Helen Chandler

 Helen Chandler (February 1, 1906 – April 30, 1965)

She was best known for playing Mina Seward in the 1931 horror film Dracula. Chandler's Broadway career began in 1917. Her early performances include Arthur Hopkins' 1920 production of Richard III, which starred John Barrymore, Macbeth in 1921 with Lionel Barrymore; Hedvig in Henrik Ibsen's The Wild Duck in 1925 and Ophelia in the 1925 modern dress version of Hamlet starring Basil Sydney. By the time of her first film she had been in over twenty Broadway productions. She made her film debut in 1927 in the silent film The Music Master and in 1930 joined Leslie Howard, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., and Beryl Mercer for Outward Bound, the film version of the stage success. She achieved more successes in A House Divided (1931) and Christopher Strong (1933), all the while dividing her time among films, radio work, and theater roles in Los Angeles, New York and London. She starred in British actor Will Hay's 1934 movie, Radio Parade of 1935 and played a role on Lux Radio in Alibi Ike with Joe E. Brown (1937). Among her later stage successes were Within The Gates in 1934, Pride and Prejudice in 1935, Lady Precious Stream in 1936 with then-husband Bramwell Fletcher, a reprise of her film role in Outward Bound in 1938 and various productions of Boy Meets Girl and Noël Coward's Tonight at 8.30. By the late 1930s she was battling alcoholism and her acting career declined. She was hospitalized several times but was unable to gain control over her life. She was married 3 times. Helen Chandler died on April 30, 1965, from cardiac arrest during surgery for a stomach ulcer in Hollywood, California. She is interred at Hollywood Forever Cemetery.