Gwili Andre Profile

Gwili Andre

	(Gurli Andresen)
4 February 07	is born in Copenhagen, Denmark, to Mr. and Mrs. Andresen
?	marries Stanislaw Mlotkowski
30	as Gurli Mlotkowski, she resides with her husband in Manhattan, New York City. He’s 50; she’s 23.
5 January 31	becomes a naturalized citizen at the U.S. District Court in New York
Late January 31	columnist Harrison Carroll tells that she will report to Hollywood on February 1: “having first to complete some modeling contracts. Once she is introduced to the mysteries of the camera, David Selznick, RKO’s confident magician, will undertake to transform her into a foreign star. I am assured she will start right out playing leads.”
February 32	is hailed “the highest priced model in America”
	columnist Louella Parsons asks: “Will she become a second Garbo or will she merely become another movie actress?”
	Parsons reports: “Gwili Andre, Radio’s new foreign actress, so lovely that every one at the Cocoanut Grove turned to look at her, dancing and dining with Willis Goldbeck."
April 32	she and Loretta Young keep “their perfect figures by joining the Beverly Hills Athletic Club...”
May 32	the press tells that she “bids fair to become Hollywood’s newest mystery girl. She cats, talks, and walks alone, prefers her own company, likes chicken consommé, French fried potatoes, and Mickey Mouse...”
August 32	it’s reported that she’s not allowed to talk for publications as does fellow newcomer Anna Sten
	Hollywood acclaims “Richard Dix as the new maker of stars and points to Gwili Andre as justification for the honor...”
November 32	she and Willis Goldbeck are a persistent pairing
December 32	the press tells that she was brought up by her family to be “a quiet little wife, heh heh heh...”
	is “in love and veree happee, but won’t say who...”
	Parsons reports Howard Hughes ”finally meeting Gwili Andre and taker her out stepping...”
?	earns $25,000 a year
January 33	is seen at the RKO cafe, “wearing a hand-knitted suit of reddish brown and white with a gay scarf of scarlet and a brown felt hat...”
	columnist Dan Thomas reports her telling “about her most treasured possession, a framed $10 bill...”
	Thomas notes “Howard Hughes, the young millionaire producer, and Gwili Andre lunching at the Brown Derby...”
March 33	Parsons mentions her and Willis Goldbeck “cooing over their coffee at the Beverly Hills Derby...”
	Parsons notices Arline Judge Ruggles in a $1250 frock at the Beverly Brown Derby, showing her purchase to Gwili Andre. “Gwili with the always devoted Willis Goldbeck...”
	Parsons notes her and Goldbeck, “who are still ‘that way’ about each other, at the Brown Derby dining...”
July 34	will be Jack Gilbert’s heroine in The Captain Hates the Sea
11 March 35	divorces Stanislaw Mlotkowski, Philadelphia realtor, in Reno Nevada, on her charge they have not lived as man and wife for five years. Mlotkowski will die in Florida in 1950.
March 35	Parsons reports her “back in town, lovelier than ever and divorced, dining with Willis Goldbeck...”
February 36	Parsons tags her “one of New York’s prettiest women who had a try at the movies without much luck...”
November 36	Parsons reports her, “once head woman in Willis Goldbeck’s life, dining with him again...”
April 37	attends the A Star is Born gala preview with Willis Goldbeck
29 September 39	as Gwili Mlotkowski, she arrives in New York from Southampton, England, aboard the Nieuw Amsterdam
?	marries William Dallas Cross, Jr., an engineer
22 February 44	her son, Peter Lance, is born in Los Angeles
30 October 46	as Gwili A. Cross, she arrives aboard the Jutlandia in New York from Copenhagen, Denmark
48	divorces Cross
February 48	Parsons confirms: “I had forgotten all about Gwili Andre, the beautiful model who looked so much like Greta Garbo that she was brought here for pictures, until I met her at the John Considine party. Poor Gwili was never able to do anything. She married Bill Cross and left Hollywood. She told me she is now divorced and has a four-year-old son and that she had been in her native Denmark for a year. She looks just as beautiful as ever, and I wonder now with the improvements in make-up and all, if she wouldn’t have a chance now...”
6 August 52	arrives in New York from Copenhagen, Denmark, aboard the Bolivia
53	for the last time, she is on the cover of a national magazine
3 May 54	as Gwili A. Cross, she arrives in New York from Copenhagen, Denmark
March 58	columnist Frank Morris writes: “But I have to think hard to recall the names of any of the other actresses who were foisted on the screen as Greta Garbo imitators. One of them, nevertheless, was Gwili Andre. Miss Andre was a fashion model, and she photographed to perfection. As her studio groomed her for stardom, the fan magazines and the newspapers blossomed with pictures of her. There was a more than ordinary interest in Miss Andre. Alas, in her first picture she proved to be such a stiff, colorless and completely talentless performer that she disappeared almost overnight...”
?	resides alone at 2109 Ocean Front Walk, a modest beach-front apartment in Venice, California
5 February 59	as Gurlie / Gwili Andre Cross, she dies at age 51 in a fire at her Venice home. Police say she was found sprawled on the bedroom floor in her apartment. Another resident of the building, George Katzenberger, 83, is pulled to safety by two neighbors after he broke a bathroom window. The cause of the fire is not determined. From her scrapbook, friends and neighbors put together the story of her heyday as one of the top fashion models of Europe and New York.

Sources: San Mateo Times, The News-Herald, The Fresno Bee, The Arcadia Tribune, The Evening Tribune, The Newark Advocate and American Tribune, The Ogden Standard, Syracuse Herald, The Charleston Daily Mail, The Lowell Sun, The Helena Daily Independent, Indiana Evening Gazette, The News-Herald, Modesto News-Herald, Middletown Times Herald, Long Beach Independent, Winnipeg Free Press, www.Ancestry.com
Recommended Books:
Links: Filmography