Dorothy Jordan

Brunette Dorothy Jordan was a graduate of Southwestern University and the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. Trained as a ballerina, she first graced the stage as a chorus girl in top flight musicals, like "Funny Face" (1927), with Fred Astaire, and "Treasure Girl" (1928), with Gertrude Lawrence and Clifton Webb.

This led to what turned out to be a fairly short and desultory movie career, beginning with a run-of-the-mill thriller, Black Magic (1929).

Dorothy was soon cast as assorted sultry dames in Devil-May-Care (1929) and Call of the Flesh (1930), opposite Latin star Ramon Novarro.

Rather more demure was her Bianca, the overtly obedient (but deceptively cunning) younger sister of Kate (Mary Pickford) in The Taming of the Shrew (1929).

She gave rather better account of herself in more downtrodden waif-like roles, notably as Marie Dressler's daughter in Min and Bill (1930), as an unwed mother in Bondage (1933) and as simple-minded Southern girl Betty Wright in The Cabin in the Cotton (1932). After her marriage to famed producer Merian C.

Contemporary critics were frequently unimpressed with Dorothy's acting, whether it was speaking her lines too quickly (Hell Bound (1931)) or delivering them as a 'memory citation' (Beloved Bachelor (1931)).

Cooper in 1933 -- and finding decent roles ever harder to come by -- Dorothy gave up acting to raise a family.

Auditioned for the role of Melanie in Gone with the Wind (1939) and screen-tested for the role alongside Susan Hayward as Scarlet.