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Florence Turner

{{Short description|American actress (1885–1946)}}

{{Use mdy dates|date=June 2013}}

{{more citations needed|date=August 2016}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Florence Turner

| image = Florence Turner 1916 2.jpg

| imagesize =

| caption = Turner in 1916

| birth_name =

| birth_date ={{birth date|1885|1|6}}

| birth_place = New York City, New York, U.S.

| death_date = {{death date and age|1946|8|28|1885|1|6}}

| death_place = Woodland Hills, California, U.S.

| othername =

| occupation = Actress

| years_active = 1907–1943

| spouse =

}}

Florence Turner (January 6, 1885 – August 28, 1946) was an American actress who became known as the "Vitagraph Girl" in early silent films.

Biography

Born in New York City, Turner was pushed into appearing on the stage at age three by her ambitious mother. Turner became a regular performer in a variety of productions. In 1906, she joined the fledgling motion picture business, signing with the pioneering Vitagraph Studios and making her film debut in How to Cure a Cold (June 8, 1907).

At the time there were no stars per se, unless an already famous stage star made a movie. Performers were not even mentioned by name. Long, drawn-out screen credits were non-existent. There was nothing but the name of the company and the picture. As the content of movies evolved from simple incidents or situations into definite stories, some of the heroes and heroines were conceded a vague identity, such as the "Edison Girl", or "The Girl from Sheepshead Bay."{{cite web|last=Morton|first=David|title='The Vitagraph Girl' or 'The Girl From Sheepshead Bay'?|url=http://www.sensesofcinema.com/2017/feature-articles/the-vitagraph-girl/|work=Senses of Cinema|access-date=August 14, 2023|date=September 2017|archive-date=May 7, 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230507072356/http://www.sensesofcinema.com/2017/feature-articles/the-vitagraph-girl/|url-status=live}}

File:Florence-Turner-1912.jpg Girl" in 1912]]

Though she was known only as the "Vitagraph Girl" in the early motion picture shorts, Turner became the most popular American actress to appear on screen (which at that time was still dominated by French pictures, especially from the Pathe and Gaumont companies). Her worth to the studio, as its biggest box-office draw, was recognised in 1907 when her pay was upped to $22 a week, as proto-star plus part-time seamstress. It was somewhat less than the male leading players, especially those with stage experience, particularly the super-popular Maurice Costello. In March 1910, she and Florence Lawrence became the first screen actors not already famous in another medium to be publicized by name by their studios to the general public.Eileen Bowser, The Transformation of Cinema, 1907–1915, University of California Press, 1994, p. 112–113; {{ISBN|978-0-520-08534-3}}

Later that year, Florence was paired several times with heartthrob Wallace Reid, who was on his way to stardom. But with the rise of more stars such as Gene Gauntier and Marin Sais at Kalem Studios, Marion Leonard and Mary Pickford at Biograph Studios, and Florence Lawrence (Biograph, moving to IMP in 1910), Florence Turner was no longer quite as special. By 1913 she was looking for new pastures and left the United States accompanied by longtime friend Laurence Trimble, who directed her in a number of movies.Passenger list of S.S. Kaiser Wilhelm II, Port of Plymouth, England, May 5, 1913. Ancestry.com. UK Incoming Passenger Lists, 1878-1960 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2008. They moved to England, where she and Larry began performing together in London music halls.

File:Daisy Doodad's Dial (1914).webm, a 1914 comedy starring and directed by Turner]]

Turner sometimes wrote screenplays and directed her own movies, including a number of comedies. She also organized her own production company, Turner Films, for which she made more than thirty shorts.[https://web.archive.org/web/20200731183802/https://filmography.bfi.org.uk/person/174102 Florence Turner], bfi.org.uk. Accessed April 16, 2020. These were shot at the Walton Studios of Cecil Hepworth, west of London.

Turner entertained Allied troops during World War I. She returned to the U.S. after the Armistice, but was not as successful as before. In 1920, she again went to England, where she remained until moving to Hollywood, virtually forgotten, in 1924."[https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=k0UtAAAAIBAJ&sjid=mJ8FAAAAIBAJ&pg=1043%2C636190 Would You Be Famous? Consider for a Moment the Fortunes of These Stars of Yesterday!]", The Evening Herald, Rock Hill, South Carolina, July 21, 1924, p. 8.

By then she was thirty-nine years of age, and her starring days were long behind her. She continued to act in supporting roles into the 1930s.

{{quote box|width=30em|bgcolor=cornsilk|align=right|fontsize=90%|salign=right|quote= “Florence Turner was the original innocent heroine, spirited and resourceful but still pure and virginal, who, stemming as she did from the girl-woman ideals of Gene Stratton-Porter and Eleanor Porter, set the style for Mary Pickford. Blanche Sweet and scores of others later on.” —Biographer Charles Higham in The Art of the American Film (1973).Higham, 1973 p. 8}}

In 1928, she acted in a minor role on Broadway in Sign of the Leopard, which ran for 39 performances.Internet Broadway Database.

Turner was placed on the payroll at MGM by Louis B. Mayer in the 1930s, but was limited in the assignments offered. She mostly played bit or small parts and worked as an extra.

Last years

She later moved to the Motion Picture Country House, a retirement community for the industry in Woodland Hills, California.{{Citation needed |date=November 2022}}

After appearing in more than 160 motion pictures, Turner died at the age of 61 in Woodland Hills.{{cite news |date=August 30, 1946 |title=Obituaries; Florence Turner |url=http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1946/08/30/page/16/article/obituary-4-no-title |newspaper=Chicago Tribune |access-date=2015-11-28 }} She was cremated at a mortuary in Hollywood and, at her request, there was no funeral service. Her ashes stored in vault 1 at Chapel of the Pines Crematory.{{Citation needed |date=November 2022}}

Film appearances

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Other film credits

Notes

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References

  • Higham, Charles. 1973. The Art of the American Film: 1900-1971. Doubleday & Company, Inc. New York; {{ISBN| 0-385-06935-9}}. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 70-186026.
  • Morton, David. [http://sensesofcinema.com/2017/feature-articles/the-vitagraph-girl/ "'The Vitagraph Girl' or 'The Girl From Sheepshead Bay'?: Florence Turner Constructed as an Everywoman Matinee Idol"], SensesofCinema.com. September 2017.

External links

{{Commons category}}

  • {{IMDb name|0877550|Florence Turner}}
  • [https://wfpp.cdrs.columbia.edu/pioneer/ccp-florence-turner/ Florence Turner] at Women Film Pioneers Project
  • {{AFI person | 51722-Florence-Turner }}
  • [http://www.virtual-history.com/movie/person/2099/florence-turner Literature on Florence Turner]
  • [http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-hbOiVgTZx5s/UfJaanDkmbI/AAAAAAAABXQ/dE9SYe9fOHA/s320/far-from-the-madding-crowd-florence-turner-lost-silent-movie-03+(1).jpg 1915 portrait, during the production of Far from the Madding Crowd]

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Turner, Florence}}

Category:19th-century American actresses

Category:American stage actresses

Category:American film actresses

Category:American silent film actresses

Category:Screenwriters from New York (state)

Category:Actresses from New York City

Category:1885 births

Category:1946 deaths

Category:American women screenwriters

Category:Burials at Chapel of the Pines Crematory

Category:American women film directors

Category:Writers from New York City

Category:Film directors from New York City

Category:20th-century American actresses

Category:Women film pioneers

Category:20th-century American women writers

Category:20th-century American screenwriters