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Marion Davies

For the 18th-century English musician, see Marianne Davies. For the British figure skater, see Marion Davies (figure skater).

Marion Davies
Davies in the 1920s
Born
Marion Cecilia Douras[a]

(1897-01-03)January 3, 1897
Brooklyn, New York, U.S.
DiedSeptember 22, 1961(1961-09-22) (aged 64)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Resting placeHollywood Forever Cemetery
Occupations
  • Actress
  • producer
  • screenwriter
  • philanthropist
Years active1914–1937
Spouse
Horace G. Brown
​
(m. 1951)​
PartnerWilliam Randolph Hearst (1917–1951; his death)
ChildrenPatricia Lake (alleged)
RelativesRosemary Davies (sister)
Reine Davies (sister)
Charles Lederer (nephew)
Pepi Lederer (niece)

Marion Davies (born Marion Cecilia Douras;[a] January 3, 1897 – September 22, 1961) was an American actress, producer, screenwriter, and philanthropist. Educated in a religious convent, Davies fled the school to pursue a career as a chorus girl. As a teenager, she appeared in several Broadway musicals and one film, Runaway Romany (1917). She soon became a featured performer in the Ziegfeld Follies.

While performing in the 1916 Follies, the nineteen-year-old Marion met the fifty-three-year-old newspaper tycoon, William Randolph Hearst, and became his mistress. Hearst took over management of Davies's career and promoted her as a film actress.[1][2]

Hearst financed Davies's pictures and promoted her career extensively in his newspapers and Hearst newsreels. He founded Cosmopolitan Pictures to produce her films. By 1924, Davies was the number one female box office star in Hollywood because of the popularity of When Knighthood Was in Flower and Little Old New York, which were among the biggest box-office hits of their respective years.[3] During the zenith of the Jazz Age, Davies became renowned as the hostess of lavish soirees for Hollywood actors and political elites. However, in 1924, her name became linked with scandal when film producer Thomas Ince died at a party aboard Hearst's yacht.[4][5][6]

Following the decline of her film career during the Great Depression, Davies struggled with alcoholism.[7] She retired from the screen in 1937 to devote herself to an ailing Hearst and charitable work.[1] In Hearst's declining years, Davies remained his steadfast companion until his death in 1951.[8]

Eleven weeks after Hearst's death, she married sea captain Horace Brown.[9] Their marriage lasted until Davies' death at 64 from malignant osteomyelitis (bone cancer) of the jaw in 1961.[10]

By the time of her death, her popular association with the character of Susan Alexander Kane in the film Citizen Kane (1941) already overshadowed Davies' legacy as a talented actress.[11] The title character's second wife—an untalented singer whom he tries to promote—was widely assumed to be based upon Davies.[1] However, many commentators, including writer-director Orson Welles, defended Davies's record as a gifted actress and comedienne to whom Hearst's patronage did more harm than good.[12] In his final years, Welles attempted to correct the widespread misconceptions the film had created about Davies's popularity and talents as an actress.[12][13]


Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).

  1. ^ a b c Cite error: The named reference The New York Times 1961 p. 19 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Tri-City Herald 1961, p. 2
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference Lorusso 2017 p. 96 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference Swanberg 1961 pp. 445–46 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ Elley 2001
  6. ^ Cite error: The named reference Taves 2012 pp. 3–7 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ Brooks 1982, p. 41
  8. ^ Spokane Daily Chronicle 1951, p. 7
  9. ^ The New York Times 1951, p. 30
  10. ^ Guiles 1972, p. 372
  11. ^ Guiles 1972, p. 91
  12. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference Welles 1975 Foreword was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  13. ^ Welles & Bogdanovich 1992

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