Lillian Worth

Born: 1884-06-24

Lillian Worth (stage name), born Lillian Burgher Murphy, (June 24, 1884 – February 23, 1952) was an American actress. She appeared in 58 films between 1913 and 1937. Lillian Murphy was born on June 24, 1884, in Brooklyn, New York, the daughter of Katherine Stahler and John B. Murphy. After she married in 1905, she began using her husband's surname as her stage name; and by 1909 she, as Lillian Wiggins, had gained public attention and favorable reviews for her performance in the theatrical production Beauty Spot By early 1913, she was a leading actress at Pathé's West Coast studio in Edendale, Los Angeles, where she starred in Western films. Pathé transferred Wiggins a few months later to its East Coast studio in Jersey City, New Jersey, and then in October 1913 to its new Southern studio in St. Augustine, Florida. In March 1914, Pathé once again relocated her, dispatching her to Europe, where she worked at the company's Paris studio before moving to London. There she made films first for British and Colonial Kinematography Company and then for Motograph Film Company. Wiggins returned to the United States in September 1914 and the next year started performing in films for Deer Film Company. Following the dissolution of her first marriage, she married again in 1918. She, however, elected not to use her second husband's surname professionally; instead, she adopted the new stage name Lillian Worth, which is how she continued to be credited until 1937. Lillian Worth was married twice. On May 3, 1905, she married Benjamin Platt Wiggins in Brooklyn, New York. The couple separated after a couple of years, and she filed for divorce in Reno, Nevada in 1911, although on that occasion she did not obtain the divorce. She filed again in Los Angeles, California, and was finally granted a divorce in 1914. She then married Erville Alderson, an American actor, on January 14, 1918, in Sydney, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia. That marriage too ended in divorce in 1925. Worth died at age 67 in Los Angeles, California, on February 23, 1952. In death records from that time, she is identified as Lillian Alderson despite the fact that she had divorced Erville Alderson 27 years earlier. Her gravesite is located at Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Los Angeles.


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The Docks of New York

as Steve's Girl
Released: 1928-09-16

A blue-collar worker on New York's depressed waterfront finds his life changed after he saves a...

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Private Number

as Maud
Released: 1936-06-05

Ellen Neal, a young and inexperienced maid, becomes romantically involved with her employers son...

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Other Men's Women

as Waitress
Released: 1931-01-17

The friendship of two working stiff railroad engineers is put to the test when one falls for the...

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The White Angel

as Woman Donating Bandages (uncredited)
Released: 1936-06-25

In Victorian England, Florence Nightingale's heroic measures slowly change the attitude towards...

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Stranded

as Blonde (uncredited)
Released: 1935-06-29

A Traveler's Aid worker who delights in solving people's problems gets mixed up with gangsters.

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Stars Over Broadway

as Buxom Singer
Released: 1935-11-23

An aggressive agent turns a hotel porter into an overnight sensation.

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Tarzan the Tiger

as Queen La of Opar
Released: 1929-12-08

After Tarzan's estate is destroyed by Arabs Jane is sold into slavery by a man posing as a...

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Maybe It's Love

as First Complaining Wife (uncredited)
Released: 1935-01-12

Director William C. McGann's 1935 film stars Gloria Stuart and Ross Alexander as a young couple...

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Dangerous Paradise

as Myrtle
Released: 1930-02-13

Heyst, a hermit on his own tropical island, plays unwilling host to red-headed stowaway Alma....

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Stairs of Sand

as Babe
Released: 1929-06-08

An outlaw with a Heart of Gold sacrificing his own life for the happiness of two young people in...

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Upstream

as Sister Team
Released: 1927-01-30

A silent comedy set in an actor's boardinghouse. Some plot points are seemingly inspired by the...

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Carnival

as Half Man-Half Woman
Released: 1935-02-15

"Chick" Thompson is a puppet-master in a traveling carnival whose wife dies in childbirth and...

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The Adventures of Tarzan

as Queen La of Opar
Released: 1921-12-01

Tarzan spurns the love of La, Queen of Opar. When he isn't trying to keep the Bolshevik Rokoff...

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In Search of a Sinner

as Valeska
Released: 1920-03-07

Georgiana Chadbourne is a young widow. Her dead husband was such a straight arrow that it bored...

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The Fatal Fortune

as uncredited
Released: 1919-12-15

A young newspaperwoman travels to a South Seas island to search for buried treasure.

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Rustlers' Ranch

as Tessie
Released: 1926-04-11

Lee Crush, an out-of-work cowhand, gets into a fight with Bull Dozier and knocks him through a...

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Won by Law

as Mother Franklin
Released: 1925-08-19

Wanda Wiley stars as a very slow and lazy daughter in this excellent Century short. She gets...

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The Foolish Age

as Flossy
Released: 1921-10-16

After graduating from college, rich girl Margery Carr decides to do some good in the world. Much...

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The Fighting Sheriff

as Florabell
Released: 1931-05-15

A dying Jack makes Bob and Flash promise not to tell his sister that he was an outlaw. When Bob...

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Race Memories

as Denton's Sweetheart
Released: 1913-11-06

Denton, an anthropologist of note, meets by accident a new neighbor, an attractive girl, whose...

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