Ida Estelle Taylor (May 20, 1894 – April 15, 1958) was an American actress, singer, and model. With "dark-brown, almost black hair and brown eyes," she was regarded as one of the most beautiful silent film stars of the 1920s.
After her stage debut in 1919, Taylor began appearing in small roles in World and Vitagraph films. She achieved her first success with While New York Sleeps (1920), in which she played three different roles, including a femme fatale, or "vamp." She was a contract player of Fox Film Corporation and, later, Paramount Pictures, but for the majority of her career she freelanced. She became famous and was commended by reviewers for her portrayals of historical women in important films: Miriam in The Ten Commandments (1923), Mary, Queen of Scots in Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall (1924), and Lucrezia Borgia in Don Juan (1926).
Taylor and her second husband, world heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey, were a popular Hollywood couple. Although she made a successful transition to sound films, she retired from film acting in 1932 to focus entirely on her singing career. She was also active in animal welfare before her death from cancer in 1958. She was posthumously honored in 1960 with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in the motion pictures category.
Early life
Ida Estelle Taylor was born on May 20, 1894, in Wilmington, Delaware. Her father, Harry D. Taylor (born 1871), was born in Harrington, Delaware. Her mother, Ida LaBertha "Bertha" Barrett (1874–1965), was born in Easton, Pennsylvania, and later worked as a freelance makeup artist. The Taylors had another daughter, Helen (1898–1990), who also became an actress. According to the 1900 census, the family lived in a rented house at 805 Washington Street in Wilmington.
Taylor was raised by her maternal grandparents, Charles Christopher Barrett and Ida Lauber Barrett. Charles Barrett ran a piano store in Wilmington, and Taylor studied piano. Her childhood ambition was to become a stage actress, but her grandparents initially disapproved of her theatrical aspirations. When she was ten years old she sang the role of "Buttercup" in a benefit performance of the opera H.M.S. Pinafore in Wilmington. The couple remained together for five years until Taylor decided to become an actress. which opened on April 8, 1919, at 48th Street Theatre in New York City. The story was about a shoe clerk who has a dream in which he inherits one million dollars and must make another million within six months. It was not a great success and closed after sixteen weeks.
Fox also cast her as Gilda Fontaine, a "vamp", in the 1922 remake of the 1915 Fox production A Fool There Was, She played a Russian princess in the film Bavu (1923), Taylor's younger sister, Helen, was hired by Sid Grauman to play Miriam in the Egyptian Theatre's onstage prologue to the film.
thumbnail|Taylor as [[Mary, Queen of Scots, from Stars of the Photoplay (1924)]]
Despite being ill with arthritis, she won the supporting role of Mary, Queen of Scots in Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall (1924), starring Mary Pickford. "I've since wondered if my long illness did not, in some measure at least, make for realism in registering the suffering of the unhappy and tormented Scotch queen," she told a reporter in 1926.
She was to have co-starred in a film with Rudolph Valentino, but he died just before production was to begin. One of her last silent films was New York (1927), featuring Ricardo Cortez and Lois Wilson.
In 1928, she and husband Dempsey starred in a Broadway play titled The Big Fight, loosely based around Dempsey's boxing popularity, which ran for 31 performances at the Majestic Theatre.
She made a successful transition to sound films or "talkies." Her first sound film was the comical sketch Pusher in the Face (1929). Johnson was delighted with Taylor's reappearance in the film industry: "[Interviewing] Estelle was a pleasant surprise. The lady is as beautiful and as vivacious as ever, with the curves still in the right places." In September, Peacock announced he would sue Taylor for divorce on the ground of desertion.
Taylor and Dempsey were married on February 7, 1925, at First Presbyterian Church in San Diego, California. They lived in Los Feliz, Los Angeles. Her marriage to Dempsey ended in divorce on September 21, 1931.
Her third husband was theatrical producer Paul Small. Of her last husband and their marriage, she said: "We have been friends and Paul has managed my stage career for five years, so it seemed logical that marriage should work out for us, but I'm afraid I'll have to say that the reason it has not worked out is incompatibility."
Animal rights activism
In her later years, Taylor devoted her free time to her pets and was known for her work as an animal rights activist. "Whenever the subject of compulsory rabies inoculation or vivisection came up," wrote the United Press, "Miss Taylor was always in the fore to lead the battle against the measure." She was the president and founder of the California Pet Owners' Protective League, In 1953, Taylor was appointed to the Los Angeles City Animal Regulation Commission, She left an estate of more than $10,000, most of it to her family and $200 for the care and maintenance of her three dogs, which she left to her friend Ella Mae Abrams.
Awards
- One of Photoplays Best Performances of the Month (June 1929) for Where East Is East
- One of Screenlands Ten Best Portrayals of the Month (November 1931) for Street Scene
Film portrayal
In the 1983 American television biopic Dempsey, Estelle Taylor was portrayed by British actress Victoria Tennant.
Filmography
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! Year
! Title
! Role
! Notes
|-
| rowspan="2"|1919
| A Broadway Saint
| The Parisian
| Lost film;
|-
| The Golden Shower
| Helen
| Lost film
|-
| rowspan="5"|1920
| The Adventurer
| Maritana
| Lost film
|-
| The Revenge of Tarzan
| Countess de Coude
| Extant
|-
| While New York Sleeps
| A Wife / The Vamp / The Girl
| Extant
|-
| Blind Wives
| Anne / Annie / Annette
| Extant
|-
| The Tower of Jewels
| Adele Warren
|Lost film
|-
| 1921
| Footfalls
| Peggy Hawthorne
| Lost film
|-
| rowspan="6"|1922
| A Fool There Was
| Gilda Fontaine
| Lost film
|-
| Monte Cristo
| Mercedes, Countess de Morcerf
| Extant
|-
| The Lights of New York
| Mrs. George Burton
| Lost film
|-
| Only a Shop Girl
| Mame Mulvey
| Lost film
|-
| Thorns and Orange Blossoms
| Rosita Mendez
| Extant
|-
| A California Romance
| Donna Dolores
| Lost film
|-
| rowspan="5"|1923
| Bavu
| Princess Annia
| Lost film
|-
| Mary of the Movies
| Herself
| Incomplete; uncredited
|-
| Forgive and Forget
| Mrs. Cameron
| Incomplete
|-
| Desire
| Madalyn Harlan
| Lost film
|-
| The Ten Commandments
| Miriam, The Sister of Moses
| Extant
|-
| rowspan="6"|1924
| Phantom Justice
| 'Goldie' Harper
| Incomplete
|-
| Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall
| Mary, Queen of Scots
| Extant
|-
| Tiger Love
| Marcheta
| Lost film
|-
| Passion's Pathway
| Dora Kenyon
| Lost film
|-
| The Alaskan
| Mary Standish
| Lost film
|-
| Playthings of Desire
| Gloria Dawn
| Extant
|-
| rowspan="2"|1925
| Manhattan Madness
| The Girl
| Extant
|-
| Wandering Footsteps
| Helen Maynard
| Extant
|-
| 1926
| Don Juan
| Lucrezia Borgia
| Extant
|-
| 1927
| New York
| Angie Miller
| Lost film
|-
| rowspan="4"|1928
| The Whip Woman
| Sari
| Lost film
|-
| Honor Bound
| Evelyn Mortimer
| Extant
|-
| Lady Raffles
| Lady Raffles
| Extant
|-
| The Wreck of the Singapore
| Daisy
| Lost film
|-
| rowspan="2"|1929
| Pusher in the Face
|
| Short film; sound debut
|-
| Where East Is East
| Mme. de Sylva
|
|-
| 1930
| Liliom
| Mme. Muscat
|
|-
| rowspan="3"|1931
| Cimarron
| Dixie Lee
|
|-
| Street Scene
| Mrs. Anna Maurrant
|
|-
| The Unholy Garden
| Eliza Mowbray
|
|-
| rowspan="2"|1932
| Western Limited
| Doris
|
|-
| Call Her Savage
| Ruth Springer
|
|-
| 1935
| Frisco Kid
| Undetermined role
| Uncredited
|-
| 1939
| Bachelor Mother
| Undetermined role
| Uncredited
|-
| 1945
| The Southerner
| Lizzie
|
|}
Notes
References
External links
- Estelle Taylor at Virtual History
- Estelle Taylor in The Silent Collection by Tammy Stone
- A 1922 portrait of Estelle Taylor—which looks to be on a movie set—and a 1936 portrait