Isabel Leighton
{{Use mdy dates|date=February 2022}}
{{Short description|American writer and actress (1899–1995)}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Isabel Leighton
| image = Isabel Leighton, Apeda, 1921.jpg
| alt =
| caption = Leighton in 1921
| birth_name = Isabella Kahn
| birth_date = {{Birth date|1899|07|17}}
| birth_place = New York City, U.S.
| death_date = {{Death date and age|1995|04|22|1899|07|17}}
| death_place = New York City, U.S.
| other_names =
| occupation = Actress, writer
| years_active =
| notable_works =
| spouse = {{plainlist|
- {{marriage | Herbert B. Lederer||1933|end=d.}}
- {{marriage | Frederic A. Willis|1935||end=div}}
- {{marriage | Arthur H. Bunker||1964|end=d.}}}}
}}
Isabel Leighton Bunker (July 17, 1899{{snd}}April 22, 1995) was an American writer and actress. She was the writer of six Broadway plays, and had an extensive journalism career throughout the 1930s and 40s.
Early life
Leighton was born as Isabella Kahn on July 17, 1899, in New York, New York, to Clara (née Rothschild) and David Kahn and was raised in high society.{{cite news |last1=Alden |first1=Alice |title=Men Err Demanding Youth |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/93968410/sunday-news/ |access-date=February 1, 2022 |work=Sunday News |date=May 7, 1933 |location=Lancaster Pennsylvania |page=3 |via=Newspapers.com}}{{cite web |title=New York City Births: 1899 Isabella Kahn |url=https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2WWZ-TYR?from=lynx1UIV8&treeref=GW6L-G44 |website=FamilySearch |publisher=New York Municipal Archives |access-date=February 1, 2022 |location=New York City, New York |date=July 17, 1899}}{{#tag:ref|Some sources give her birth date as July 17, 1901,{{cite web |title=Ship Passenger Lists, New York Arrivals: Aquitania |url=https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33S7-95W5-XKN?i=578&cc=1923888&personaUrl=%2Fark%3A%2F61903%2F1%3A1%3A24XL-QBC |date=May 18, 1929 |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration |access-date=February 1, 2022 |location=Washington, D.C. |id=NARA Series T715, Roll 4498, line 12}} while her passport applications and birth record reflect that it was in 1899.{{cite web |title=Passport Applications: 1909 David, Clara, and Isabel C. Kahn |url=https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QSQ-G9D6-4QFY?i=509&cc=2185145 |website=FamilySearch |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration |access-date=February 1, 2022 |location=Washington, D.C. |date=April 20, 1909 |id=NARA Series M1490, Roll 82, application #2961}}{{cite web |title=Passport Applications: 1918 Isabel Kahn Lederer |url=https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QS7-99XD-WSP2?i=972&cc=2185145&personaUrl=%2Fark%3A%2F61903%2F1%3A1%3AQKDN-6DY4 |website=FamilySearch |publisher=National Archives and Records Administration |access-date=February 1, 2022 |location=Washington, D.C. |date=December 19, 1918 |id=NARA Series M1490, Roll 656, application #52483}}|group="Notes"}} She graduated from Horace Mann School and then attended the Columbia School of Journalism, making her debut in 1917, before leaving school to marry.{{cite news |title=Miss Kahn to Wed H. B. Lederer |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/93973229/marriage-of-kahn-lederer/ |access-date=February 1, 2022 |work=The New York Times |date=July 30, 1918 |location=New York, New York |page=11 |via=Newspapers.com}}
Career
=As actress=
Leighton's career began in the 1920s, when she appeared in several Broadway productions.{{cite news |title=Isabel Leighton, 95; Actress and Writer |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1995/04/27/obituaries/isabel-leighton-95-actress-and-writer.html |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=The New York Times |date=April 27, 1995 |archive-date=June 29, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210629141518/https://www.nytimes.com/1995/04/27/obituaries/isabel-leighton-95-actress-and-writer.html |url-status=live }}
In 1920, she performed in Deburau.{{cite web |title=Isabel Leighton (Performer) |url=https://www.playbill.com/person/isabel-leighton-vault-0000026017 |website=Playbill |access-date=January 11, 2022 |language=en |archive-date=October 2, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211002060626/https://www.playbill.com/person/isabel-leighton-vault-0000026017 |url-status=live }} In 1922, she starred in Why Men Leave Home. In the next year, she starred in Anathema and What's Your Wife Doing?
In 1924, she starred in the John Henry Mears-produced play Sweet Seventeen at the Lyceum Theater.{{cite news |last1=Robinson |first1=David |title=New York Theater Gossip |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92363989/new-york-theater-gossip/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=The Miami Herald |date=March 23, 1924 |page=14A |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224514/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92363989/new-york-theater-gossip/ |url-status=live }} In the same year, she starred in The Haunted House. In 1925, she starred in The Dagger.
=As scriptwriter=
Leighton's first play was Mercenary Mary, which was written in 1925. It was an adaptation of the play What's Your Wife Doing?, which she had acted in two years earlier, and was performed in New York and Chicago.{{cite news |title=Mercenary Mary |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92366989/mercenary-mary/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=Chicago Tribune |date=August 18, 1925 |page=17 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224514/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92366989/mercenary-mary/ |url-status=live }} In the same year, she adapted The Sapphire Ring from Hungarian for the stage.{{cite news |title=Theater |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92366228/untitled/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=Chicago Tribune |date=February 26, 1925 |page=17 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224524/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92366228/untitled/ |url-status=live }}
In 1927, she cowrote the operetta Katja with Frederick Lonsdale and Harry Graham. It was adapted from a German original and performed in Chicago's Garrick Theater.{{cite news |title=Katja |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92367546/katja/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=Chicago Tribune |date=March 14, 1927 |page=23 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224545/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92367546/katja/ |url-status=live }} The next year, she adapted the play Polly With a Past into a musical comedy called Polly.{{cite news |title=Polly |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92372769/polly/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=The Philadelphia Inquirer |date=November 4, 1928 |page=5 TH |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224515/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92372769/polly/ |url-status=live }} It was performed on Broadway in 1929.
In 1939, Leighton wrote the story for the film Fight for Your Lady alongside Jean Negulesco.{{cite web |title=Isabel Leighton |url=https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2baca0f6b6 |website=BFI |access-date=January 11, 2022 |language=en |archive-date=March 1, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210301142619/https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2baca0f6b6 |url-status=dead }}{{cite book |last1=Capua |first1=Michelangelo |title=Jean Negulesco: The Life and Films |date=September 1, 2017 |publisher=McFarland |isbn=978-1-4766-6653-2 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9ZAwDwAAQBAJ |language=en |access-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224515/https://books.google.com/books?id=9ZAwDwAAQBAJ |url-status=live }}{{rp|208}} In 1941, she collaborated with Bertram Bloch to write the play Spring Again.
=As journalist and author=
During the 1930s and 40s, Leighton wrote for several magazines, including The Smart Set.{{cite book |last1=Rose |first1=Kenneth D. |title=American Women and the Repeal of Prohibition |date=June 1997 |publisher=NYU Press |isbn=978-0-8147-7466-3 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zmETCgAAQBAJ |language=en |access-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224514/https://books.google.com/books?id=zmETCgAAQBAJ |url-status=live }}{{rp|75}} She wrote for the North American Newspaper Alliance, for whom she interviewed Carol II of Romania in 1931.{{cite news |last1=Leighton |first1=Isabel |title=King Carol of Roumania, Granting Interview to American Woman, Frankly Declares Return of the Princess Helen is an Impossibility |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92398115/the-times-dispatch/ |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=The Times Dispatch |date=August 9, 1931 |page=III-1}}
In 1933, she published My Boy Franklin with Gabrielle Forbush, a collection of interviews with Sara Roosevelt about her son Franklin D. Roosevelt. Segments of the interviews were published in Good Housekeeping in February of that year.{{cite news |title=Groton Record Set by President-Elect |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92368332/groton-record-set-by-president-elect/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=The Boston Globe |date=January 25, 1933 |page=21 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224548/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92368332/groton-record-set-by-president-elect/ |url-status=live }} In the same year, she worked with Margaret Livingston Whiteman to write Whiteman's Burden, a look at her husband Paul Whiteman's difficulties with losing weight.{{cite news |title=Paul Whiteman's Big Heart Stops; Jazzman Was 76 |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92388506/paul-whitemans-big-heart-stops/ |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=Daily News |date=December 30, 1967 |page=4}}
During the Second World War, she served as a naval correspondent. In 1944, she published Where Away: A Modern Odyssey with George Sessions Perry, which told the story of the USS Marblehead.
Leighton edited a collection of essays on life during the Interwar period titled The Aspirin Age: 1919-41. It featured essays from John Lardner and Howard Fast among others.
In 1945, she conducted an exclusive interview with Soong Mei-ling, the wife of Chiang Kai-shek.{{cite news |last1=Leighton |first1=Isabel |title='America Can Lead World Out of Wilderness' |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92370976/america-can-lead-world-out-of/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=The Boston Globe |date=November 27, 1945 |page=20 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224518/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92370976/america-can-lead-world-out-of/ |url-status=live }}
=Mental health activism=
In the 1950s, Leighton served as moderator on the television show How Did They Get That Way?, which dealt with mental health issues.
She served on the boards of the World Federation for Mental Health, Menninger Foundation, and the National Committee for Mental Hygiene.{{cite book |title=Hearings |date=1950 |publisher=U.S. Government Printing Office |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ND6rkcJuj34C |language=en |access-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224514/https://books.google.com/books?id=ND6rkcJuj34C |url-status=live }}{{rp|1257}}
=Political activism=
In 1933, Leighton served as head of the women's committee of the National Recovery Administration campaign in New York City.{{cite news|date=October 21, 1933|title=Broker Hangs Self to Transom|page=18|work=The Miami Herald|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92369005/broker-hangs-self-to-transom/|url-status=live|access-date=January 11, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224545/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92369005/broker-hangs-self-to-transom/|archive-date=January 11, 2022}} She was appointed vice-chairman of the independent citizen's committee for Democratic New York mayoral candidate Joseph V. McKee, and vice-chairman for the women's division of his campaign.{{cite news |title=Husband of Actress, Wall Street Broker Employee, Hangs Self |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92370210/husband-of-actress-wall-street-broker/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=Chicago Tribune |date=October 21, 1933 |page=13 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224518/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92370210/husband-of-actress-wall-street-broker/ |url-status=live }}
Personal life
Aged 17, Isabella married Herbert B. Lederer, a customer's man (registered representative) at Edward B. Smith & Co. brokerage firm. A dozen years into this marriage, she told an interviewer that American men seek out youth to their detriment, and that an older woman has more to offer, not least in constructive companionship.{{cite news |last1=Alden |first1=Alice |title=Men Err Demanding Youth |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/93968410/sunday-news/ |access-date=February 1, 2022 |work=Sunday News |date=May 7, 1933 |location=Lancaster Pennsylvania |page=3 |via=Newspapers.com}} Herbert Lederer hanged himself in October 1933 at their 1045 Park Avenue apartment.
On February 15, 1935, at Norwalk, Connecticut, Leighton married Frederic A. Willis, assistant to William S. Paley, the president of Columbia Broadcasting System.{{cite news |title=Writer Weds |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92374264/writer-weds/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=Daily News |date=February 17, 1935 |page=18 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224516/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92374264/writer-weds/ |url-status=live }} Her second husband was a grandson of British Army officer Frederick Willis and a distant cousin of Winston Churchill through the Jerome family.{{cite news |title=Fashion writer, Failing in 'Comeback' Ends Life |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92375390/fashion-writer-failing-in-comeback/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=The Morning News |date=May 21, 1938 |page=1 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224615/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92375390/fashion-writer-failing-in-comeback/ |url-status=live }} His ex-wife, Helen Thornton Willis, committed suicide in her Park Avenue apartment in May 1938. Another ex-wife, Helen Hoadley Willis, married lawyer Lydig Hoyt{{cite news |title=Mrs. Helen H. Willis Bride of Lydig Hoyt; New Yorkers Marry in Paris and Leave on Secret Honeymoon |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1928/06/28/archives/mrs-helen-h-willis-bride-of-lydig-hoyt-new-yorkers-marry-in-paris.html |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=The New York Times |date=June 28, 1928}} (who had also married a 17 year old actress, Julia Hoyt)[https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1914/06/04/100318373.pdf "Miss Julia Robbins Marries Lydig Hoyt"] New York Times (June 4, 1914).). Leighton and Willis were divorced by 1957.{{cite news |last1=Randolph |first1=Nancy |title=People and Plans |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92376453/people-and-plans/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=Daily News |date=December 4, 1957 |page=8 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224615/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92376453/people-and-plans/ |url-status=live }}
Leighton was later married to Arthur H. Bunker, an American businessman and the brother of diplomat Ellsworth Bunker.{{cite news |title=Arthur H. Bunker Dead at 68; American Metal Climax Officer; Headed Executive Committee —Distinguished in Mining, Finance, Public Service |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1964/05/20/archives/arthur-h-bunker-dead-at-68-american-metal-climax-officer-headed.html |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=The New York Times |date=May 20, 1964}} His ex-wife, Frances Wilkinson, married Italian ambassador Augusto Rosso ("Mussolini's man") in January 1937.{{cite news |title=U.S. Divorcee to Wed Envoy, Capital Hears |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92390592/us-divorcee-to-wed-envoy-capital/ |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=Daily News |date=October 21, 1936 |page=52}}{{cite news |title=Mrs. Bunker Bride of Augusto Rosso; Washington Society Woman Is Wed to Italian Ambassador to Moscow in Paris |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1937/01/29/archives/mrs-bunker-bride-of-augusto-rosso-washington-society-woman-is-wed.html |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=The New York Times |date=January 29, 1937}} Bunker's daughter Daphne was found strangled on June 4, 1962, in her Topeka apartment. She had been a patient at the Menninger Clinic in the city and was briefly married to the writer Evan H. Rhodes.{{cite news |title=Tycoon's Daughter is Slain |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92380692/tycoons-daughter-is-slain/ |access-date=January 11, 2022 |work=Daily News |date=June 5, 1962 |page=3}} Bunker died of leukemia in 1964.
By 1964, she was living in the River House apartment building.{{cite news |title=Isabel's Divine Party for 'Only You, Dick Daring' |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92386680/isabels-divine-party-for-only-you/ |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=Daily News |date=October 7, 1964 |page=20}} In October 1964, she hosted a party for Rhodes and his co-author Merle Miller on the publication of their book Only You, Dick Daring (subtitled OR, HOW TO WRITE ONE TELEVISION SCRIPT AND MAKE $50,000,000, A TRUE-LIFE ADVENTURE). Guests included her brother-in-law Ellsworth Bunker, Joshua Logan and his wife Nedda Harrigan, and Hugh John Casey. In May 1968, she hosted a cocktail party for Gloria Vanderbilt on the opening of a new art exhibition.{{cite news |title=Zoocotheque |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92387495/zoocotheque/ |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=Daily News |date=May 27, 1968 |page=12}}
Following a farewell dinner for Rudolf Bing at the Metropolitan Opera House on October 31, 1971, Leighton and two others were attacked by armed robbers outside River House, having thousands of dollars worth of jewelry stolen.{{cite news |last1=McFadden |first1=William |title=Quick Holdup Costs 2 Women 100G in Gems |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/92385187/quick-holdup-costs-2-women-100g-in-gems/ |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=Daily News |date=November 1, 1971 |page=3}}
Leighton died (aged 95) from a stroke at her Manhattan home on April 22, 1995.
Legacy
Leighton's papers are kept within the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library at the Yale University Library and contain materials on her acting, writing, and mental health work.{{cite web |title=Isabel Leighton papers |url=https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/11/resources/1795 |website=Archives at Yale |access-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-date=August 25, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200825011900/https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/11/resources/1795 |url-status=live }} It includes scripts for The Sapphire Ring, Cadge, and Mercenary Mary, as well as correspondence from John Kenneth Galbraith, Henry Kissinger, and Archibald MacLeish.{{cite journal |title=Recent Acquisitions Briefly Noted |journal=The Yale University Library Gazette |date=1996 |volume=71 |issue=1/2 |pages=75–96 |jstor=40859163 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40859163 |access-date=January 11, 2022 |issn=0044-0175 |archive-date=January 11, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220111224535/https://www.jstor.org/stable/40859163 |url-status=live }}{{rp|89}}
=Yale professorship=
With Arthur Bunker having graduated from Yale University's Sheffield Scientific School in 1916, Leighton left a bequest following her death to create a new chair in hematology called the Arthur H. and Isabel Bunker Associate Professor in Medicine.{{cite journal |title=Hematologist awarded endowed chair |url=https://archive.org/details/yalemedicinealum3132yale/page/n282/mode/1up?q=bunker |journal=Yale Medicine |date=Fall 1997 |volume=31 |issue=4 |page=39 |publisher=Yale School of Medicine}} Hematology covers the study of blood cancers such as the leukemia from which her husband died. The list of chairs and their appointed years is as follows:
{{columns-list|colwidth=30em|
- Nancy Berliner (1997)
- Madhav Dhodapkar (2008){{cite news |title=Dr. Madhav Dhodapkar is the New Bunker Professor of Hematology |url=https://news.yale.edu/2008/05/16/dr-madhav-dhodapkar-new-bunker-professor-hematology |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=YaleNews |date=May 16, 2008 |language=en}}
- Markus Müschen (2020){{cite news |title=Müschen named to Arthur H. and Isabel Bunker Professorship at Yale |url=https://news.yale.edu/2020/10/21/muschen-named-arthur-h-and-isabel-bunker-professorship-yale |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=YaleNews |date=October 21, 2020 |language=en}}
- Stephanie Halene (2021){{cite news |title=Halene named Arthur H. and Isabel Bunker Associate Professor of Medicine |url=https://news.yale.edu/2021/12/15/halene-named-arthur-h-and-isabel-bunker-associate-professor-medicine |access-date=January 12, 2022 |work=YaleNews |date=December 15, 2021 |language=en}}
}}
Filmography
| class="wikitable plainrowheaders sortable" style="margin-right: 0;"
! scope="col" | Title ! scope="col" | Year of production ! scope="col" | Media ! scope="col" class="unsortable" | Notes |
| scope="row" | {{sort|Deburau|Deburau}}
| {{sort|1920|1920}} | Stage work | |
|---|
| scope="row" | {{sort|Why Men Leave Home|Why Men Leave Home}}
| {{sort|1922|1922}} | Stage work | |
| scope="row" | {{sort|Anathema|Anathema}}
| {{sort|1923|1923}} | Stage work | |
| scope="row" | {{sort|What's Your Wife Doing?|What's Your Wife Doing?}}
| {{sort|1923|1923}} | Stage work | |
| scope="row" | {{sort|Sweet Seventeen|Sweet Seventeen}}
| {{sort|1924|1924}} | Stage work | Performed at the Lyceum Theater. |
| scope="row" | {{sort|The Haunted House|The Haunted House}}
| {{sort|1924|1924}} | Stage work | |
Publications
=Books=
| class="wikitable plainrowheaders sortable" style="margin-right: 0;"
! scope="col" | Title ! scope="col" | Year of first ! scope="col" | First edition publisher ! scope="col" | Notes |
| scope="row" | {{sort|My Boy Franklin|My Boy Franklin}}
| {{sort|1933|1933}} | New York: Ray Long & Richard R. Smith | |
|---|
| scope="row" | {{sort|Whiteman's Burden|Whiteman's Burden}}
| {{sort|1933|1933}} | New York: Viking Press | Cowritten with Margaret Livingston Whiteman. |
| scope="row" | {{sort|Where Away: A Modern Odyssey|Where Away: A Modern Odyssey}}
| {{sort|1944|1944}} | | Cowritten with George Sessions Perry. |
| scope="row" | {{sort|The Aspirin Age: 1919-41|The Aspirin Age: 1919-41}}
| {{sort|1949|1949}} | New York: Simon and Schuster | Editor. |
=Scripts=
| class="wikitable plainrowheaders sortable" style="margin-right: 0;"
! scope="col" | Title ! scope="col" | Year of release ! scope="col" | Media ! scope="col" class="unsortable" | Notes |
| scope="row" | {{sort|The Sapphire Ring|The Sapphire Ring}}
| {{sort|1925|1925}} | Stage work | |
|---|
| scope="row" | {{sort|Mercenary Mary|Mercenary Mary}}
| {{sort|1925|1925}} | Stage work | |
| scope="row" | {{sort|Katja|Katja}}
| {{sort|1927|1927}} | Operetta | Cowritten with Frederick Lonsdale and Harry Graham. |
| scope="row" | {{sort|Polly|Polly}}
| {{sort|1928|1928}} | Stage work | |
| scope="row" | {{sort|Fight for Your Lady|Fight for Your Lady}}
| {{sort|1937|1937}} | Film | Story cowritten with Jean Negulesco. |
| scope="row" | {{sort|Spring Again|Spring Again}}
| {{sort|1941|1941}} | Stage work | Cowritten with Bertram Bloch. |
Notes
{{reflist|group=Notes}}
References
{{reflist}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Leighton, Isabel}}
Category:20th-century American actresses
Category:Actresses from New York City
Category:American war correspondents of World War II
Category:American women dramatists and playwrights
Category:American women novelists
Category:American women philanthropists
Category:American women war correspondents
Category:Benefactors of Yale University