German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 5986/1, 1930-1931. Photo: Paramount.
British postcard. Photo: Paramount. Wynne Gibson in If I Had a Million (James Cruze, Ernst Lubitsch, a.o., 1932).
Gaining wide experience on stage
Wynne Gibson was born as Winifred Gibson on the 3rd of July 1898 in New York, U.S.A.
After several years spent at the Wadleigh School for Girls, she turned to the stage.
Over time, Gibson appeared in vaudeville and in stock.
She notably formed a vaudeville act with Billie Vernon, who was married to James Cagney from 1922 to his death.
On Broadway, she had her most substantial part as Pauline Clare, an inebriated minor actress, in 'Jarnegan' (1928-1929), starring Richard Bennett and offering his daughter, Joan Bennett, her first important role on the stage.
German postcard by Eidelsan, series II, Bild 86. Photo: Associated Press.
First steps in films
Wynne Gibson made her film debut in the Paramount Astoria studios in New York in Nothing But the Truth (1929), in which she formed a gold-digging sister pair with Helen Kane.
She was quick to catch that working in movies could be interesting and lucrative, and she soon departed for Hollywood.
In a 1931 interview, she reminisced: "When I boarded the train to come to Hollywood, I felt like an adventurer starting a new life. There was no contract in my purse, or even a verbal agreement with my manager that I would find work on the Coast. But I had cut all the old ties, and I was in the frame of mind to take a chance on anything".
Fortunately, Gibson didn’t have to wait long before being noticed.
At M.G.M., she played a secretary secretly in love with Lawrence Gray in Children of Pleasure (1930) and, at R.K.O, she was a gangster’s moll in The Fall Guy (1930).
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 6409/1, 1931-1932. Photo: Paramount.
A contract with Paramount
She then signed with Paramount, which put her in two Jack Oakie vehicles, The Gang Buster (1931), as a mobster’s former lover, and June Moon (1931), as a discontented and cynical wife.
She played William Powell’s ex-girlfriend who helps him run a scandal sheet in Man of the World (1931).
She again was a gangster’s moll in City Streets (1931) and Kick In (1931).
She appeared in a supporting role as a dizzy divorcée in The Road to Reno (1931), an exposé about how a selfish and irresponsible mother’s behaviour affects her children’s lives.
In the women’s prison melodrama Ladies of the Big House (1931), she was excellent as a tough convict who is bitchy towards her fellow inmate Sylvia Sidney, before realising that she’s been set up and helping her in proving her innocence.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 8040/1, 1933-1934. Photo: Paramount.
1932: a landmark year
In Two Kinds of Women (1932), Wynne Gibson was a fun-loving party girl, and, as a contrast, Miriam Hopkins was a senator’s naive daughter.
As a change of pace, Paramount starred her in the title role of The Strange Case of Clara Deane (1932), a Madame X-style melodrama in which she had to endure many misfortunes such as being unfairly sent to jail, having to surrender her little child to adoption and killing her blackmailing husband to protect her now grown-up daughter, to whom she would never reveal she was her mother.
She was perfectly cast as Puff Rogers, a speakeasy hostess and prizefighter George Bancroft’s gal, in Lady and Gent (1932), in which both turn to the country life to offer proper upbringing to their adopted boy. She thereafter played George Raft’s discarded girlfriend, whom he had dumped in favour of the classier Constance Cummings, in Night After Night (1932). But this was the film debut of Mae West, who upstaged everybody.
She was at her best in the anthology film If I Had a Million (1932), as low-class and world-weary prostitute Violet Smith, who is among a group of people picked at random by an eccentric millionaire to receive one million dollars each. She uses her money to rent a room in a smart and costly hotel to be able at last to sleep alone, without any man at her side. This kind of story raised some eyebrows at The Studio Relations Committee, which had been created by William Hays in the 1920s. Several local censors deleted a scene in which she removes her black stockings in her large bed.
Wynne Gibson rounded up 1932 by playing a car thief ring leader’s girlfriend, who reforms and finds happiness with mechanic Edmund Lowe, in The Devil Is Driving (1932).
Spanish postcard by M.C. Barcelona, no. 313. Wynne Gibson in Night After Night (Archie Mayo, 1932).
11 films from 1933 to 1935
In The Crime of the Century (1933), Wynne Gibson was Jean Hersholt’s money-hungry and unfaithful wife. At R.K.O, she played a hard-bitten hospital nurse in Emergency Call (1933) and had the title role in Aggie Appleby, Maker of Men (1933), in which she transforms a mild-mannered and diffident man into a tough guy.
Her Paramount contract ended with Her Bodyguard (1933), as a Brooklyn-born Broadway star, who had changed her name from Margaret O’Brian to the posher Margot Brienne, attracted to the man hired to protect her.
In 1934, she was featured in the crime dramas The Crosby Case at Universal and Sleepers East and Gambling, both at Fox. At Columbia, she also appeared in The Captain Hates the Sea, John Gilbert’s final movie.
Two years after The Strange Case of Clara Deane, Universal had the idea to star her in another lachrymose mother-love story, I Give My Love, from a story by Vicki Baum.
Gibson then decided to try her luck in England, where she starred in the comedy Admirals All (1935), as a film actress and in the spy movie The Crouching Beast (1935), as a newspaper reporter.
Spanish postcard by Dümmatzen, no. 242. Photo: Paramount.
An actress kept busy in B-movies
Upon her return, Wynne Gibson was mostly used in B pictures, often at Columbia and Republic, such as Come Closer, Folks (1936), Racketeers in Exile (1937), Gangs of New York (1938), My Son Is Guilty (1939), Forgotten Girls (1940), Double Cross (1941) and A Man’s World (1942).
She was given an interesting role in Republic’s Michael O’Halloran (1937), as a selfish and careless woman who redeems herself through contact with two orphans. It was adapted from a 1915 Gene Stratton-Porter novel.
Her last movie was the crime whodunit Mystery Broadcast (1943), as a lady with a shady past who is murdered in the course of the action.
In the 1940s and 50s, she worked for radio and television. Her last TV appearance was in 1956.
In the 1950s, Wynne Gibson served as chair of the Equity Library Theater.
British postcard in the Colourgraph series, London, no. C201. Photo: Paramount.
Interred side by side
According to some sources, she would have briefly been married to a stage manager in her youth, but no mention of the husband’s name or the dates of the marriage can be found. So this is subject to caution.
It seems that a marriage to actor John Gallaudet from 1927 to 1930 is more plausible.
During the filming of the Joe E. Brown vehicle Flirting with Fate (1938), she met actress Beverly Roberts, who became her long-time companion.
Wynne Gibson passed away on the 15th of May 1987.
Her final resting place is Forest Lawn Memorial Park. In 2009, Beverly Roberts was buried in the grave located just next to hers.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. A 2011/1, 1939-1940. Wynne Gibson and Jack Oakie are visiting the Paramount Zoo.
Spanish postcard by Dümmatzen, no. 325. Photo: Paramount.
Text and postcards: Marlene Pilaete.
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