-Fred MacMurray
She had a foul mouth and a generous heart, thus her nickname "The Profane Angel". She could also easily be called the "Queen of Screwball Comedy". Her comedic talent has never been matched.
Carole Lombard was born Jane Peters, on October 6, 1908 in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Her parents divorced when she was eight years old. On a trip out to the West Coast, her mother liked what she saw so much that she moved Jane and her two older brothers to Los Angeles.
There Jane was discovered while she played baseball in the street. At age twelve she made her film debut in A Perfect Crime (1921). Then she went back to school and lived a normal life, but not for long. At the age of fifteen, Jane dropped out and started performing in stage shows.
In 1925, she signed a contract with Fox and started filming silent shorts. She asked a family friend if she could borrow his glamorous last name and she became Carol Lombard. When the studio mistakenly tacked an 'e' on the end of Carol in the credits of one of her movies, she decided to keep the spelling.
A serious car accident in 1926 forced Carole to put movies aside for a while. The left side of her face was seriously damaged. Throughout the rest of her career, she carefully concealed her scars makeup.
By the time Carole had recovered from her injuries, her contract with Fox had been cancelled. She started working for Pathe studios. There she performed in more than a dozen slapstick comedies for director Max Sennett. The legendary king of slapstick helped Carole to develop the superb comic timing that would one day revitalize her career.
However, for the bulk of her early career, Carole was primarily a dramtic actress. There is no sign of her giddy comic genius in the stills from these years. In a typical shot, she rolls her heavily lined eyes to the sky in melodramatic agony. In movies such as Supernatural and White Woman not even a hint of the giddy comic genius to come can be seen.
In 1932, Carole played her only role with future husband Clark Gable. Unfortunately, it was one of those serious roles. The movie, No Man of Her Own would have probably been forgotten if it hadn't of been for the pairing that foreshadowed a great love affair.
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