Wendy Barrie Biography

Fast Facts

• Was active in various charities and would speak at philanthropic functions free of charge
• At one time, she was engaged to marry gangster Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel
• Briefly worked in a beauty parlor after graduating from her finishing school in Switzerland
• Producer Alexander Korda discovered her while eating lunch at the Savoy Grill
• Started to pursue an acting career in her teems, starting out in English theater
• Hosted several television talk shows during the late 1940s and early 1950s, including one of the first in the genre, "The Wendy Barrie Show․"
• Became one of the first movie personalities to star in television advertisements when she started doing commercials on "The $64,000 Question" television quiz show
• Her best received performances were in 1933's "The Private Lives of Henry VIII," 1937's "Dead End" and 1939's "The Houds of the Baskervilles․"
• Though she was born in Hong Kong to British parents, she became a naturalized American citizen in 1942
• J․M․ Barrie, the author of "Peter Pan," was her godfather