British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London no. W. 686. Photo: R.K.O. Radio.
The golden cage of Howard Hughes
Bette Jane Greer was born in Washington, D.C., in 1924. She was the daughter of Charles Durell McClellan Greer Jr. and his wife, Bettie, who wrote children's stories. As a baby, ‘Bettejane’ already won a beauty contest and from her teenage years, she worked as a model for furs. At 15, she suffered facial paralysis and she later claimed that it was the subsequent therapeutic exercises that enabled her to express herself as an actress.
Thanks to her good looks and her attractive contralto voice she first started a career as a singer. She dropped out of her senior year at high school to work as a vocalist in a nightclub. She mostly sang for Enric Madriguera's orchestra at the Latin Club Del Rio in Washington, D.C. and sang phonetically in Spanish. She also performed on the radio where she met singer, entertainer, actor and bandleader Rudy Vallee.
In 1942, Bettejane appeared on the cover of Life magazine modelling army uniforms for women. The eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes reportedly noticed the 18-year-old and gave her a contract with RKO Pictures. Hughes managed to keep Greer under a kind of house arrest for five months. "Hughes was obsessed with me," she said many years later. "But at first it seemed as if he were offering me a superb career opportunity." She flew the obsessed Hughes and quickly married Rudy Vallee in 1943. An enraged Hughes pressured her and ruined the marriage. The couple separated after three months and divorced in 1944.
She returned to Hughes and her contract. At first, RKO gave her bit parts as showgirls in three films under her real name Bettejane Greer. She made her uncredited film debut in the romantic comedy Pan-Americana (John H. Auer, 1945). In 1945, Greer had her name legally changed to Jane Greer by a court in Los Angeles. She had bigger roles in the Film Noir Two O'Clock Courage (Anthony Mann, 1945) and Dick Tracy (William Berke, 1945), starring Russ Conway. This was a film adaptation of the Dick Tracy comic strip created by Chester Gould. It was the first of four instalments of the Dick Tracy film series, released by RKO Radio Pictures.
Greer had her breakthrough as femme fatale Kathie Moffat in the now classic Film Noir Out of the Past (Jacques Tourneur, 1947). Ronald Bergan in The Guardian: “She came into her own as one of the great two-timing dames in Jacques Tourneur's superb film noir Out of The Past, a part that was enough to make her one of the icons of the genre. As the femme fatale who coldly seduces Robert Mitchum in his first starring role, Greer changes character expertly to suit her particular needs, remote one moment, charming the next.” Greer co-starred with Robert Young and Susan Hayward in the Film Noir They Won't Believe Me (Irving Pichel, 1947), produced by Alfred Hitchcock's longtime assistant and collaborator, Joan Harrison.
British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. D. 249. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. James Mason and Jane Greer in The Prisoner of Zenda (Richard Thorpe, 1952).
British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. D. 250. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. James Mason, Robert Douglas and Jane Greer in The Prisoner of Zenda (Richard Thorpe, 1952).
As long as I own the studio, you won't work
In 1947, Jane Greer married the lawyer and businessman Edward Lasker with whom she had three children. Even though Greer was now married, Hughes, in a noirish twist of fate, had just bought RKO, and was still interested in her romantically, writes Ronald Bergan. When Greer resisted him, Hughes barked out, "As long as I own the studio, you won't work." However, he relented and cast her to co-star once again with starred alongside Robert Mitchum, in another Film Noir, the fast-paced The Big Steal (Don Siegel, 1949).
Greer's last film for RKO was The Company She Keeps (1950) as a deceitful ex-con, making a play for the boyfriend of her parole officer (Lizabeth Scott). In one scene, the baby in her arms is Jeff Bridges, making his screen debut. At MGM, she appeared in the war comedy You're in the Navy Now (Henry Hathaway, 1951) opposite Gary Cooper.
In 1952, Greer co-starred in one of her best-known films, the Swashbuckler The Prisoner of Zenda (Richard Thorpe, 1952). Opposite Stewart Granger and James Mason, she was great as the plotting Antoinette de Mauban. In 1953, Greer largely withdrew from the film business for her family life. In the following decades, she only took on roles sporadically. Most were guest appearances in television series.
In the cinema, she co-starred with James Cagney in the dark dramatic film Man of a Thousand Faces (Joseph Pevney, 1957) detailing the life of silent film actor Lon Chaney. She played the second wife of Chaney. In 1984, she played the role of Kathie Moffat (Rachel Ward)'s mother, Jessie Wyler, in Against All Odds (Taylor Hackford, 1984), the remake of Out of the Past (1947). One of her last roles was that of the restaurant critic and failed actress Vivian Smythe Niles in David Lynch's mystery series Twin Peaks (1990).
In 2001, Jane Greer died of cancer at the age of 76 in Los Angeles and was buried in Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles. For her contribution to cinema, a star was dedicated to her on the Hollywood Boulevard Walk of Fame. She divorced Edward Lasker in 1963. From 1965, she was the companion of actor and dialogue coach Frank London until he died in 2001, six months before Greer died. Jane Greer was the mother, with Edward Lasker, of Alex Lasker, Steven Lasker, and Lawrence Lasker. Lawrence Lasker was twice nominated for an Oscar - as the producer of Awakenings (Penny Marshall, 2001) and as the screenwriter of WarGames (John Badham, 1983). His brother Alex Lasker is also active in the film industry and is known as the screenwriter of such films as Firefox (Clint Eastwood, 1982), Beyond Rangoon (John Boorman, 1995) and Tears of the Sun (Antoine Fuqua, 2003).
West German postcard by Kunst und Bild, Berlin, no. V 311. Photo: R.K.O. Radio. Jane Greer in The Big Steal (Don Siegel, 1949).
Belgian postcard, no. 252. Photo: 20th Century Fox. Jane Greer (not Green) in You're in the Navy Now (Henry Hathaway, 1951).
Sources: Ronald Bergan (The Guardian), Jack Johnson (IMDb), Wikipedia (Dutch, German and English), and IMDb.
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