Known For
Acting
Born
Nov 14, 1906
Died
Aug 08, 1985
Place of Birth
Cherryvale, Kansas, USA
Credits
37 titles
Louise Brooks
Biography
Mary Louise Brooks (November 14, 1906 – August 8, 1985) was an American film actress and dancer during the 1920s and 1930s. She is regarded today as an icon of the Jazz Age and flapper culture, in part due to the bob hairstyle that she helped popularize during the prime of her career. Brooks began her career as a dancer. While dancing in the Ziegfeld Follies in New York City, she came to the attention of Walter Wanger, a producer at Paramount Pictures, and was signed to a five-year contract with the studio. She appeared in supporting roles in various Paramount films before taking the heroine's role in Beggars of Life (1928). Dissatisfied with her mediocre roles in Hollywood films, Brooks went to Germany in 1929 and starred in three feature films that launched her to international stardom: Pandora's Box (1929), Diary of a Lost Girl (1929), and Miss Europe (1930); the first two were directed by G. W. Pabst. By 1938, she had starred in seventeen silent films and eight sound films. After retiring from acting, she fell upon financial hardship and became a paid escort. For the next two decades, she struggled with alcoholism and suicidal tendencies. Following the rediscovery of her films by cinephiles in the 1950s, a reclusive Brooks began writing articles about her film career; her insightful essays drew considerable acclaim. She published her memoir, Lulu in Hollywood, in 1982. Three years later, she died of a heart attack at age 78. [preceding biography, edited, from Wikipedia]
Known For
Filmography
Away with Words
Louise Brooks
Clara Bow: Hollywood's Lost Screen Goddess
Fragments: Surviving Pieces of Lost Films
Herself (archive footage)
Flappers, Speakeasies, and the Birth of Modern Culture
Why Be Good?: Sexuality & Censorship in Early Cinema
Self (archive footage)
Clara Bow: Discovering the "It" Girl
Self (archive footage)
Louise Brooks: Looking for Lulu
Herself (archive footage)
Mysteries and Scandals
Self (archive footage)
The Casting Couch
1001 Films
(archival)
Louise Brooks
Herself (Archival Footage)
Lulu in Berlin
Self
Hollywood
Self
Memories of Berlin: The Twilight of Weimar Culture
Self - Interviewee
Overland Stage Raiders
Beth Hoyt
When You're in Love
Specialty Ballerina in Chorus
Empty Saddles
Boots Boone
Windy Riley Goes Hollywood
Betty Grey
God's Gift to Women
Florine
It Pays to Advertise
Thelma Temple
Miss Europe
Lucienne
Diary of a Lost Girl
Thymian Henning
The Canary Murder Case
The Canary
Pandora's Box
Lulu
Beggars of Life
The Girl (Nancy)
A Girl in Every Port
Marie / Mam'selle Godiva
The City Gone Wild
Snuggles Joy
Now We're in the Air
Griselle and Grisette
Rolled Stockings
Carol Fleming
Evening Clothes
Fox Trot
Just Another Blonde
Diana O'Sullivan
The Show Off
Clara
It's the Old Army Game
Mildred Marshall
A Social Celebrity
Kitty Laverne
Love 'Em and Leave 'Em
Janie Walsh
The American Venus
Miss Bayport
The Street of Forgotten Men
A Moll