03-07

A Navy boxer (Jack Oakie) meets a dance-hall hostess (Vivienne Osborne) who tries to sober him...

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Prisoner of Japan

as Toni Chase
Released: 1942-07-22

An American astronomer living on a Pacific island attempts to thwart the Japanese during WWII.

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The Witching Hour

as Margaret Price
Released: 1934-04-26

Jack Brookfield, a gambler with clairvoyant and hypnotic powers, is able to win at cards through...

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Ann Vickers

as Mona Dolphin
Released: 1933-09-26

After a love affair ending in an abortion, a young prison reformer submerges herself in her...

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Women's Prison

as Chief Matron Sturgess
Released: 1955-02-01

A crusading psychiatrist battles a sadistic female warden to improve conditions at a women's prison.

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Father Brown, Detective

as Evelyn Fischer
Released: 1934-12-14

After notorious jewel thief Flambeau meets Evelyn Fischer during a raid on a casino, he falls...

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Cradle Song

as Marcella
Released: 1933-11-19

In a deeply cloistered convent, nun Dorothea Wieck (Mädchen in Uniform) raises a foundling to be...

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Darling, How Could You!

as Mrs. Rossiter
Released: 1951-08-08

Two absentee American parents get to know their three children again after spending five years...

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Bugles in the Afternoon

as May
Released: 1952-03-04

Old enemies stationed together at an Army post vie for the same woman.

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George White's Scandals

as Miss Lee
Released: 1934-03-15

Reporter Miss Lee is looking for a story and approaches George White as he's assembling the...

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Menace

as Helen Chalmers
Released: 1934-11-22

A psychotic man stalks three innocent people whom he believes are responsible for his brother's...

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Women in Bondage

as District Director Schneider
Released: 1943-12-16

Women in Bondage is a 1943 World War II film about conditions for women under Hitler's regime....

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Allotment Wives

as Gladys Smith
Released: 1945-11-08

Unscrupulous women marry servicemen for their pay.

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Faces in the Fog

as Nora Brooks
Released: 1944-11-30

Tom and Cora Elliott love their active social life so much that they neglect their daughter Mary...

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Club Havana

as Hetty - Powder Room Attendant
Released: 1945-11-23

A number of different characters unfolding love, hate, and death problems during an evening in a...

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I Can't Give You Anything But Love, Baby

as Magda Delys
Released: 1940-05-01

In I Can't Give You Anything But Love, Baby, Broderick Crawford plays a sentimental gangster who...

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Murder on the Blackboard

as Jane Davis
Released: 1934-06-15

There are plenty of guilty secrets at the school where Hildegarde Withers teaches. When she...

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Mr. Dodd Takes the Air

as Jessica Stafford
Released: 1937-08-11

A country bumpkin becomes a singing sensation on the radio.

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The Farmer's Daughter

as Clarice Sheldon
Released: 1940-03-29

Broadway producer Nickie North and press agent Scoop Trimble find an investor for their next...

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Hidden Power

as Virginia Garfield
Released: 1939-09-07

Dr. Garfield gets so involved in his research for an antitoxin for severe burns that he...

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Sophie Lang Goes West

as Sophie Lang
Released: 1937-09-10

Reformed jewel-thief Sophie Lang, tired of being questioned by the New York City police every...

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The Notorious Sophie Lang

as Sophie Lang
Released: 1934-07-20

After an extended stay in England, Sophie Lang returns to America. She is beautiful,...

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Search for Beauty

as Jean Strange
Released: 1934-02-02

Three con artists dupe two Olympians into serving as editors of a new health and beauty magazine...

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I Believed in You

as Pamela Banks
Released: 1934-04-09

an aspiring writer and her boyfriend, a professional agitator head off to the Big Apple in...

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Till We Meet Again

as Elsa Duranyi
Released: 1936-04-04

In London, August 1914, Austrian star Elsa Duranyi (Gertrude Michael) and English matinee idol...

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The Return of Sophie Lang

as Sophie Lang
Released: 1936-06-18

In order to give up her life of crime and go straight, renowned jewel thief Sophie Lang fakes...

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Night of Terror

as Sarah Rinehart
Released: 1933-04-23

The heirs to a family fortune are required to attend a seance at the spooky old family mansion....

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Slightly Tempted

as Duchess
Released: 1940-10-18

A con man tries to sell phony stocks to unwary investors.

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Parole Fixer

as Collette Menthe
Released: 1940-02-02

This expose of the U.S. parole system, as seen through the eyes of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover,...

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Where Are Your Children?

as Nell Wilson
Released: 1943-11-26

Judy Wilson (Gale Storm), feeling neglected because both of her parents are working in defense...

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It Happened in New York

as Vania Nardi
Released: 1935-03-29

A New York City cab driver in need of $200 picks up a movie star in his cab, and schemes to get...

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Wayward

as Mary Morton
Released: 1932-02-19

Story of a mother's antagonism to her son's wife. Based on the novel "Wild Beauty" by Mateel...

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The Last Outpost

as Rosemary Haydon
Released: 1935-10-11

During WW1, the destinies of British officers Michael Andrews and John Stevenson seem...

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Bolero

as Lady D'Argon
Released: 1934-02-23

The complicated relationship between an ambitious, ruthless nightclub dancer and the woman he loves.

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Four Hours to Kill!

as Mrs. Sylvia Temple
Released: 1935-04-11

A detective who has "four hours to kill" before delivering his prisoner, an escaped killer,...

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No Escape

as Olga Valerie Lewis
Released: 1953-07-31

When the available evidence in a murder case points to a young woman as the main suspect, her...

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Make Way for a Lady

as Miss Eleanor Emerson
Released: 1936-11-13

An imaginative teenager decides to play matchmaker for her widowed father. Director David...

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The Continental Twist

as Letitia Clunker
Released: 1961-12-12

Sam Butera and the Witnesses perform several Twist numbers to save a small New Orleans nightclub...

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A Bedtime Story

as Louise
Released: 1933-04-22

Parisian playboy plays father to an abandoned baby who interferes with his womanising.

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Pound Foolish

as Mrs. Irene Reynolds
Released: 1940-01-27

An expose of attempts by wealthy people to avoid payment of customs duties. Part of the MGM...

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Woman Trap

as Barbara 'Buff' Andrews
Released: 1936-03-06

A gangland murder is the motivating factor of this fast-moving crime drama. George Murphy stars...

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Second Wife

as Virginia Howard
Released: 1936-08-21

Kenneth discovers that his son by his first wife is ill in a remote Swiss village, and is forced...

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Unashamed

as Marjorie
Released: 1932-07-02

A debutante's (Helen Twelvetrees) brother (Robert Young) stands trial for killing her no-good lover.

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Forgotten Faces

as Cleo / Harry's wife
Released: 1936-05-15

Harry Ashton is a superstitious gambling house owner, who relies on sprigs of heliotrope as his...

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Hold That Girl

as Dorothy Lamont
Released: 1934-03-23

"That girl" is newspaper sob-sister Tony Bellamy (Claire Trevor), whose nose for news gets her...

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Perry Mason

as Helen Rucker
First aired: 1957-09-21

The cases of master criminal defense attorney Perry Mason and his staff who handled the most...

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Sea Hunt

as uncredited
First aired: 1958-01-04

Sea Hunt is an American adventure television series that aired in syndication from 1958 to 1961...

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The 20th Century Fox Hour

as uncredited
First aired: 1955-10-05

The 20th Century Fox Hour is an American drama anthology series televised in the United States...

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Cavalcade of America

as Major Pauline Cushman
First aired: 1952-10-01

Cavalcade of America is an anthology drama series that was sponsored by the DuPont Company,...

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The Case of the Dangerous Robin

as Kay Salisbury
First aired: 1960-10-18

The Case of the Dangerous Robin is an American crime drama series which aired in syndication...

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Hallmark Hall of Fame

as uncredited
First aired: 1951-12-24

Hallmark Hall of Fame is an anthology program on American television, sponsored by Hallmark...

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Schlitz Playhouse of Stars

as The Duchess
First aired: 1951-10-05

Schlitz Playhouse of Stars is an anthology series that was telecast from 1951 until 1959 on CBS....

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Schlitz Playhouse of Stars

as uncredited
First aired: 1951-10-05

Schlitz Playhouse of Stars is an anthology series that was telecast from 1951 until 1959 on CBS....

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