Faithful reader lupner has made a special request for a word about silent film star Marie Prevost. So here's the word:Canadian-born Marie Prevost got her start with legendary comedy film producer Mack Sennett in 1915. In 1921, she came to the attention of a young producer at Universal by the name of Irving Thalberg, who decided she had the makings of a star. Known primarily as a light comic actress, she probably did her best work in a trio of Ernst Lubitsch vehicles, The Marriage Circle, Three Women and Kiss Me Again.
Although she continued to appear in movies throughout the 1930s, Prevost's career took a sudden nosedive with the advent of sound and she began slipping down the billing until she was reduced to playing uncredited bit parts.
A heavy drinker since the silent days, Prevost was found dead in January 1937 of malnutrition and acute alcoholism. She was thirty-eight.
The body wasn't found immediately and the coroner discovered her pet dachshund had fed on her corpse, a fact I mention only because in 1978, Nick Lowe memorialized her in the song "Marie Provost" [sic]. "She was a winner," he sang, "That became a doggie's dinner."Yes, well said.
More trivia: In 1919, Prevost married socialite Sonny Gerke whose family was so disapproving of the acting profession, the two kept their marriage a secret until 1923 when Gerke finally had to reveal the union in order to file for divorce.
