INTRODUCTION

HER STORY

QUOTES

"When you put them all together and add them up, Gloria Swanson comes out the movie star of all movie stars," observed Cecil B. DeMille, decades after the actress's rise to stardom in the twenties.  "She had something that none of the rest of them had."

She was a beautiful child with unique features, yet two worrisome flaws: unusually large ears and oversize teeth.

Her fan mail during the twenties was never less than ten thousand letters a week.

After a few films, she decided not to conceal her chin mole; it became a trademark and was copied the world over.

Her yearly clothing bill for personal and professional purposes was supposedly the highest of any star, totalling in the region of $ 125,000 a year-- she reportedly spent $ 10,000 on stockings alone.

She bought a twenty-two-room palatial mansion on Crescent Drive in Beverly Hills that belonged to King Gillette, the razor blade magnate.  In New York she bought a sumptuous $ 100,000 Manhattan penthouse-- she made sure the elevator was perfumed-- and a 25-acre estate on the Hudson river.  She also owned a château in Paris.

She once went to New York to borrow $ 25,000 and then blew it all on a private railway car back to California.

After suffering severe stomach problems in 1927, she became a natural food devotee before anyone knew about brown rice and vitamins.  Her interest in healthy living would, over time, become her greatest passion.

She was the first actress to adopt and the first to do so as a single woman.

She was nominated for best actress in the first Academy Awards presentation in 1928 (for Sadie Thompson).

Her interest in health prompted her to create a line of beauty products called Essence of Nature Cosmetics.

The part of Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard (1950) was first offered to Mae West who turned it down.

In the late 1920s she had an affair with Joseph P. Kennedy, father of three future politicians (John, Robert and Edward).

When she returned to the USA with her new French husband, Henri, Marquis de la Falaise de la Coudraye, she wired Paramount, "Am arriving with the Marquis tomorrow.  Please arrange ovation."

"All right, Mr DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up," from Sunset Boulevard (1950) is listed 7th in the list of Most Memorable Movie Quotes Ever (poll by The American Film Institute (AFI).

Swanson was the Queen of the Comebacks.  Her final comeback was a cameo in Airport 1975 (1974) after her 'swansong' performance in Mio Figlio Nerone (1956) eighteen years before.

Often she called fans at random on the telephone, enjoying their surprised reaction when she would say, "Hello, this is Gloria Swanson."

In 1948 she ventured into the new medium of television, becoming the first actress to have her own talk show.

Her first talking picture The Trespasser (1929) was a runaway hit.  Her speaking voice was one of the best of the new medium, and she amazed everyone with her talent for singing.

When she married the Marquis de la Falaise de la Coudraye, she became the first film star to marry a title.

She read voraciously: one of her prized possessions would always be her collection of first editions.

Her studio Paramount described her in press releases as "the second to earn a million"-- Pickford was the first-- "and the first to spend it."

Swanson entertained lavishly.  She thought nothing of hosting a soirée for three hundred and giving each guest a solid gold compact or cigarette case as a party favor.

Joan Crawford idolized her so much that she not only tried to emulate the look but also remade several of Swanson's films and patterned her screen career on Swanson's notion of continual reinvention.

She was the first to wear bracelets on her upper arms, and she created a fad for jeweled sandals.

She found motion pictures so crude and silly that she wouldn't watch her own movies from beginning to end even when she landed featured roles that had her playing mature socialites.

It was Swanson's dazzling persona in the 1920s that put "glamour"-- then a rarely used word-- into common usage, making it synonymous with Hollywood.