So I’m sort of “half watching” this really bad movie this morning, Winter Meeting (1948) and I go to IMDB to look up the ages of the two stars Bette Davis (I always thought it was pronounced ‘Bet’ but they tell me its ‘Betty’) and Jim Davis (yes Jock Ewing from Dallas). They were both 40 near enough. Which is funny as Davis always had these horrendous bags under her eyes that added 10 years easy to her appearance. Kind of like Lauren Bacall, even though I like Bacall and despise the queen of melodrama Davis. I just always have resented Hollywood telling me who I have to think is “great“.
So I get to the IMDB page where they have the little picture and the name of the actor playing the role, and I see the name of this gorgeous woman Janis Paige playing ‘Peggy Markham’. Being a sucker for 1940’s era cheesecake I look a little deeper into Miss Paige. Reading through her bio she seems to have done okay, but just never became the celebrity of her archnemesis Doris Day. She got so fed up with the workings of Hollywood she left it for a time to devote her attentions to Broadway. She was quite the singer and quite the looker, but for reasons I don’t fully understand (I think its lack of imagination) Hollywood has a very strict pigeon hole system and it is nealy impossible to break out of. She was never able to get out of the shadow of Day. She recently celebrated her 100th birthday September 16.
“Joyous scene-stealer Janis Paige started out playing rather bland film ingénues, but never seemed to be comfortable in those roles–she had too much snap, crackle and pop to be confined in such a formulaic way. Born Donna Mae Tjaden in 1922 in Tacoma, Washington, she was singing in public from age 5 in local amateur shows. She moved to Los Angeles after graduating from high school and earned a job as a singer at the Hollywood Canteen during the war years. The Canteen, which was a studio-sponsored gathering spot for servicemen, is where she was spotted by a Warner Brothers talent scout, who saw potential in her and signed her up. She began co-starring in secondary musicals that often paired her with either Dennis Morgan or Jack Carson. Later she was relegated to rugged adventures and dramas that just seemed out of her element. Following her role in the forgettable Two Gals and a Guy (1951), she decided to leave the Hollywood scene. She took to the Broadway boards and scored a huge hit with the 1951 comedy-mystery play “Remains to Be Seen”…. – IMDB
Hollywood rejected that? It makes no sense. A triple threat. Asolutely gorgeous. Why?
Iowa life 
As so many people have discovered, you still have to be able to act, draw a crowd, and make money for the Hollywood tycoons. Some people can handle playing the game and some people can’t.
Oh sure, I don’t know how many times that has happened where I see somebody I’ve never heard of before. Everybody knows Doris Day.
Man! What is going on with that election in Arizona?? Just from an outsider’s point of view the honesty of the officials there looks rather sketchy.
Maybe I’ll remember what I was thinking this morning. I saw something and I thought, “I wonder what Dawn thinks of that?” If I remember I’ll get back to you. That bugs me. The only thing “big” I can think of is the protests in China, and that’s too vague for what I was thinking.
I’ve been complaining about the machine malfunctions since Election Day. It looks like deliberate sabotage to me. I’ve sent numerous emails to the Secretary of State, the Governor, and Maricopa Supervisor Bill Gates. It’s my view that Katie Hobbs should resign. She refused to recuse herself and oversaw an election in which she was running for governor. The ethical violation and the conflict of interest is so blatant!
Thanks for that assessment from someone “on the ground”. Its just so blatant. What are we coming to.
She still looked good as the female gambler in Bret Maverick: The Lazy Ace in the very early 1980s.
Oh so you knew of her? I sure didn’t. I see Garner had Stuart Margolin in that one from his Rockford Files days.
Yes, Stuart Margolin was Philo Sandeen, a supporting character on the resulting short-lived series, but Janis was only in the pilot movie, as Mandy Packer.