Delicate Silent Film Star May McAvoy Original 20s Soft Focus Glamour Photograph

Description

ITEM: This is a 1920s vintage and original Warner Bros. photograph of contract player May McAvoy. A popular silent film star, this portrait, done in soft focus, captures McAvoy's delicate features and beauty in a lovely Pictorialist style.
May McAvoy debuted as an actress in
Hate
(1917), and within two years was playing leading ladies. A successful performance in
Sentimental Tommy
(1921) led to an invitation to Hollywood; already an established star when she was subsequently signed by Paramount, she increased her popularity playing innocent heroines. In 1923 she refused to appear scantily-dressed in a Cecil B. DeMille film, after which she had fewer and less important roles. She bought out her contract and began free-lancing at high prices; intelligent and discriminating in her choice of movies, she did very well. She made history by playing Al Jolson's leading lady in
The Jazz Singer
(1927), the first major talkie. She retired from the screen to get married in 1929; some have suggested that her career ended in the sound era because she lisped, but she denied this. In 1940 she was signed by MGM, but appeared only as an extra and in bit parts in a handful of films over the next two decades; it is said she signed to work as a lark.
Photograph measures 8" x 10" on a glossy single weight paper stock. Date stamp and pencil notations on verso.
Guaranteed to be 100% vintage and original from Grapefruit Moon Gallery.
More about May McAvoy:
Silent-screen star May McAvoy was born in an upscale area of New York City. Her well-to-do family owned and operated a large livery stable situated where the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel now stands. She initially wanted to be a teacher but became intrigued with show business after watching a friend rehearse a show at a nearby vaudeville theater. A model whose first job was a commercial for Domino Sugar, she moved into extra work in films and received her first major break with The Devil's Garden (1920) co-starring Lionel Barrymore. Stardom was hers, however, as the lead in Sentimental Tommy (1921), which led to a Paramount contract.
McAvoy later stated that she was not content to play whatever part the studio might choose for her and she demanded quality. She claimed that Cecil B. DeMille wanted her as the leading lady for _Adam's Rib (1923)_ but she balked at bobbing her hair and wearing the required pelt for the caveman sequence. She believed that he was able to have her unofficially suspended because of her refusal. Whatever her reasons for leaving Paramount, May bought out her contract and freelanced for the next six years. McAvoy wound up flourishing in such movies as The Enchanted Cottage (1924), Tessie (1925) and Lady Windermere's Fan (1925), while replacing Gertrude Olmstead as Esther in her best known silent film, Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1925). Mostly forgotten today except by more devoted film enthusiasts, May nevertheless holds a steadfast position in film history thanks to her co-starring role in Hollywood's first talkie, The Jazz Singer (1927) opposite Al Jolson, which is actually a silent film with several sound musical and speaking sequences; she herself had no talking scenes. Coincidentally, May also starred in England's first all-talking picture The Terror (1928). She retired after her marriage in 1929 and bore one son, Patrick. She returned to films for a decade and a half in the 1940s for MGM but never received any screen credit for these parts (her final role was as an extra in Ben-Hur (1959). She was widowed in 1973 and died a decade later of a heart attack.
- IMDb Mini Biography By: Gary Brumburgh