Helen Twelvetrees

Helen Marie Twelvetrees (December 25, 1908 – February 13, 1958) was an American movie and theatre actress, who became a top female star through a series of "women's pictures" in the early 1930s.

Early life

She was born Helen Marie Jurgens in Brooklyn, where she attended Public School 119. Her family moved to Flatbush, where her younger brother was born. During the winter of 1919, the four-bedroom apartment in which the family resided caught fire one night. Twelvetrees's brother perished in the burning structure, but the rest of the family was rescued. Later she attended Brooklyn Heights Seminary. After graduation, she enrolled in the Art Students League of New York, where she studied for a year before enrolling at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. While attending AADA, she met actor Clark Twelvetrees, whom she married in 1927. She adopted her husband's surname which she used as her professional name.

Career

File:HelenTwelvetrees.jpg

Twelvetress filming Thoroughbred in 1938.

With some stage experience, Twelvetrees went to Hollywood with a number of other actors to replace the silent stars who could not or would not make the transition to talkies. Her first job was with Fox Film Corporation, and she appeared in The Ghost Talks (1929). After three films with Fox, she was released from her contract. However, she was signed by Pathé shortly thereafter, and along with Constance Bennett and Ann Harding, Twelvetrees starred in several lachrymose dramas, not all of which were critically acclaimed. When Pathé was absorbed by RKO Radio Pictures, she found herself at various times miscast in mediocre films. With the arrival of Katharine Hepburn at RKO, Twelvetrees left the studio to freelance (Harding and Bennett would also subsequently depart).

The 1930 film Her Man set the course of her screen career, and she was subsequently cast in a series of roles portraying suffering women fighting for the wrong men. Later she played opposite Spencer Tracy in 1934's Now I'll Tell (also known as When New York Sleeps) from a novel by Mrs. Arnold Robinson; opposite Donald Cook in The Spanish Cape Mystery; and costarred in Paramount's A Bedtime Story with Maurice Chevalier. She also starred in two Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer films, which induced author John Douglas Eames to note that she "had a gift for projecting emotional force with minimal visible effort."

In 1936, she traveled to Australia to star in the Cinesound Studios production Thoroughbred, about the rise of a Melbourne Cup winning racehorse. The filming was done at Cinesound Studios sound stages in Bondi Junction, Sydney. After filming completed, Twelvetrees returned home to Brooklyn, where she fell ill. After a slow recovery, she returned to acting in the USO production of The Man Who Came to Dinner. She made her final two films, Persons in Hiding and Unmarried, in 1939.

Twelvetrees left films in favor of summer stock and made her Broadway debut in Jacques Deval's Boudoir in 1941. The play folded after only 11 performances, and she largely retired after marrying for a third time. She continued to act occasionally and successfully essayed the role of Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire in summer stock in Sea Cliff, New York, in August 1951. Fellow cast member Naomi Caryl (who played Eunice Hubbell) recalled that Twelvetrees had "the saddest eyes I'd ever seen" and "it was also obvious that she had an extremely fragile psyche."

Personal life

Twelvetrees was married three times. She married her first husband, actor Clark Twelvetrees, in February 1927. During the marriage, Clark attempted suicide by jumping out a window. He was hospitalized for several months afterwards. In March 1930, she filed for divorce, citing mental cruelty. During the divorce trial, Twelvetrees claimed that Clark was an alcoholic who was drunk when they married and beat her on four occasions. Their divorce became final in March 1931. Clark Twelvetrees died in August 1938 of a skull fracture after striking his head on a curb when a man who witnessed him hitting a woman with whom he was arguing attempted to intervene.

Twelvetrees married real estate broker Frank Woody in April 1931. They had a son, Jack Bryan Woody, born in October 1932, who became a wildlife biologist. She filed for divorce in March 1936, and it was finalized the following month.

She married for a third and final time to farmer and Air Force captain Conrad Payne (13 November 1916 – 2 March 1970) in 1947. After their marriage, Twelvetrees occasionally acted in stage productions but largely retired from acting. She spent her remaining years traveling around the world with her husband, who was stationed in the United States and Europe.

Death

On February 13, 1958, Twelvetrees was found unconscious on the floor of her living room at her home in Middletown, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Harrisburg. She was taken to Olmstead Air Force Base Hospital in Middletown where she died. According to the county coroner, Twelvetrees had been suffering from a kidney ailment for some time and took an overdose of sedatives. Her death was ruled a suicide. Twelvetrees's remains were later cremated. Her funeral service was attended by only her widower and a close friend. Her ashes were interred in a grave in Middletown Cemetery. The gravesite was left unmarked until January 2013, at which point her surviving family placed a headstone.

For her contribution to the motion picture industry, Helen Twelvetrees has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame located at 6263 Hollywood Boulevard.

In popular culture

The play I'm Looking For Helen Twelvetrees explores her life through the eyes of an actor who went to see her perform in Long Island, New York. Parallels between Twelvetrees and the character she played, Blanche, are explored.

Filmography

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1929	The Ghost Talks	Miriam Holt
1929	Blue Skies	Dorothy May	Episode 2
1929	Words and Music	Dorothy Blake
1930	The Grand Parade	Molly
1930	Swing High	Maryan
1930	Her Man	Frankie Keefe
1930	The Cat Creeps	Annabelle West	Film Lost
1931	The Painted Desert	Mary Ellen Cameron	Clark Gable's first major role
1931	Millie	Millicent "Millie" Blake Maitland
1931	A Woman of Experience	Elsa Elsbergen	Alternative title: Registered Woman
1931	Bad Company	Helen King Carlyle
1932	Panama Flo	Flo Bennett
1932	Young Bride	Allie Smith Riggs
1932	State's Attorney	June Perry	Alternative title: Cardigan's Last Case
1932	Is My Face Red?	Peggy Bannon
1932	Unashamed	Joan Ogden
1933	Broken Hearts
1933	A Bedtime Story	Sally
1933	Disgraced!	Gay Holloway
1933	My Woman	Connie Riley Rollins
1933	King for a Night	Lillian Williams
1934	All Men Are Enemies	Katha
1934	Now I'll Tell	Virginia Golden	Alternative titles: Now I'll Tell You When New York Sleeps
1934	She Was a Lady	Sheila Vane
1934	One Hour Late	Bessie Dunn
1935	Times Square Lady	Margo Heath
1935	She Gets Her Man	Francine
1935	The Spanish Cape Mystery	Stella Godfrey
1935	Frisco Waterfront	Alice	Alternative title: When We Look Back
1936	Thoroughbred	Joan
1937	Hollywood Round-Up	Carol Stevens
1939	Persons in Hiding	Helen Griswold
1939	Unmarried	Pat Rogers

External links

• Helen Twelvetrees at the Internet Broadway Database
• Helen Twelvetrees at AllMovie
• Helen Twelvetrees at the Internet Movie Database
• Helen Twelvetrees at the TCM Movie Database
• Photographs of Helen Twelvetrees
• Helen Twelvetrees at Find a Grave