Gilda Gray - Biography, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Filmography (Read)
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Gilda Gray - Biography, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Filmography
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Gilda Gray - biography, date of birth, place of birth, filmography, clips, actress.
October 24, 1901 - December 22, 1959 - American actress of Polish descent who popularized the shimmy dance in the United States, which became popular in the 1920s.
She was born in Krakow, then part of Austria-Hungary, in the family of Max and Wanda Michalski, who immigrated to the United States in 1909 and settled in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Since the family lived in poverty, her parents married Marianne at the age of 15 to the violinist John Goretsky, from whom a year later she gave birth to a son, Martin, who became the leader of a jazz orchestra. She began her career with performances in a pub, where she sang and danced.
Wanting to gain popularity, she left her husband and moved to Chicago, where she met the pianist Frank Westphal, who saw her talent and took her with him to New York. There she met his wife, the famous singer Sophie Tucker, who convinced her to change her name to Gilda Gray. Gray's New York career began in 1919 with participation in vaudeville and revue, and in the same year she first appeared on the cinema screens. At the same time, she invented the “shimmy” dance, when during one of her performances she forgot part of the words of the US anthem, and to hide her embarrassment began to shake her shoulders and hips. The dance quickly gained success with the public, and soon became one of the most popular dances of the time, and the actress herself received the nickname "Queen of Shimmy". Later, the dance "shimmy" became her trademark.
Her career quickly gained momentum, and in 1922 she successfully participated in the famous Broadway revue of "The Siegfeld Folly". In 1923, Gray married her agent Gillard Baugh, with whom she moved to Hollywood, where she continued successful performances in vaudeville, and also began to intensively develop a career in cinema. The most successful films with her participation were "The Devil's Dancer" (1927) and "Piccadilly" (1929), which brought her large fees and the love of the public.
In 1929, after the stock market crashed, Gray lost most of her savings. The ensuing work difficulties, stress and divorce from her second husband led to a heart attack in 1931. In May 1933, she married the Venezuelan diplomat Hector Briceno de Saha, whom she divorced five years later. By that time, her performances had become rather rare, and in 1939 the film "Rose Marie" was released, which became the last in her film career.
In 1946, Gray filed a million-dollar lawsuit against Columbia Pictures, claiming that their film Gilda, starring Rita Hayworth, was based on her life. In 1954, after years of litigation, the claim was dismissed. In 1953, a documentary film dedicated to Gilda Gray was released on television, which told about her courage during the Second World War in organizing charitable foundations in support of the Polish people, for which she was later awarded the Cross of Merit.
At the end of her life, Gray experienced serious financial problems, and for the last six years she lived with the family of the fire captain of the Warner Bros. Studios. Antonio Rayo. Five days before her death, Gray suffered a bout of food poisoning, and on December 22, 1959, she died of a heart attack at the age of 58. Her funeral at the Holy Cross Catholic Cemetery in Culver City was paid for by the Cinematic Relief Fund, and in February 1960, her personalized star was laid on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
