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Florence Marly Profile
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Photo gallery |
| (Hanna Smekalova) |
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| 2 June 19 | is born in Bruenn / Obrnice, Czechoslovakia, of Slavic origin |
| wants to become an opera star but doesn’t have the voice |
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| c. 37 | is discovered by French director Pierre Chenal while a student at the Sorbonne University, Paris, where she studies art, literature, and philosophy |
is rushed into her movie debut, L’Alibi, only a few days after meeting Chenal |
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| ? | is hailed “the most beautiful girl in the world” in France |
| 40 | marries Chenal. He’s 15 years her senior. |
| June 40 | on suggestion of fellow actress Marie Bell, she flees Paris in her new Packard the very day before the Germans move into the city. Her car isn’t confiscated by the government because it requires too much gasoline. With her travel two renowned Parisian lesbians. |
| 42-45 | spends the war years in Argentina, where she stars in two movies, El Viaje Sin Regreso and La Piel de Zapa |
| 46 | returns to France after the war |
| 47 | is nominated in the Best Actress category at the Cannes Film Festival for her role in Les Maudits and wins the Best Motion Picture award |
| is back in her native Czechoslovakia for the filming of Krakati, based on Karel Capek’s best-selling novel. She leaves her salary of almost $100,000 to friends and relatives who need it more than she. |
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| 1 October 47 | as Florence Marly, she arrives aboard the Queen Elizabeth in New York from Southampton |
| October 49 | is back in Hollywood after a trip to Chicago with Chenal, who is now directing Native Son with Richard Wagg in Buenos Aires. She says Chicago is one of the most beautiful cities she’s ever seen. If Chenal’s picture is a success, she will get a diamond necklace next year. |
| Late January 50 | can’t go to Argentina with Jean Wallace, who will star in Pierre Chenal's upcoming Native Son, to be filmed in Argentina in February. “I have to start a picture here for Allied Artists in March,” she says. |
| March 50 | following her introduction at a meeting of Hollywood’s foreign press, she says: “I’m speechless in four languages.” |
| April 50 | their work separates them for about two years, but she doesn’t mind the separation. At the moment he directs Native Son in South America, and she’s in Hollywood waiting for a new assignment from Allied Artists following her loan-out for Humphrey Bogart's Tokyo Joe. |
| 51 | is off to Japan for location filming for Tokyo File 212. When not working on the film, she spends her time entertaining American troops in Korea. |
| February 51 | is desperate over not getting together with her husband. He was supposed to come to Hollywood six months ago from the Argentine, but instead he went to Paris to direct a picture. Now he is back in Buenos Aires, so she will fly to Uruguay for the film festival and will stop off in Argentina. |
| March 51 | will get the big RKO oolah-lah buildup |
| April 51 | she and Chenal talk about a divorce |
| January 52 | says she’s happy if her husband "stays faithful to me in his mind" |
| 52 | is off to Chile for the filming of El Idolo for American producer Tom Lewis. While trying to renew her visa at the American consulate in Santiago, she learns she has been blacklisted for being a Communist. |
| has to sell her jewelry and clothes to survive in Chile |
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| c. 53 | after a year and a half, she moves to Mexico, where she pleads for another two and a half years with the American Consulate for permission to return to the States |
| c. 56 | with the help of female consul Carey C. White, her name is cleared and she is allowed to enter the States again. Finally, she finds out she has been a victim of mistaken identity U.S. authorities mistook her for a Russian nightclub singer named Anna Marly. |
| 56 | becomes the second wife of Austrian Count Adolf Gundaccar Maria Degenhart, Graf von Wurmbrand-Stuppach. He’s approximately 26 years her senior. The Wurmbrands hit the US press in 1934 when young Clendenin J. Ryan, heir to New York traction and copper millions, marries 19-year-old Austrian Countess Marie Anne von Wurmbrand-Stuppach. The press suspects "the greatest American fortune plot" ever. The marriage is dissolved a year later. Degenhard divorced his first wife, Burlingame, California, socialite Counter Lawton, in December 1935 and has a 29-year-old daughter, Leonora, from this marriage. |
| August 56 | the Hollywood press reports: “Florence Marly, who left here for Chile four years ago, returned as Countess Degenhart Wurmbrand - he’s an Austrian and mighty good looking...” |
| ? | divorces Count Degenhart. He will later remarry in Reno, Nevada, and die at age 72 in Vienna, Austria, in 1965. |
| August 62 | is arrested under suspicion of selling a misbranded drug in Los Angeles after police find a suitcase full of bottles in her apartment. Dr. Francisco Rosete, 53, is booked on suspicion of selling cancer cures and youth potions that are not properly branded to movie actors and actresses. |
| January 63 | is seen at Perino’s with Alfred Karlsen |
| 22 January 63 | in Los Angeles municipal court, Dr. Francisco Rosete is found guilty of misbranding drugs. The court also convicts her, “former actress Florence Marly, 43,” of one count of possessing a misbranded drug. Her legal name is given as Countess Florence von Wurmbrand. Rosete will die in 1964. |
| 7 February 63 | is fined $250 and placed on three years probation |
| October 64 | attends the Jack and Alice Tyler party with Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. |
| January 65 | columnist Mike Connolly notes: “There seemed to be some competition, wardrobewise, between Ursula Andress and Florence Marly at the Beverly Hills wedding of Elena da Vinci and attorney Herschel Kaufman... I kept my eyes on actresses Marly and Andress. The former arrived first, wearing a tiger-fur stole - and stole the show. Or so I thought, until Miss Andress (also known on the nudie film market as “Undress”) arrived five minutes later wearing a cheetah-fur stole, and from then on it was Ursula’s show.” |
| October 65 | is seen at the action with Sal Ponti, a.k.a. Tony Hall |
| January 66 | is noted at the Beverly Hills Crystal Room with French writer Alain de in Cotardiere |
| is seen at Sneaky Pete’s with Curtis Harrington |
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| March 66 | columnist Harrison Carroll tells: “And Curtis Harrington squired Florence Marly to the Haunted House for the party for Lon Chaney, Jr...” |
| April 66 | columnist Harrison Carroll notes her dining at the Bistro with Faith Domergue |
| October 66 | columnist Mike Connolly tells that she just signed “for another acting chore in The Queen and the Rebels” |
| March 67 | is a French citizen and resides in Westwood, Los Angeles, California |
| 67 | plans to star in the upcoming Queen and the Rebels, directed by Ugo Betti |
| July 67 | is noted singing her Space Boy tune at the Science Fiction Convention at the Sheraton West |
| July 68 | she and John Farquhar are among the twosomes at the Gordon Knots opening at the Club Arthur |
| January 69 | attends the Richard Rush party with Curtis Harrington |
| June 72 | she and TV personality Ron Taft co-star for the live stage portion of the John Barrymore Film Classic show held at the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood |
| December 72 | is among the judges of the "Miss Charity of 1973" beauty pageant, which is held in Hollywood and taped for television |
| is photographed promoting Andre Ramillon’s Yellowfinger French Cafe in Sherman Oaks |
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| June 73 | is photographed at Magic Pan in Beverly Hills with Mr. and Mrs. Lance Petri and producer Curtis Harrington |
| 73 | as Florence Marly von Wurmbrand, she's writer, actor, and composer of Space Boy |
| 5 November 75 | attends the Motion Picture and Television Relief Fund premiere of Paper Tiger at the Cinerama Dome Theater. Her address is 10795 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90024. |
| 9 November 78 | as Florence Marly, she dies at age 59 in Glendale, California, from a heart attack. She had no children and is survived by a brother and sister in Czechoslovakia. |
| 15 November 78 | at 8 p.m., her funeral mass is said at St. Paul the Apostle Church |
| November 14 | Rosete’s grandson supposes his mother, born in Mexico in 1957, to be the secret daughter of his grandfather and Florence. Florence visited her home very often and his mother has a big resemblance to her. |
| Sources: Hugues Marc Antoine Bartoli, Ron Nabors in CAD, Kirk Crivello, Gotha, Nevada State Journal, Reno Evening Gazette, The Daily Register, The Zanesville Signal, The Monessen Daily Independent, Humboldt Standard, The News, The Post-Standard, The Newark Advocate, Dixon Evening Telegraph, The Vidette-Messenger, Corpus Christi Times, The Fresno Bee, The News Tribune, Independent Star-News, Kokomo Morning Times, Pasadena Star-News, New Castle News, Van Nuys News, Tyrone Daily Herald, www.Ancestry.com | |
| Recommended Books: | |
| Links: Filmography | |