Clara Bow
Forest Lawn Glendale
Clara Bow, popular
film star of the 1920s best known as "The 'It' Girl," was America's first
real sex symbol.
Bow grew up in a household of poverty, violence and mental
illness. She escaped her circumstances by entering her photo and winning
a movie magazine contest, with the top prize being the chance to appear in
a small role in the film, "Beyond the Rainbow" (1922). Bow's acting was
considered so amateurish that her scenes were cut before the film was
released. When she became a star a few years later, however, her scenes
were restored to the film.
Despite her difficult beginning, Bow worked steadily in
films through the 1920s, typically appeared in supporting roles in films
that were described as "domestic melodramas," with an occasional comedy. The
type of films she appeared in can best be described simply by listing some
of the titles -- "Enemies of Women" (1923), "Grit" (1924), "Poisoned Paradise"
Bow had become the symbol for the Roaring '20s and the flapper
age -- an attractive, vibrant, liberated woman with boundless energy, bobbed hair,
"bee-stung" lips and flashing eyes. Bow also became a symbol for the growing
sexual liberation of the era.
The film that defined Bow's career was "It" (1927), in which
she played a lowly shopgirl with designs on the wealthy storeowner. In an effort
to make him notice her, she dates the storeowner's best friend and her plan
works. In the film, Bow was a woman who saw what she wanted, and did whatever
it took to get it. From then on, Bow was known as "The It Girl," with "it" usually
meaning sex appeal. Bow also appeared in "Wings" (1927), which won the first
Academy Award as Best Picture. Bow continued to appear in films as the often-wild
women who knows what she wants, and gets it, including "Get Your Man" (1927),
"The Fleet's In" (1928), "The Wild Party" (1929), "Dangerous Curves" (1929),
"Her Wedding Night" (1930), "No Limit" (1931) and "Call Her Savage" (1932). When
sound films became popular in the early 1930s, Bow's thick Brooklyn accent was
a severe handicap. Her last film was "Hoopla" (1933).
Bow married cowboy actor Rex Bell in 1931, and she devoted her
time to raising their two children. But she was also the continuing focus of
wild rumors about her previous romantic affairs, including one involving the
entire University of Southern California football team. Bow's former secretary
sold her story to the tabloids, telling wild tales of Bow's frequent and enthusiastic
sexual trysts with dozens of Hollywood suitors.
Bow retired from films in 1933, when she was just 26 years old,
and went to live with Bell on his Walking Box Ranch, west of Searchlight, NV. For
the rest of her life, Bow fought a series of personal struggles, including a
weight problem and growing mental instability. In her later years, she was
often confined to a sanatorium, and she never returned to show business. "Being
a sex symbol is a heavy load to carry," Bow once said. In her final years,
Bow moved back to Los Angeles, where she lived as a virtual recluse. She died
alone, suffering a heart attack while watching a Gary Cooper Western on television.
Bow's crypt marker identifies her as "Hollywood's 'It' Girl."
Bow was born Clara Gordon Bow on July 29, 1907 (some sources
say 1905), in Brooklyn, NY. She died on Sept. 27, 1965, in Los Angeles, CA.
1907 - 1965
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