Ida Lupino

Ida Lupino
in The Hard Way (1943)
Born	4 February 1918(1918-02-04) Camberwell, London, UK
Died	3 August 1995(1995-08-03) (aged 77) Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Occupation	Actress, director
Years active	1931–1978
Spouse	Louis Hayward (1938–1945; divorced) Collier Young (1948–1951; divorced) Howard Duff (1951–1984; divorced); 1 child

Ida Lupino (4 February 1918 – 3 August 1995) was an English-born film actress and director, and a pioneer among women filmmakers. In her 48-year career, she appeared in 59 films and directed seven others, mostly in the United States. She appeared in serial television programmes 58 times and directed 50 other episodes. Additionally, she contributed as a writer to five films and four TV episodes.

Acting career

Lupino was born in 1918 into an English family of performers. Her father, Stanley Lupino, was a music hall comedian, and her mother, Connie Emerald (1892–1959), was an actress. As a girl, Ida Lupino was encouraged to enter show business by both her parents and her uncle, Lupino Lane. She trained at RADA and made her first film appearance in The Love Race (1931), the next year making Her First Affaire. She spent the next several years playing minor roles. She moved to Hollywood in 1933.

Following her appearance in The Light That Failed (1939) Lupino began to be taken seriously as a dramatic actress. As a result, her parts improved during the 1940s, and she described herself as "the poor man's Bette Davis."

During this period, Lupino became known for her hard-boiled roles, as in such films as They Drive by Night (1940) and High Sierra (1941), both opposite Humphrey Bogart. For her performance in The Hard Way (1943), she won the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress. She worked regularly and was in demand throughout the 1940s without becoming a major star until later. In 1947, Lupino left Warner Bros. to freelance. Notable films she appeared in around that time include Road House and On Dangerous Ground.

Directing career

In the mid-1940s, while on suspension for turning down a role, Lupino became interested in directing. She described herself as being bored on set while "someone else seemed to be doing all the interesting work." She and her husband Collier Young formed an independent company, The Filmakers [sic], and Lupino became a producer, director and screenwriter of low-budget, issue-oriented films.

Her first directing job came unexpectedly in 1949 when Elmer Clifton suffered a mild heart attack and could not finish Not Wanted, the film he was directing for Filmakers. Lupino stepped in to finish the film and went on to direct her own projects, becoming Hollywood's only female film director of the time.

In an article for the Village Voice, Carrie Rickey wrote that Lupino was a model of modern feminist filmmaking, stating:

Not only did Lupino take control of production, direction and screenplay, but each of her movies addresses the brutal repercussions of sexuality, independence, and dependence.

Lupino (left) directing The Hitch-Hiker (1953)

After four "woman's" films about social issues – including Outrage (1950), a film about rape – Lupino directed her first hard-paced, fast-moving picture, The Hitch-Hiker (1953), making her the first woman to direct a film noir. Writer Richard Koszarski noted that:

Her films display the obsessions and consistencies of a true auteur... In her films The Bigamist and The Hitch-Hiker Lupino was able to reduce the male to the same sort of dangerous, irrational force that women represented in most male-directed examples of Hollywood film noir.

Lupino often joked that if she had been the "poor man's Bette Davis" as an actress, then she had become the "poor man's Don Siegel" as a director. In 1952, Lupino was invited to become the "fourth star" in Four Star Productions by Dick Powell, David Niven and Charles Boyer, after Joel McCrea and Rosalind Russell had dropped out of the company.

Television

Lupino continued acting throughout the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. Her directing efforts during these years were almost exclusively television productions such as Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Thriller, The Twilight Zone, Have Gun – Will Travel, The Donna Reed Show, Gilligan's Island, 77 Sunset Strip, The Ghost & Mrs. Muir, The Rifleman, The Virginian, Sam Benedict, The Untouchables, The Fugitive and Bewitched.

Lupino appeared in 19 episodes of Four Star Playhouse from 1952 to 1956. From January 1957 through September 1958, Lupino starred with her then husband, Howard Duff, in the CBS sitcom Mr. Adams and Eve, in which the duo played husband and wife film stars named Howard Adams and Eve Drake, living in Beverly Hills, California. Duff and Lupino also co-starred as themselves in 1959 in one of the 13 one-hour installments of The Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour. Lupino guest-starred on numerous television programs, including The Ford Television Theatre (1954), The Twilight Zone (1959), Bonanza (1959), Burke's Law (1963–64), The Virginian (1963–65), Batman (1968), The Mod Squad (1969), Family Affair (1969–70), Columbo (1972–74), Barnaby Jones (1974), The Streets of San Francisco ("Blockade", 1974), Ellery Queen (1975), Police Woman (1975) and Charlie's Angels (1977), to name a few. She made her final film appearance in 1978 and retired at the age of 60.

Awards and homage

Lupino has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her contributions to the fields of television and motion pictures. They are located at 1724 Vine Street and 6821 Hollywood Boulevard. Lupino is the titular subject of a jazz homage composed by Carla Bley in 1964, originally for the album Turning Point.

Personal life

Lupino in 1979

Lupino was born in Camberwell, London, (allegedly under a table during a World War I zeppelin raid^{[citation needed]}) to actress Connie O'Shea (Connie Emerald) and music hall entertainer Stanley Lupino, a member of the theatrical Lupino family. Ida's birth year is 1918 and not 1914 as some biographies have claimed. Her sister Rita Lupino, born in 1920, became an actress and dancer. During World War II she served as a Lieutenant in the Women's Ambulance and Defense Corps.

Lupino was married and divorced three times.

• Louis Hayward, actor (November 1938 - 11 May 1945)
• Collier Young, producer (1948–1951)
• Howard Duff, actor (October 1951 - 1984) with whom she had daughter Bridget Duff on 23 April 1952

In 1983, Lupino petitioned a California court to appoint her business manager, Mary Ann Anderson, as her conservator due to poor business dealings from her prior business management company and her long separation from Howard Duff.

Lupino died from a stroke while undergoing treatment for colon cancer in Los Angeles in August 1995, at the age of 77.^{[citation needed]} Lupino's memiors, Ida Lupino: Beyond the Camera, were edited after her death and published by Mary Ann Anderson.

Filmography

Film credits as actress and/or director

Title	Year	As actress	Role	As director	Notes
Love Race, TheThe Love Race	1931	Yes	Minor supporting role
Her First Affaire	1932	Yes	Anne
Ghost Camera, TheThe Ghost Camera	1933	Yes	Mary Fulton
High Finance	1933	Yes	Jill
Money for Speed	1933	Yes	Jane
I Lived with You	1933	Yes	Ada Wallis
Prince of Arcadia	1933	Yes	The Princess
Search for Beauty	1934	Yes	Barbara Hilton
Come on Marines	1934	Yes	Esther Smith-Hamilton
Ready for Love	1934	Yes	Marigold Tate
Paris in Spring	1935	Yes	Mignon de Charelle
Smart Girl	1935	Yes	Pat Reynolds
Peter Ibbetson	1935	Yes	Agnes
Fiesta de Santa Barbara, LaLa Fiesta de Santa Barbara	1935	Yes	Herself
Anything Goes	1936	Yes	Hope Harcourt
One Rainy Afternoon	1936	Yes	Monique Pelerin
Yours for the Asking	1936	Yes	Gert Malloy
Gay Desperado, TheThe Gay Desperado	1936	Yes	Jane
Sea Devils	1937	Yes	Doris Malone
Let's Get Married	1937	Yes	Paula Quinn
Artists and Models	1937	Yes	Paula Sewell/Paula Monterey
Fight for Your Lady	1937	Yes	Marietta
Lone Wolf Spy Hunt, TheThe Lone Wolf Spy Hunt	1939	Yes	Val Carson
Lady and the Mob, TheThe Lady and the Mob	1939	Yes	Lila Thorne
Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, TheThe Adventures of Sherlock Holmes	1939	Yes	Ann Brandon
Light That Failed, TheThe Light That Failed	1939	Yes	Bessie Broke
Screen Snapshots Series 18, No. 6	1939	Yes	Herself		Promotional short film
They Drive by Night	1940	Yes	Lana Carlsen
High Sierra	1940	Yes	Marie
Sea Wolf, TheThe Sea Wolf	1941	Yes	Ruth Webster
Out of the Fog	1941	Yes	Stella Goodwin
Ladies in Retirement	1941	Yes	Ellen Creed
Moontide	1942	Yes	Anna
Life Begins at Eight-Thirty	1942	Yes	Kathy Thomas
Forever and a Day	1943	Yes	Jenny
Hard Way, TheThe Hard Way	1943	Yes	Mrs. Helen Chernen
Thank Your Lucky Stars	1943	Yes	Herself
In Our Time	1944	Yes	Jennifer Whittredge
Hollywood Canteen	1944	Yes	Herself
Pillow to Post	1945	Yes	Jean Howard
Devotion	1946	Yes	Emily Bronte
Man I Love, TheThe Man I Love	1947	Yes	Petey Brown
Deep Valley	1947	Yes	Libby Saul
Escape Me Never	1947	Yes	Gemma Smith
Road House	1948	Yes	Lily Stevens
Lust for Gold	1949	Yes	Julia Thomas
Not Wanted	1949			Yes
Never Fear	1949			Yes
Woman in Hiding	1950	Yes	Deborah Chandler Clark
Outrage	1950	Yes	Country Dance Attendee	Yes
Hard, Fast and Beautiful	1951	Yes	Seabright Tennis Match Supervisor	Yes
On the Loose	1951	Yes	Narrator
On Dangerous Ground	1952	Yes	Mary Malden
Beware, My Lovely	1952	Yes	Mrs. Helen Gordon
Hitch-Hiker, TheThe Hitch-Hiker	1953			Yes
Jennifer	1953	Yes	Agnes Langley
Bigamist, TheThe Bigamist	1953	Yes	Phyllis Martin	Yes
Private Hell 36	1954	Yes	Lilli Marlowe
Women's Prison	1955	Yes	Amelia van Zandt
Big Knife, TheThe Big Knife	1955	Yes	Marion Castle
While the City Sleeps	1956	Yes	Mildred Donner
Strange Intruder	1956	Yes	Alice Carmichael
Trouble with Angels, TheThe Trouble with Angels	1966			Yes
Junior Bonner	1972	Yes	Elvira Bonner
Devil's Rain, TheThe Devil's Rain	1975	Yes	Mrs. Preston
Food of the Gods, TheThe Food of the Gods	1976	Yes	Mrs. Skinner
Charlie's Angels	1977	Yes	Gloria Gibson		TV series
My Boys are Good Boys	1978	Yes	Mrs. Morton

External links

• Ida Lupino at the Internet Movie Database
• Ida Lupino at the TCM Movie Database
• Ida Lupino at Find a Grave (photos of Lupino)