Dolores Costello
Encyclopedia
Dolores Costello was an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...

 actress who achieved her greatest success during the era of silent movies
Silent Movies
Silent Movies are 13 solo guitar compositions by Marc Ribot released September 28, 2010 on Pi Recordings.-Reception:The Allmusic review by Thom Jurek awarded the album 4 stars stating "For those interested in one of the more compelling and quietly provocative and graceful guitar records of 2010,...

. She was nicknamed "The Goddess of the Silent Screen". She was stepmother of John Barrymore's daughter Diana
Diana Barrymore
Diana Barrymore was an American film and stage actress.-Early life:Born Diana Blanche Barrymore Blythe in New York City, New York, she was the daughter of renowned actor John Barrymore and his second wife, poet Blanche Oelrichs...

 by his second wife Blanche Oelrichs
Blanche Oelrichs
Blanche Oelrichs was an American poet, playwright, and theatre actress known by the pseudonym, "Michael Strange."-Biography:...

, the mother of John Drew Barrymore
John Drew Barrymore
John Drew Barrymore was a member of the Barrymore family of actors, which included his father, John Barrymore, and his father's siblings, Lionel and Ethel...

 and the grandmother of Drew Barrymore
Drew Barrymore
Drew Blyth Barrymore is an American actress, film director, screenwriter, producer and model. She is a member of the Barrymore family of American actors and granddaughter of John Barrymore. She first appeared in an advertisement when she was 11 months old. Barrymore made her film debut in Altered...

.

Early years

Costello was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh is the second-largest city in the US Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Allegheny County. Regionally, it anchors the largest urban area of Appalachia and the Ohio River Valley, and nationally, it is the 22nd-largest urban area in the United States...

, the daughter of actors Maurice Costello
Maurice Costello
Maurice Costello was a prominent vaudeville actor of the late 1890s and early 1900s, who later played a principal role in early American films, as both a leading man, supporting player and a director....

 and Mae Costello
Mae Costello
Mae Costello was an American stage and film actress of the early twentieth-century.-Early life:Born Mae Altschuk in Brooklyn, New York, she was the daughter of Lewis Altschuk and Catherine Callender. As a teenager she began performing in stage productions in stock theater companies throughout the...

 (née Altschuk). She was of Irish
Irish American
Irish Americans are citizens of the United States who can trace their ancestry to Ireland. A total of 36,278,332 Americans—estimated at 11.9% of the total population—reported Irish ancestry in the 2008 American Community Survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau...

 descent through her father. Dolores and her younger sister Helene
Helene Costello
Helene Costello was an American motion picture actress, most notably of the silent film era.Lou Costello took his professional name from the actress.- Biography :...

 made their first film appearances in the years 1909–1915 as child actresses for the Vitagraph Film Company. They played supporting roles in several films starring their father, who was a popular matinee idol at the time. Dolores Costello's earliest listed credit on the IMDb
Internet Movie Database
Internet Movie Database is an online database of information related to movies, television shows, actors, production crew personnel, video games and fictional characters featured in visual entertainment media. It is one of the most popular online entertainment destinations, with over 100 million...

 is in the role of a fairy in a 1909 adaptation
Adaptation
An adaptation in biology is a trait with a current functional role in the life history of an organism that is maintained and evolved by means of natural selection. An adaptation refers to both the current state of being adapted and to the dynamic evolutionary process that leads to the adaptation....

 of Shakespeare's
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

 A Midsummer Night's Dream
A Midsummer Night's Dream
A Midsummer Night's Dream is a play that was written by William Shakespeare. It is believed to have been written between 1590 and 1596. It portrays the events surrounding the marriage of the Duke of Athens, Theseus, and the Queen of the Amazons, Hippolyta...

.

Film career

The two sisters appeared on Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...

 together and their success resulted in contracts with Warner Brothers Studios. In 1926
1926 in film
-Events:*August - Warner Brothers debuts the first Vitaphone film, Don Juan. The Vitaphone system used multiple 33⅓ rpm disc records developed by Bell Telephone Laboratories and Western Electric to play back audio synchronized with film....

, after several small parts in feature films, Dolores Costello starred opposite John Barrymore
John Barrymore
John Sidney Blyth , better known as John Barrymore, was an acclaimed American actor. He first gained fame as a handsome stage actor in light comedy, then high drama and culminating in groundbreaking portrayals in Shakespearean plays Hamlet and Richard III...

 in The Sea Beast
The Sea Beast
The Sea Beast is a silent film adaptation of the novel Moby Dick by Herman Melville, a story about a monomaniacal hunt for a great white whale...

, a loose adaptation of Herman Melville
Herman Melville
Herman Melville was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet. He is best known for his novel Moby-Dick and the posthumous novella Billy Budd....

's Moby-Dick
Moby-Dick
Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, was written by American author Herman Melville and first published in 1851. It is considered by some to be a Great American Novel and a treasure of world literature. The story tells the adventures of wandering sailor Ishmael, and his voyage on the whaleship Pequod,...

. Warner Bros.
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...

 soon began starring her in her own vehicles. Meanwhile, she and Barrymore
John Barrymore
John Sidney Blyth , better known as John Barrymore, was an acclaimed American actor. He first gained fame as a handsome stage actor in light comedy, then high drama and culminating in groundbreaking portrayals in Shakespearean plays Hamlet and Richard III...

 became romantically involved and, after a two year affair, married in 1928.

Within a few years of achieving stardom, the delicately beautiful blonde-haired actress had become a successful and highly regarded film personality in her own right, and as a young adult her career developed to the degree that in 1926, she was named a WAMPAS Baby Star
WAMPAS Baby Stars
The WAMPAS Baby Stars was a promotional campaign sponsored by the Western Association of Motion Picture Advertisers in the United States which honored thirteen young women each year whom they believed to be on the threshold of movie stardom. They were selected from 1922 to 1934, and annual...

, and had acquired the nickname "The Goddess of the Silver Screen."

Warners alternated Costello between films with contemporary settings and elaborate costume dramas. In 1927, she was re-teamed with John Barrymore
John Barrymore
John Sidney Blyth , better known as John Barrymore, was an acclaimed American actor. He first gained fame as a handsome stage actor in light comedy, then high drama and culminating in groundbreaking portrayals in Shakespearean plays Hamlet and Richard III...

 in When a Man Loves
When a Man Loves
Manon Lescaut is a 1926 silent German feature film based on the oft-filmed novel by Abbe Prevost. It stars Lya De Putti and was directed by Arthur Robison. It was produced and distributed by renown German film company Universum Film AG better known as UFA. A young actress named Marlene Dietrich had...

, an adaptation of Manon Lescaut
Manon Lescaut
Manon Lescaut is a short novel by French author Abbé Prévost. Published in 1731, it is the seventh and final volume of Mémoires et aventures d'un homme de qualité . It was controversial in its time and was banned in France upon publication...

. In 1928, she co-starred with George O'Brien in Noah's Ark, a part-talkie epic directed by Michael Curtiz
Michael Curtiz
Michael Curtiz was an Academy award winning Hungarian-American film director. He had early creditsas Mihály Kertész and Michael Kertész...

.

Costello spoke with a lisp (something that her granddaughter, Drew Barrymore, seemingly inherited), and found it difficult to make the transition to talking pictures, but after two years of voice coaching she was comfortable speaking before a microphone. One of her early sound film appearances was with her sister Helene in Warner Bros.
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...

's all-star extravaganza The Show of Shows (1929). Her acting career, however, became less a priority for her following the birth of her first child and she retired from the screen in 1931 to devote time to her family. However her marriage to John Barrymore
John Barrymore
John Sidney Blyth , better known as John Barrymore, was an acclaimed American actor. He first gained fame as a handsome stage actor in light comedy, then high drama and culminating in groundbreaking portrayals in Shakespearean plays Hamlet and Richard III...

 proved to be a difficult one due to his increasing alcoholism
Alcoholism
Alcoholism is a broad term for problems with alcohol, and is generally used to mean compulsive and uncontrolled consumption of alcoholic beverages, usually to the detriment of the drinker's health, personal relationships, and social standing...

, and they divorced in 1935.

Costello resumed her career a year later and achieved some successes, most notably in Little Lord Fauntleroy
Little Lord Fauntleroy
Little Lord Fauntleroy is the first children's novel written by English playwright and author Frances Hodgson Burnett. It was originally published as a serial in the St. Nicholas Magazine between November 1885 and October 1886, then as a book by Scribner's in 1886...

 (1936
1936 in film
The year 1936 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*May 29 - Fritz Lang's first Hollywood film Fury, starring Spencer Tracy and Bruce Cabot, is released.*November 6 - first Porky Pig animated cartoon...

), and The Magnificent Ambersons
The Magnificent Ambersons (film)
The Magnificent Ambersons is a 1942 American drama film written and directed by Orson Welles. His second feature film, it is based on the 1918 novel of the same name by Booth Tarkington and stars Joseph Cotten, Dolores Costello, Anne Baxter, Tim Holt, Agnes Moorehead and Ray Collins...

 (1942
1942 in film
The year 1942 in film involved some significant events, in particular the release of a film consistently rated as one of the greatest of all time, Casablanca.-Events:...

). She retired permanently from acting following her appearance in This is the Army
This Is the Army
This Is the Army is a 1943 American wartime motion picture produced by Hal B. Wallis and Jack L. Warner, and directed by Michael Curtiz, and a wartime musical designed to boost morale in the U.S. during World War II, directed by Sgt. Ezra Stone...

 (1943), again under the direction of Michael Curtiz
Michael Curtiz
Michael Curtiz was an Academy award winning Hungarian-American film director. He had early creditsas Mihály Kertész and Michael Kertész...

.

Later years

In 1939, she married Dr. John Vruwink, her obstetrician, but they divorced in 1950. Costello spent the remaining years of her life in semi-seclusion, managing an avocado farm. Her film career was largely ruined by the destructive effects of early film makeup, which ravaged her complexion too severely to camouflage. Her final film was This Is the Army (1943).

In the 1970s her house was inundated in a flash flood which destroyed a lot of her property and memorabilia from her movie career and life with John Barrymore
John Barrymore
John Sidney Blyth , better known as John Barrymore, was an acclaimed American actor. He first gained fame as a handsome stage actor in light comedy, then high drama and culminating in groundbreaking portrayals in Shakespearean plays Hamlet and Richard III...

.

Shortly before her death, she agreed to be interviewed for the documentary series Hollywood
Hollywood (documentary)
Hollywood is a 1980 documentary series produced by Thames Television which explored the establishment and development of the Hollywood studios and its impact on 1920s culture....

 discussing her film career. She died from emphysema
Emphysema
Emphysema is a long-term, progressive disease of the lungs that primarily causes shortness of breath. In people with emphysema, the tissues necessary to support the physical shape and function of the lungs are destroyed. It is included in a group of diseases called chronic obstructive pulmonary...

 in Fallbrook, California
Fallbrook, California
Fallbrook is an unincorporated community in northern San Diego County, California. The Fallbrook census-designated place population was 30,534 at the 2010 census, up from 29,100 at the 2000 census....

, in 1979, and was interred in the Calvary Cemetery, East Los Angeles
Calvary Cemetery, East Los Angeles
The Calvary Cemetery is a Roman Catholic cemetery operated by the Los Angeles Archdiocese, located at 4201 Whittier Boulevard in Los Angeles, California...

; a cemetery for people who were of the Roman Catholic faith. Her interview scenes were broadcast posthumously in 1980
1980 in film
- Events :* May 21 - Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back is released and is the biggest grosser of the year ....

.

Dolores Costello has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
Hollywood Walk of Fame
The Hollywood Walk of Fame consists of more than 2,400 five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along fifteen blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California...

 for her contributions to Motion Pictures, at 1645 Vine Street.

Child roles

Dolores Costello appeared as a child actress in many films made between 1909 and 1915 . Among them are:
  • 1909: A Midsummer Night's Dream

  • 1910: The Telephone

  • 1911: Consuming Love, or St. Valentine's Day in Greenaway Land A Geranium; The Child Crusoes; His Sister's Children; A Reformed Santa Claus; Some Good in All

  • 1912: Captain Jenks' Dilemma; The Meeting of the Ways; For the Honor of the Family; She Never Knew; Lulu's Doctor; The Troublesome Step-Daughters; The Money Kings; A Juvenile Love Affair; Wanted ... a Grandmother; Vultures and Doves; Her Grandchild; Captain Barnacle's Legacy; Bobby's Father; The Irony of Fate; The Toymaker; Ida's Christmas

  • 1913: A Birthday Gift; The Hindoo Charm; In the Shadow; Fellow Voyagers

  • 1914: Some Steamer Scooping; Etta of the Footlights; Too Much Burglar

  • 1915: The Evil Men Do

Filmography (as adult performer)

Year Film Role Notes
1923 The Glimpses of the Moon Bit Part lost
Lawful Larceny Nora the maid
1925 Greater Than a Crown Isabel Frances
Princess of Lividia
Bobbed Hair
Bobbed Hair (1925 film)
Bobbed Hair is a 1925 silent film comedy produced and distributed by Warner Brothers with directing by Alan Crosland. It is based on a novel written by twenty different authors...

Bit part
1926 Mannequin
Mannequin (1926 film)
Mannequin is a 1926 silent film romance produced by Famous Players-Lasky and distributed by Paramount Pictures. James Cruze directed and Alice Joyce, Warner Baxter and Dolores Costello were the stars...

Joan Herrick Extant
The Sea Beast
The Sea Beast
The Sea Beast is a silent film adaptation of the novel Moby Dick by Herman Melville, a story about a monomaniacal hunt for a great white whale...

Esther Harper Extant(George Eastman House)
Bride of the Storm
Bride of the Storm
Bride of the Storm is a historical adventure made at Warner Brothers, directed by J. Stuart Blackton, and starring Tyrone Power, Sr. and Dolores Costello...

Faith Fitzhugh Lost film
The Little Irish Girl
The Little Irish Girl
The Little Irish Girl is a 1926 silent film romantic drama produced and distributed by Warner Brothers. It was directed by Roy Del Ruth and starred Dolores Costello. It is considered a lost film. -Cast:*Dolores Costello - Dot Walker...

Dot Walker Lost film
The Third Degree
The Third Degree
The Third Degree is a 1926 romance film directed by Michael Curtiz based the hit 1909 play of the same name written by Charles Klein and starring Helen Ware.A copy of this film is held by The Library of Congress. -Cast:...

Annie Daly Extant (Library of Congress)
1927 When a Man Loves
When a Man Loves
Manon Lescaut is a 1926 silent German feature film based on the oft-filmed novel by Abbe Prevost. It stars Lya De Putti and was directed by Arthur Robison. It was produced and distributed by renown German film company Universum Film AG better known as UFA. A young actress named Marlene Dietrich had...

Manon Lescaut
Manon Lescaut
Manon Lescaut is a short novel by French author Abbé Prévost. Published in 1731, it is the seventh and final volume of Mémoires et aventures d'un homme de qualité . It was controversial in its time and was banned in France upon publication...

Extant (Turner/Warner Bros.)
A Million Bid
A Million Bid
A Million Bid is a 1927 drama film directed by Michael Curtiz.An incomplete print of this film, with Italian intertitles, is housed at the Library of Congress.-Cast:* Dolores Costello - Dorothy Gordon* Warner Oland - Geoffrey Marsh...

Dorothy Gordon Incomplete(Library of Congress- Italian title cards)
Old San Francisco
Old San Francisco (film)
Old San Francisco is a silent movie which was released by Warner Brothers.-Production background:The film was released in a silent version and in a Vitaphone version, with sound-on-disc recording of music and sound effects only. The film was released by Warner Brothers, directed by Alan Crosland,...

Dolores Vasquez Extant(Turner/Warner Bros.)
The Heart of Maryland
The Heart of Maryland
The Heart of Maryland is a silent 1927 costume drama produced and distributed by Warner Brothers and directed by Lloyd Bacon. The film stars Dolores Costello in the title character. This film is the last silent version of the oft filmed Victorian story with versions having been produced in 1915 and...

Maryland Calvert Extant/incomplete(Library of Congress)
The College Widow
The College Widow
The College Widow is a 1927 American silent comedy film produced and distributed by Warner Bros., and directed by Archie Mayo. The film is based on the 1904 Broadway play by George Ade and was previously adapted to film in 1915 with Ethel Clayton. The 1927 silent film version is a starring vehicle...

Jane Witherspoon Lost film
1928 Tenderloin
Tenderloin (film)
Tenderloin is a crime film directed by Michael Curtiz, starring Dolores Costello. It was produced and released by Warner Brothers. Tenderloin is considered a lost film, with no prints currently known to exist.-Cast:...

Rose Shannon Lost film
Glorious Betsy
Glorious Betsy
Glorious Betsy is a 1928 mostly-silent film with talking sequences, based on a play of the same name by Rida Johnson Young and starring Dolores Costello. It was produced by Warner Brothers and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Writing, Adaptation in 1929. The film was directed by Alan...

Betsy Patterson
Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte
Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte , known as "Betsy", was the daughter of a Baltimore, Maryland merchant, and was the first wife of Jérôme Bonaparte, and sister-in-law of Emperor Napoleon I of France.-Ancestry:Elizabeth's father, William Patterson, had been born in Ireland and came to North America...

Extant(silent only, Vitaphone talking, music and sound effects missing)
Noah's Ark Mary/Miriam Extant(Turner and/or UCLA Film & Television Archives)
1929 The Redeeming Sin
The Redeeming Sin
The Redeeming Sin is a 1929 crime drama part-talking silent film with Vitaphone music and sound effects. It was produced and distributed by Warner Brothers and starred Dolores Costello. This film is currently a lost film.-Cast:...

Joan Billaire Lost film
Glad Rag Doll
Glad Rag Doll (film)
Glad Rag Doll is a 1929 all talking drama film directed by Michael Curtiz starring Dolores Costello. This is one of many lost films of the 1920s, no prints or Vitaphone discs survive, but the song with the same title and the trailer survives.-Cast:...

Annabel Lee Lost film (trailer survives)
Madonna of Avenue A
Madonna of Avenue A
Madonna of Avenue A is a 1929 drama film directed by Michael Curtiz. It was produced and distributed by Warner Brothers. It starred Dolores Costello in one of her last silent films. This is reportedly a lost film...

Maria Morton Lost film
Hearts in Exile
Hearts in Exile (1929 film)
Hearts in Exile is a 1929 part-silent, part-sound romance film produced and distributed by Warner Brothers and directed by Michael Curtiz. It starred Dolores Costello in a story based on the 1904 play by John Oxenham. A surviving 1915 film starring Clara Kimball Young was produced. Hearts in Exile...

Vera Zuanova Lost film
The Show of Shows
The Show of Shows (film)
The Show of Shows is a lavish all talking Vitaphone musical revue film which cost $850,000 to make. The Show of Shows was Warner Bros. fifth color movie, the first four were The Desert Song , On With the Show , Gold Diggers of Broadway and Paris . This movie featured most of the contemporary...

Meet My Sister number Extant(Turner/Warner Bros.)
1930 Second Choice
Second Choice
Second Choice is a 1930 American black-and-white film released by Warner Bros. and starring Dolores Costello and Chester Morris. It is a lost film.-Cast:*Dolores Costello - Valery Grove*Chester Morris - Don Warren*Jack Mulhall - Mallory...

Vallery Grove Lost film
1931 Expensive Women
Expensive Women
Expensive Women is a 1931 talking film drama. It is very much a Pre-Code type of story. It was produced by First National and distributed through their parent company Warner Brothers. The film was directed by silent film veteran Hobart Henley and starred Dolores Costello. This film was Costello's...

Constance 'Connie' Newton Extant(Library of Congress)
1936 Little Lord Fauntleroy
Little Lord Fauntleroy (1936 film)
Little Lord Fauntleroy is a 1936 drama film based on the 1886 novel of the same name by Frances Hodgson Burnett. The film stars Freddie Bartholomew, Dolores Costello, , and C. Aubrey Smith...

'Dearest' Erroll
Yours for the Asking
Yours for the Asking
Yours for the Asking is a 1936 film starring George Raft as a casino owner and Dolores Costello as the socialite he hires as hostess. The movie also features Ida Lupino and was directed by Alexander Hall.-Cast:* George Raft as Johnny Lamb...

Lucille Sutton
1938 The Beloved Brat Helen Cosgrove
Breaking the Ice Martha Martin
1939 King of the Turf Eve Barnes
Whispering Enemies Laura Crandall
Outside These Walls
Outside These Walls
Outside These Walls is a 1939 film starring Michael Whalen, Dolores Costello, Virginia Weidler, Selmer Jackson, and Don Beddoe. The film was directed by Ray McCarey.- Plot :...

Margaret Bronson
1942 The Magnificent Ambersons
The Magnificent Ambersons (film)
The Magnificent Ambersons is a 1942 American drama film written and directed by Orson Welles. His second feature film, it is based on the 1918 novel of the same name by Booth Tarkington and stars Joseph Cotten, Dolores Costello, Anne Baxter, Tim Holt, Agnes Moorehead and Ray Collins...

Isabel
1943 This Is the Army
This Is the Army
This Is the Army is a 1943 American wartime motion picture produced by Hal B. Wallis and Jack L. Warner, and directed by Michael Curtiz, and a wartime musical designed to boost morale in the U.S. during World War II, directed by Sgt. Ezra Stone...

Mrs. Davidson

External links

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