Mary Philbin

Silent film star Mary Philbin in a graceful portrait study by photographer Jack Freulich for the THE ROSE OF PARIS (1924). Mary was born on July 16, 1902 in Chicago, Illinois, into a middle-class Irish American family and raised Catholic. She began her acting career after winning a beauty contest sponsored by Universal Pictures in Chicago. She made her screen debut in 1921, and the following year was honored at the first WAMPAS Baby Stars awards. During the 1920s, she starred in a number of high-profile films, her most celebrated being "The Phantom of the Opera" (1925). The film was a huge box-office hit and the studio's biggest money maker of the decade, launching not only Lon Chaney to stardom but Mary as well. Her next big role was the dual part in a remake of Mary Pickford's "Stella Marris" (1926). She also received good notices in "Surrender" (1927), "The Man who Laughs" (1928) in the role of the blind girl, and also in D.W. Griffith's "Drums of Love" (1928). Her final film (a talkie) was "After the Fog" (1929) in the role of Faith Barker. Mary decided to abandon her film career and devote her life to care for her aging parents. She spent the remainder of her life as a recluse, never married and rarely made public appearances. It wasn't until the 1960s, that it was discovered that she was still alive, living at the time in the very same home she had in the 1920's. During that time, she admitted that she refused interviews and photo shoots, although she gladly replied to her fans and even sent them autographs. In 1988, she made her first public appearance since 1931 at a memorial service for Rudolph Valentino. She made two more public appearances - the first at the opening night of Andrew Lloyd Webber's stage extravaganza "The Phantom of the Opera" at the Ahamasohn Theatre in LA, starring Michael Crawford. And the second to help promote Philip Riley's "The Phantom of the Opera." After that - Mary was never seen in public again. On May 7, 1993 it was announced that she had passed away of complications from pneumonia.

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