Marjorie Rambeau

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Actress Born July 15, 1889 in San Francisco, CA

Tough mining camp audiences at the turn of the century wept when 12-year-old Marjorie Rambeau played Camille, always taking at least 20 minutes to die.

Rambeau, who then billed herself as the youngest leading woman in the American theater, went on to become a Broadway star and one of Hollywood's greatest character actresses.

She was in her element whether playing Mama Ravioli, with an Italian accent, in the movie "East of the River" or Tugboat Annie, with an Irish brogue, in the picture "Tugboat Annie Sails Again."

In 1940 Rambeau was nominated for an Academy Award in the best supporting actress category for her role of Mamie in "Primrose Path."

But for all her success in the movies, Rambeau was most proud of her days as a teenage leading woman, traveling with a stock company "from one end of the Pacific Coast to the other."

—Richard West in The Los Angeles Times July 8, 1970

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• Actress Marjorie Rambeau, stage, screen veteran, dies