Bebe Daniels Movies
American actress Bebe Daniels and the motion picture industry virtually grew up together. After touring with her stage-actor parents, Daniels made her film debut at age seven in the silent one-reeler A Common Enemy (1908). After unsuccessfully applying for a job as a Mack Sennett bathing beauty (she was well under the age of consent), Daniels secured a job at Hal Roach's comedy studio in 1915, co-featured with Roach's biggest (and only) star Harold Lloyd in a series of zany slapstick comedies. In 1919, Daniels was signed by producer-director Cecil B. DeMille to star in a group of slick, sophisticated feature films in the company of DeMille regulars Gloria Swanson and Thomas Meighan. Though successful in these glamorous ventures, Daniels found herself more at home in fast-moving comedy roles, in which she specialized while contracted with Paramount Pictures in the mid-1920s; the actress played everything from a female Zorro type in Senorita (1927) to a "lady Valentino" in She's a Sheik (1927). When talking pictures came around, Paramount dropped Daniels' contract, worried that she wouldn't be able to make the transition to sound. But Daniels surprised everyone by scoring a hit in RKO's expensive musical feature Rio Rita (1929), managing to keep her career in high gear until her last American film, Music is Magic (1935). Upon her retirement from Hollywood, Daniels moved to England with her actor husband Ben Lyon in 1935. Enormously popular with London audiences, Daniels and Lyon starred in stage plays and films, and in the 1940s, headlined the successful radio series Life with the Lyons, which graduated to an even more successful TV program in the 1950s. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide- 1920
Bebe Daniels stars in this picture, based on the musical comedy by P.G. Wodehouse and Guy Bolton. Although May Barber (Daniels) has made the transformation from innocent country girl to successful stage actress, she's still fond of her former sweetheart, Willoughby Finch (big man Walter Hiers). So when she hears that Finch may be falling into the clutches of a vamp, she decides to rescue him. Unfortunately the woman she saves him from turns out to be his adored, and adorable, fiancee. She also estranges herself from her own sweetheart. Before the requisite reconciliations in the final reels, all sorts of mayhem occurs. Daniels was the only worthwhile aspect of the picture; Hiers seems to have been miscast. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide
- 1920
One of the best of Cecil B. DeMille's sophisticated sex comedies of the silent era, Why Change Your Wife? hinges upon a marriage of opposites. Husband Thomas Meighan has a fondness for wine, women and song; wife Gloria Swanson is the intellectual bookish type (we know this much because she wears thick glasses). When jazz baby Bebe Daniels enters Meighan's life, the indignant Swanson files for divorce. Realizing that she's permitted herself to become dull and drab, the newly liberated Gloria "dolls up" with a glamorous new wardrobe. Meanwhile, Meighan has become disillusioned with new bride Bebe, who is all pizazz but no substance. At a fashionable summer resort, Meighan and Swanson are reunited. When Tom and Gloria fall in love all over again, Bebe is temporarily put out, but she consoles herself with the old battle cry "Remember the Alimony!" Despite the film's farcical trappings, Why Change Your Wife? has more depth than the usual DeMille froth, thanks to the three-dimensional performances of its star trio. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Don't let that title fool you: Male and Female is really James M. Barrie's The Admirable Crichton, as interpreted by Cecil B. DeMille. Thomas Meighan plays Crichton, the very proper butler in the British household of Lord Loam (Theodore Roberts). When masters and servants go on a yachting excursion, the vessel is destroyed in a storm, marooning everyone on a desert island. The helpless aristocrats must turn to the resourceful Crichton for survival. Before long, Crichton is ruling the roost, while his masters are cheerfully performing the most menial of tasks. Haughty Lady Mary (Gloria Swanson) foregoes her class-conscious upbringing and falls in love with Crichton. Once the castaways are rescued and brought back to England, however, the original class distinctions are restored. Lady Mary goes ahead with a marriage to stuffy Lord Brockelhurst as scheduled, but it is obvious that she will be unhappy in this "socially correct" union. Meawhile, Crichton finds happiness with scullery maid Tweeny (Lila Lee), who has loved him all along. Feeling that the Barrie play didn't have sufficient "punch" to go over with 1919 filmgoers, DeMille interpolated a dream sequence in which Gloria Swanson imagines herself a Babylonian princess; this gave the actress the opportunity to share a scene with a live and none-too-docile lion. One would think that critics of the era would haul DeMille over the coals for taking so many liberties with The Admirable Crichton, but such was not the case. One reviewer of Male and Female even congratulated DeMille for making Barrie "filmable"! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Thomas Meighan, Gloria Swanson, (more)
- 1919
Harold Lloyd and Bebe Daniels are next-door neighbors in a shabby boardinghouse. Harold scrapes together just barely enough money to pay his rent when he runs into Bebe, who is crying in the hallway. Her rent is overdue, so Harold gives her his cash. Harold has to use all his ingenuity to avoid his aptly-named landlord, Bearcat Simpson, so he can make his way to the theater to find out the status of a new play he has written. To get to the theater, he jumps on a passing car and annoys its stuffy passenger. Unfortunately, the man turns out to be the manager of the theater, and Harold enters his office, he throws him out. Meanwhile, Bebe, who is rehearsing on stage, is being unfairly fired by the musical director (Harry "Snub" Pollard). Harold comes to her defense and as a result, is tossed out of the theater completely. As he is nursing his wounds, a limo drives up -- it's a wealthy young man who takes Bebe out for an evening on the town. Harold literally hitches a ride by crawling into a streetcleaner's cart and hooking it on the back of the limo. Everyone arrives at a supper club where, through a chain of events, Harold wins a big pile of money at roulette and makes up with Bebe. The police raid the place and Harold and Bebe spend the last few minutes of the film successfully evading arrest. This was Lloyd's first two-reeler as his "glasses" character, and marked his initial jump into stardom. ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide
- 1919
Allegory is a storytelling form little used in cinema today, but it popped up frequently during the silent era, especially before the '20s kicked in. This particular film was based on a morality play by Walter Browns. Everywoman (Violet Heming) is on a quest for love, but Flattery (Raymond Hatton) convinces her to go on the stage. Other temptations and distractions that stand in her way include Wealth (Theodore Roberts), Passion (Irving Cummings) and Dissipation (Fred Huntley). Finally, she discovers that Love is a humble young physician (Monte Blue). Although the premise to this film sounds corny now, some of the casting still fascinates; the dark, delectable Bebe Daniels is a fetching choice for Vice! ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide
- 1919
Harold Lloyd plays a dreamy young man in this Hal Roach short. Bebe Daniels (Lloyd's regular leading lady at the time) portrays a girl who is being courted by the unappetizing Snub Pollard. Harold, meanwhile, is at work, but it's spring, the day is beautiful and the office is next to a lovely park. His mind is anywhere but on his job, so he wanders off and the other office workers are unable to retrieve him. Harold causes so much trouble at the park that he is obliged to hide in a gigantic bush -- just as Bebe hides in it to get away from Pollard. Thus the two get acquainted. Bebe, for obvious reasons, finds him much more appealing than her beau and after a few more adventures, takes him home, where he discovers that her father is his boss. But the father is a man after Harold's own heart -- he advises Harold to "Do like I do and go to work whenever you please." ~ Janiss Garza, All Movie Guide
