Mary Pickford

Mary Pickford (April 8, 1892 – May 29, 1979) was a motion picture star and co-founder of United Artists, known as "America's Sweetheart" and "the girl with the curl." She was one of the Canadian pioneers in early Hollywood. Mary Pickford is mostly known as the first Movie Star in Hollywood.

Partial chronology

• 1909: discovered by David Wark Griffith at Biograph, worked for $5 a day
• 1910: I.M.P., $175 a week
• 1911: Majestic Film Corp.
• 1912: back to Biograph
• 1913: appeared (with Lillian Gish) in Belasco's Broadway production A Good Little Devil
• 1913: Famous Players, $20,000 a year
• 1915: worked for various companies, $1000 to $2000 a week
• 1916: founded "The Mary Pickford Corporation" as a part of Paramount Pictures, she earned about $10,000 a week. She became the first actress to produce her own films.
• 1917: starred in Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and The Poor Little Rich Girl, among other films. She toured the United States of America with Fairbanks and others, supporting U.S. involvement in World War I and promoting Liberty Bonds.
• 1918: played two starring roles in Stella Maris, in performances that Adolph Zukor reluctantly judged her best yet. She earned $675,000 (about $10 million in 2005-terms) for three films with First National, plus 50% of all profits, plus a signing bonus of $50,000 and complete control over her films, ranging from script to the final cut.
• 1919: co-founded United Artists
• 1923: Pickford, wanting to work with a strong director, convinced Ernst Lubitsch to direct her next film. After considering alternatives, they settled on Rosita, with a performance which critics praised but her fans avoided (it lacked her 'little girl' image).
• 1927 United Artists, under Pickford's direction, opens their flagship Spanish Gothic movie theatre in downtown Los Angeles. Pickford became deeply involved in the design of the theatre, and two Anthony Heinsbergen murals in the auditorium feature her. Theatre architect Howard Crane opened two other UA theatres in the same year, in Chicago and Detroit. The Los Angeles theatre has become known as the University Cathedral of Dr. Eugene Scott.
• 1929: Pickford becomes the first major actress to star in a sound film, Coquette, a production that did well at the box office, earning $1.4 million. Her performance earned her an Oscar.
• 1933: Pickford stars in Secrets, a money-losing film which proved her last.
• 1937: Pickford founds Mary Pickford Cosmetics, a beauty company.
• 1941: Pickford, Charlie Chaplin, Walt Disney, Orson Welles, Samuel Goldwyn, David O. Selznick, Alexander Korda, and Walter Wanger found the Society of Independent Motion Picture Producers.
• 1949: Pickford and her husband form Pickford-Rogers-Boyd, a radio and television-production company.
• 1976: Pickford receives an Academy Honorary Award for a lifetime of achievements.

Mary Pickford has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6280 Hollywood Boulevard.

Related Topics:
Hollywood Walk of Fame - Hollywood Boulevard

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