Trivia of Yvonne De Carlo

Trivia of Yvonne De Carlo (1 September 1922 - 8 January 2007)

*Her birth name was Margaret Yvonne Middleton.She chose her own stage name by using her middle name and her mother's maiden name of De Carlo. She later explained that she changed her name because she did not look like the all-American girl next door.

*Won second place in the Miss Venice Beach contest of 1940. The prize was a check for $25. Sir Cedric Hardwicke, her future co-star in The Ten Commandments (1956), was one of the judges. This appearance led to her first job as a nightclub dancer and, eventually, to a successful movie career.

*Regarded The Ten Commandments (1956) as her best film. She was nominated for the Laurel Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance. In her autobiography and in a book about the film, she said that it is a timeless film that her descendants will see.

*The first Hollywood actress to play the leading role in a French film without an English-language version. The film was La contessa di Castiglione (1954).

*Took the role of Lily Munster on The Munsters (1964) to help pay husband Bob Morgan's medical bills. Morgan, an actor and stuntman, had suffered near-fatal injuries while filming How the West Was Won (1962). By her own admission, De Carlo never imagined, at the time, that the show would become such a hit. She also had mixed feelings about the show; she was grateful it returned her to the spotlight but felt its popularity tended to overshadow the rest of her career.

*Eva Perón, First Lady of Argentina from 1946 to 1952, was a great fan of hers. According to De Carlo's autobiography, Perón told the Hollywood film star that she enjoyed every one of her movies and that her favorite was Buccaneer's Girl (1950). Perón also said that she wanted De Carlo to portray her in a biopic. Before De Carlo left Argentina, Perón gave her a copy of her autobiography in which she inscribed: "A remembrance of your passing through Argentina, with my gratitude for your kindness toward me. With my best wishes for your happiness always and a big hug - Eva Perón".

*An accomplished singer since childhood, she sang in most of her films of the 1940s and 1950s. She also sang and played the harp in Far Out Munsters (1965).