Dolores Del Rio

Mexican born beauty Dolores Del Rio in dazzling costume for MADAME DU BARRY (1934). Del Rio was born on August 3, 1904 and came from an aristocratic family in Durango, Mexico. In 1921 she married Jaime Del Río, a wealthy Mexican, and the two became friends with Hollywood producer/director Edwin Carewe, who "discovered" del Rio and invited the couple to move to Hollywood where they launched careers in the movie business (she as an actress, Jaime as a screenwriter). Eventually they divorced after Carewe cast her in her first film "Joanna" (1925), followed by "High Steppers" (1926) and "What Price Glory?" (1926). She had her first leading role in the silent version of "Pals First" (1926) and soared to stardom in 1928 with "Ramona" (1928). Her career continued to rise with the arrival of sound in the drama / romance "Bird of Paradise" (1932) and the hit musical "Flying Down to Rio" (1933). She later married Cedric Gibbons, the well-known art director and production designer at MGM studios. After a number of films in Hollywood, Del Rio finally returned to Mexico in 1942 and entered in what has now been called the Golden Era of Mexican Cinema. With such pictures as "María Candelaria" (1944), "The Abandoned" (1945) and "Bugambilia" (1945), she became the prototypical Mexican beauty. In her last years she received accolades because of her work for orphaned children. Her last film was "The Children of Sanchez" (1978). Del Río is now considered a mythical figure of American and Mexican cinema, and a quintessential representation of the female face of Mexico in the world. Her career had a great impact on the trajectories of the Latinas in Hollywood who later followed her footsteps, including modern stars such as Salma Hayek, Jennifer Lopez, Sofia Vergara and Penelope Cruz.

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