A Tribute to Katherine Perry
Born Katherine Perry in New York City on January 5, 1897, a
Ziegfeld Follies show girl as Katherine was a natural for a screen career,
despite a limited talent as an actress.
Katherine came to director D.W. Griffith’s attention and
with her mother visited his Mamaroneck Studios on Long Island.
However, Katherine was disappointed when her participation
was limited to that of of one of the attractive young ladies partying with
Lowell Sherman. Griffith did, however, give her one close-up, and that may have
lead to Katherine’s making her first credited screen performance as Miss
Hollander in Lewis J. Selznick’s production of Sooner or Later (1920).
The leading man in Sooner or Later (1920) was Owen Moore
(Mary Pickford’s first husband). Katherine did not play opposite him, but in
her second film with Owen Moore, The Chicken in the Case (1921) she was his
leading lady. Katherine married Owen Moore on July 16, 1921, and embarked on a
domestic life that was as comic as the farces in which the two appeared on
screen.
Owen Moore was brother to Matt and Tom, all of whom were
from Ireland. Aside from The Chicken in the Case (1921), Katherine co-starred
with Owen in A Divorce of Conscience (1921) and Love Is an Awful Thing (1922)
for Lewis J. Selznick, and Husbands for Rent (1927) at Warner Bros.
Katherine
starred opposite Mat Moore in The First Year (1926) and Early to Wed (1926)
released by Fox. Katherine’s first talkie was Side Street (1929), a crime drama
released by RKO starring all three of the Moore brothers, but with Tom rather
than Owen as her romantic interest. After Side Street (1929) there were no more
featured roles. Owen Moore died at the couple’s Beverly Hills home on June 9,
1939 of a heart attack at the age of 52. Katherine continued to act on screen
through 1951, but her roles were always uncredited bits such as that of a
socialite in My Man Godfrey (1936). Toward the end of her life Katherine
admitted that she didn’t think she did anything very well, but she was happy
all the time. Katherine died at the Motion Picture Country Hospital on October 14,
1983. She was 86 years old, and had aged from a beautiful brunette to a
gray-haired old lady with a risqué sense of humor.
Katherine appeared in a total of thirty-six films from
1920-1936, and most of them were credited as Kathryn Perry.
Thank you Silent for your wonderful review.. I will look for her next time I watch the film, My Man Godfrey.
ReplyDeleteI've never heard of Perry. I learned a lot from reading this.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you liked my review of Katherine Perry. She wasn't in that many films, but I thought it was interesting that she was the wife of Owen Moore, Mary Pickford's first husband, and that they both appeared in films together. I will also look for her next time I watch My Man Godfrey, which is a very funny film.
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