Trivia of Ann Sothern

Trivia of Ann Sothern (22 January 1909 - 15 March 2001)

*At the age of five, Sothern began taking piano lessons. She later studied at McPhail School of Music, where her mother taught piano. She began accompanying her mother on her concert tours when her school schedule permitted.By age 11, she had become an accomplished pianist and was singing solos in her church choir.Later, her mother moved to Los Angeles, where she worked as a vocal coach for Warner Bros studios.While visiting her mother in California, she won a role in the Warner Bros revue The Show of Shows (1929). She did a screen test for MGM and signed a six-month contract.

*She replaced Jean Harlow in Maisie (1939) after Harlow's unexpected death.Maisie (1939) became first of ten movies starring Ann Sothern as the heroine Maisie Ravier.

*Best friends with Lucille Ball and Ann Dvorak, both of whom she met while working as a chorus girl (Ball at the Goldwyn Studios, Dvorak at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer).

*MGM head Louis B. Mayer paid $80,000 to purchase film rights to the Broadway production of DuBarry Was a Lady in 1943 especially for Ann Sothern.When Sothern rejected the revised script MGM decided to cast Lucille Ball (Sothern's best friend in real life).

*In 1953, her film career waned and she decided to give television a chance. When a television series based on her popular "Maisie" film character failed to materialize, she made her series debut as Suzie McNamara on Private Secretary. The show ran for five seasons, from 1953 to 1957.

*Over the course of her career, Sothern also managed several businesses and production companies. In the 1950s, she opened the Ann Sothern Sewing Center in Sun Valley, Idaho, which sold fabric, patterns, and sewing machines. She also owned a cattle ranch in Idaho named the A Bar S Cattle Company. Sothern owned Vincent Productions, Inc. (named for Sothern's patron saint Vincent de Paul) which produced her first series Private Secretary, and Anso Productions which produced The Ann Sothern Show.Sothern had been so busy in the entertainment industry for so many years, once quipped that she had done everything in the business except rodeo.

*Left visibly overweight by a bout of hepatitis, she only wore black outfits in her 1950s sitcoms Private Secretary (1953) and The Ann Sothern Show (1958).