Belita 4(%£)#%£15%%.£/&£&),-£./)2
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12 Noir City Sentinel July / Aug 2009 Belita 4(%£)#%£15%%.£/&£&),-£./)2 By Eddie Muller ounds a bit incongruous: figure skating and film skater, but acting and particularly filmmaking were ily charity event. At age two she was doing public noir. But there may be no better example of the totally foreign to her.” pantomime shows with her brothers. At three she was Spervasiveness of noir in postwar Hollywood Though unschooled as an actress, Belita dis- studying ballet. Ice skating began at age four, eventu- than the short, strange career of Belita, an Olympic plays an innate confidence and charisma, bordering ally leading to private instruction from the Swiss skat- figure skater who wanted to be the next Sonja Henie on haughtiness, that sets her above the cheapness of ing champion Jakob Gerschweiler. but ended up Audrey Totter on ice. When she died on the productions and the grinding genre mechanics. Queenie convinced the renowned London ballet December 18, 2005, obituaries accorded her film She seems, frankly, like a circus animal—a superior dancer and choreographer Anton Dolin to take her résumé scant respect, focusing more on her renown as creature trapped in a cage for the amusement of lesser six-year-old daughter on as a pupil. Five years later, an athlete and star of theatrical ice shows. I suggest beings. This was, we now know, how Belita unhap- little Gladys became Dolin’s dance partner. She made that her most memorable legacy should be a trio of pily saw herself. But it’s that proud, defiant sense of her solo ballet debut at 11 at a grand event in Cannes. low-budget crime thrillers that she made, in succes- self, more than acting skill, that brings to life the stock Her musical accompanist was Noël Coward, who sion, between 1946 and 1948: Suspense, The Gang- characters she played. remarked, with his inimitable panache, “I was told I ster, and The Hunted. was to play for a little girl. Had I realized I was to play The limbo state of these titles* is unfortunate THE “BALLERINA ON BLADES” was born Maria Gladys for an artist, I would have practiced.” A few months because all three are strong and intriguing, featuring Olive Lyne Jepson-Turner in 1923 in the pugilistically later she participated in both the British and world contributions from significant writers: Philip Yordan named town of Nether Wallop in Hampshire, Eng- figure skating championships. At 13 she was chosen (Suspense), Steve Fisher (The Hunted), and Daniel land. The stage name Belita (roughly translated “little to represent Britain in the 1936 Olympic Games in Fuchs (The Gangster, adapting his novel Low Com- beauty”) came from the name of one of five Argen- Germany. She finished 16th. Sonja Henie, the 24- pany with an uncredited assist from Dalton Trumbo). tinean cattle ranches established by her great-grand- year-old Norwegian sensation, won gold for the third While none rate as neglected masterworks, each is father, Charles Drabble, an Englishman credited with time. unique, inventive, and deserving of rescue, restora- helping found Argentina’s meat-producing economy. The following year, the 14-year-old prodigy tion, and critical rehabilitation . as is Belita herself. Her grandfather, Dr. Bertram Lyne-Stevens, was starred in Opera on Ice, a London skating spectacular. In all three, Belita is an oddly out-of-place pres- a consulting physician to all the royal families of “The show was a disaster, but I received good ence, and it works to each film’s advantage. Her ath- Europe. Her father, Major William Jepson-Turner, reviews,” Belita related in a 2003 interview. She and letic physicality contrasts with her refined diction was a Boer War veteran and a high-ranking member Queenie then toured Europe, with a French maid and (she’s hiding a British accent). Her regal bearing is of Britain’s Home Guard during World War II. Her Pekingese pooch in tow. In France she was offered the often at odds with the low-rent surroundings. She two brothers were officers with General Mont- starring role in a combination dance-skating show co- seems the most worldly and experienced member of gomery’s rifle brigade in North Africa, both wounded conceived by Jean Cocteau, Cecil Beaton, and Sal- each cast, yet she’s only in her mid-20s. and cited for gallantry in action. vador Dalí. “The stretch of their imagination was Barry Sullivan, her costar in both Sus- Yet the person who had the most pro- quite extraordinary,” Belita recalled. “Cocteau’s pense and The Gangster, remarked candidly found impact on her life was, without a doubt, dance was called ‘The Little Dream Girl,’ Beaton’s (if ungallantly), “I always had a fondness “Queenie,” perhaps the most ambitious was based on Emile Zola’s Nana, and Dalí’s had lots for Belita because she didn’t know what stage mother of all time. Mrs. Jepson- of motorcycles at full throttle with me appearing from the fuck was happening! She was a great Turner, who’d harbored her own above to do acrobatics on the cycles!” Alas, the ambi- dream of being a professional figure tious show never came off. One of the reasons was skater, first put her only daugh- that Belita was by this time having trouble walking, * These films remain largely unknown due to ter in the spotlight at 11 let alone dancing. She had suffered a back injury Monogram’s complicated fate. Its Allied months of age . hanging when accidentally pushed offstage at Covent Garden. Artists subsidiary ended up subsuming its par- her as a live ornament on Queenie, now split from Major Jepson-Turner, packed ent company in 1953. Monogram’s catalog— a Christmas tree at up her daughter and sailed for America, having including wonderful B noirs such as When a royal fam- learned of a back specialist in Los Angeles. Strangers Marry (1944), The Guilty (1947), and High Tide (1947)—sank deeper into obscurity after AA’s bankruptcy purchase by Lorimar Productions in 1980. Warner Bros.’s Left: Striking a publicity pose for The Hunted acquisition of Lorimar in 1988 nudged the Monogram titles deeper into cold storage. Above: Glamorous in The Gangster Today they’re at the bottom of a vast inven- Opposite page, left: with Eugene Pallette and tory of films in the Time Warner Barry Sullivan in Suspense empire. One only hopes the resurrection of Decoy (1946) as part of Warner Bros.’ Film Noir Collection bodes well for the eventual release of other recondite Monogram titles. July / Aug 2009 Noir City Sentinel 13 “The doctor didn’t help, and I was in a wheel- That fairly captured the persona that Belita, fol- and compelling. It was the final directorial effort of chair for a few months until Peter Lorre came into my lowing one more “gay” turn in Lady, Let’s Dance the little-known Gordon Wiles, who for most of his life. He said he knew a man who could certainly cure (1944), would bring to film noir. career was an art director and production designer. me. This man turned out to be a veterinarian, who Belita is a frosty foil for Sullivan’s meltdown, a slum- hung me as he did cows with bad backs. I was walk- SUSPENSE (1946) WAS A WATERMARK in the rising tide ming sophisticate who salves the fragile ego of a para- ing again in a couple of weeks.” of Hollywood noir. Dark psychological murder noid and potentially violent man. It was a relationship By now the war had started and Queenie was dramas were proving so popular with both filmmak- she’d also enact in real life. unable to get money from home. “I had to get a job,” ers and the public that the notoriously penny-pinching In 1946 she married aspiring actor Joel McGin- Belita stated. She was given a regular dancing gig by King Brothers, Frank and Maurice, decided that their nis Riordan, partly to escape Queenie’s stranglehold. her old friend Sol Hurok, who was just starting his first $1 million–budget movie—specifically designed Suddenly liberated, Belita revealed herself in inter- ballet theater in New York. But the $50-a-week head- to showcase Monogram’s skating star—would be a views as alarmingly bright and sophisticated. She liner pay couldn’t cover Queenie, the French maid, dose of Double Indemnity over ice. Belita eagerly noted that her upbringing caused her to approach life, and the Pekingese. During a rehearsal break, Belita’s embraced the sordid material, believing it would once and acting, as a competition. She played the violin colleague Nana Gollner commented that hard times and for all dispel comparisons between herself and the and was fluent in four languages. She was compelled had convinced her to teach flying once again (Gollner eternally sunny Sonja Henie. to become an expert skier and swimmer as well as a was a pilot as well as a dancer). When Belita com- Frank Tuttle (This Gun for Hire) was hired to skater. She appeared on the cover of Life performing mented that the “only” other thing she could do was direct Yordan’s script (originally entitled Glamour an “underwater ballet,” which was, according to skate, her friend blurted, “You little fool! That’s the Girl), a Cain-style tale of infidelity and murder fes- Belita, “nothing more than an exercise session to help second-highest-paying job in the United States, next tooned with absurd, if entertaining, plot gimmicks and stretch my injured back. I didn’t even know they were to film. Get on with it!” visual gimcrackery.