Jean Parker

Pretty Jean Parker in an enchanting pose for the 1939 film IT’S SPRING AGAIN. Parker was born on August 11, 1915 in Deer Lodge, Montana, USA. She made her feature film debut in the pre-code drama “Divorce in the Family” (1932), before being loaned to Columbia Pictures, who cast her in Frank Capra's “Lady for a Day” (1933). The same year, she starred as Elizabeth March in George Cukor's adaptation of “Little Women” opposite Katharine Hepburn, Joan Bennett, and Frances Dee. Subsequent roles included lead parts in the drama “Sequoia” (1934), and in the British comedy-fantasy “The Ghost Goes West” (1935). Parker later starred in the Laurel and Hardy comedy “The Flying Deuces” (1939), followed by “The Pittsburgh Kid” (1941), and the film noir “Dead Man's Eyes” (1944). She made her Broadway debut in 1946, in the title role of Loco, followed by a leading role in the Broadway production of “Burlesque” (1946–1947). In 1948, she replaced Judy Holliday for the national Broadway touring production of Garson Kanin's “Born Yesterday”, which earned her favorable reviews. Parker's fourth and last husband, actor Robert Lowery, played opposite her as Brock in the play for a short stint. By this marriage, Parker bore her only child, a son, Robert Lowery Hanks. The next year, she appeared opposite Gregory Peck in a stage production of the comedy “Light Up the Sky” (1949). By the 1950s, Parker's film career had slowed, though she continued to appear in a small number of films, including supporting parts in the Westerns “The Gunfighter” (1950) and “Toughest Man in Arizona” (1952), and the film noir “Black Tuesday” (1954). Parker made her final film appearance in “Apache Uprising” (1965). She spent her later years in California, where she passed away of a stroke at the Motion Picture and Television Country House and Hospital in Nov 2005 (aged 90).

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