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Anne Shirley
Born	Dawn Evelyn Paris (1918-04-17)April 17, 1918 New York City, NY, U.S.
Died	July 4, 1993(1993-07-04) (aged 75) Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Other names	Dawn O'Day
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1922–1944
Known for	Anne of Green Gables Steamboat Round the Bend Stella Dallas Murder, My Sweet Anne of Windy Poplars
Spouses	John Payne ​ ​(m. 1937; div. 1943)​ Adrian Scott ​ ​(m. 1945; div. 1948)​ Charles Lederer ​ ​(m. 1949; died 1976)​
Children	2, including Julie Payne
Awards	Hollywood Walk of Fame

Anne Shirley (born Dawn Evelyn Paris; April 17, 1918 – July 4, 1993) was an American actress.

Beginning her career as a child actress under the stage name Dawn O'Day, she adopted the stage name of Anne Shirley after playing the title character in the film adaptation of Anne of Green Gables in 1934, after which she achieved a successful career in supporting roles. Among her films is Stella Dallas (1937), for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.

Shirley left the acting profession in 1944 at the age of 26 and remained in Los Angeles, where she died at the age of 75.

Early life

Born in New York City as Dawn Evelyn Paris, Shirley began modeling as a baby and made her film debut with a featured role in Moonshine Valley (1922). She began acting at the age of five as the live-action Alice in Walt Disney's silent animated series Alice in Cartoonland. Shirley had a highly successful career in pre-Code films such as Liliom, Riders of the Purple Sage, So Big, Three on a Match and Rasputin and the Empress.

Career

In 1934, Shirley starred as the character of Anne Shirley in Anne of Green Gables and took that character's name as her legal and stage name.

She starred in Steamboat Round the Bend, Make Way for a Lady and Stella Dallas, for which she was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. Her later roles came in films such as Vigil in the Night, Anne of Windy Poplars, The Devil and Daniel Webster and Murder, My Sweet, her final film.

Critic Bosley Crowther of The New York Times praised Shirley's performance in Saturday's Children (1940), writing that she played her role "with heroic integrity and strength of character."

Personal life

Shirley married actor John Payne on August 22, 1937, in Montecito, California. They had a daughter, former actress Julie Payne, and divorced in 1943.

Her second husband was film producer and screenwriter Adrian Scott. When he was blacklisted and wanted to move the family to Europe, Shirley opted to remain in the U.S. The couple divorced in 1949.

Her third husband was Charles Lederer, nephew of Marion Davies. They had one son, Daniel Lederer.

Shirley had brief relationships with younger Western star Rory Calhoun and with French film star Jean-Pierre Aumont.

Shirley died from lung cancer in Los Angeles at the age of 75 on July 4, 1993, and was cremated. For her contributions to the motion-picture industry, she has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 7020 Hollywood Blvd.

Filmography

Awards and nominations

References

1. "Anne Shirley At Weller". The Times Recorder. Zanesville, Ohio. July 7, 1940. p. 16. Retrieved July 13, 2016 – via Newspapers.com.
2. ^ Shipman, David (October 22, 2011). "Obituary: Anne Shirley". The Independent. London. Archived from the original on 2022-05-07. Retrieved November 1, 2015.
3. "Information Desk". Modern Screen. Vol. 11, no. 2. July 1935. p. 10. Retrieved November 1, 2015.
4. "Venus em Flor". Gazeta de Noticias (in Brazilian Portuguese). Vol. 60, no. 156. Rio de Janeiro. 1935-07-04. p. 9.
5. Crowther, Bosley (1940-05-04). "The Screen; John Garfield and Anne Shirley Seen at Strand in 'Saturday's Children'—Star Dust' at Roxy". The New York Times. p. 13.
6. "Anne Marries". Mansfield News Journal. United Press. August 23, 1937. p. 10. Retrieved July 13, 2016 – via Newspapers.com.
7. ^ "Anne Shirley". Variety. Associated Press. July 8, 1993. Retrieved August 26, 2020.
8. Barzman, Norma (August 18, 2004). The Red and the Blacklist: The Intimate Memoir of a Hollywood Expatriate. Public Affairs. ISBN 978-1560256175.

External links

• Anne Shirley at IMDb
• Anne Shirley at the AFI Catalog of Feature Films
• Anne Shirley at the Turner Classic Movies database
• Anne Shirley at AllMovie
• Anne Shirley at Virtual History

• American child actresses
• American film actresses
• American silent film actresses
• Deaths from lung cancer in California
• Actresses from New York City
• 1918 births
• 1993 deaths
• 20th-century American actresses