Biography

Binnie Barnes

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Overview

Born
March 25, 1903 · Finsbury, London, England, UK
Died
July 27, 1998 · Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, California, USA (natural causes)
Birth name
Gittel Enoyce Barnes (later called Gertrude Maude Barnes)
Nickname
- Texas Binnie Barnes
Height
5′ 5″ (1.65 m)

Mini bio

British-born actress who appeared in both British and American films, but who found her greatest success in Hollywood second leads. After a variety of jobs, including nurse, chorus girl and milkmaid, Barnes entered vaudeville. She appeared in more than a score of short comedies with comedian Stanley Lupino before making her feature bow in 1931. Two years later she achieved prominence as one of the half-dozen wives of the King in The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933). The following year she moved to Hollywood and began a career as the smart-aleck pal of the lead or as the angry "other woman." Barnes also played numerous leading roles, but spent most of the 1930s and 40s in strong supporting parts. In 1940 she married football star (and later producer) M.J. Frankovich and after the war, they moved to Italy and appeared in several films there and elsewhere in Europe. She retired from films in 1954, but returned for a few roles in the late 60s and early 70s. She worked busily with numerous charities until her death in 1998.
- IMDb mini biography by: Jim Beaver <jumblejim@prodigy.net>
Her early work, beginning at age 15, included milkmaid, nurse, chorus girl, dance hostess and a vaudeville rope-twirling act in which she was known as "Texas Binnie Barnes." Her acting debut, with Charles Laughton, was in 1929 in Silver Tassie; her film debut was the English movie A Night in Montmartre (1931). She did 26 comedy shorts with Stanley Lupino, which led to her playing Catherine Howard in Laughton's The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933) and a year later a part in Douglas Fairbanks' The Private Life of Don Juan (1934). In 1934, Carl Laemmle Jr. brought her to Hollywood where she played in more than 75 movies including Diamond Jim (1935) with Edward Arnold, The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938) with Gary Cooper, and The Three Musketeers (1939) with Don Ameche. In 1940, she married UCLA football star (and later Columbia Studios producer) M.J. Frankovich. They moved to Italy after World War II where she made more films. She returned to Hollywood in the 1960s, playing in TV series and as Sister Celestine in the two Rosalind Russell "Angels" movies. Her last film was 40 Carats (1973) starring Liv Ullmann and Gene Kelly. Her husband died in 1992; she died six years later, aged 95, at her home in Beverly Hills. She was survived by two sons and a daughter.
- IMDb mini biography by: Ed Stephan <stephan@cc.wwu.edu>

Family

Spouses
Children
Relatives

Trivia

She and her husband are buried alongside Joe E. Brown in his grave site at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California. Plot The Joe E. Brown family plot, Sunrise Slope, behind the Great Mausoleum to the left of Aimee S. McPherson.
She sued Harry Cohn of Columbia Pictures because he supposedly ordered her to be photographed in her garters behind a screen, but it was just a publicity stunt cooked up by Barnes and Cohn.
She played Fanny in the original London stage version of Noël Coward's play "Cavalcade", but was signed by Fox for a different role in the film adaptation. She sailed to New York on the Queen Mary and was taken to the Waldorf Towers. It was a stormy night, and when no one from the studio showed up to meet her, she sailed back to Britain the next day.
Before her screen debut in 1929, she worked as a nurse, chorus girl, dance hostess and vaudeville comedienne. According with the IMDB, her debut was in 1923 at the age of 20 in a movie called PHONOFILM and her next movie was only in 1931.
She played poker with Clark Gable at the studio and at the actor's home.

Quotes

I'm no Sarah Bernhardt. One picture is just like another to me as long as I don't have to be a sweet woman.
[In a 1990 interview] Look at some TV series which masquerade as glamor and see how much they have fallen into cheapness and tawdriness. So you ask me if I miss the business. I have to say it just isn't there any more. I've made all the comebacks I intend to, thanks very much!
[on Robert Taylor when they co-starred in "There's Always Tomorrow"] A nice boy but bad teeth and rather simian features. He went back to MGM where they fixed his hairline and capped his teeth. The next I knew he was a big star in "Small Town Girl" and I was the featured player.
[1972] Frankly, I've never been mad about acting - it just happened to be the only way I could make a living.