From a Toronto childhood on the stage to the heights of silent-film stardom and the boardroom of United Artists, Mary Pickford was both America’s Sweetheart and one of Hollywood’s first powerful producers.
From Gladys Smith to Mary Pickford
Born Gladys Louise Smith in Toronto on 8 April 1892, Mary Pickford began acting as a child to support her family after her father’s death. She worked on the stage in Canada and the United States, and by her teens she was performing on Broadway. When she moved into films, first with the Biograph company under D. W. Griffith, she quickly became one of the most recognisable faces in the new medium.
Pickford’s screen image was that of a young girl, often an orphan or a spirited child, played with a mixture of sweetness and determination. Films such as Tess of the Storm Country (1914), The Poor Little Rich Girl (1917) and Pollyanna (1920) made her a global star, and her curls and smile became familiar around the world.
Power behind the camera
Pickford understood her value, and in 1919 she co-founded United Artists with Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks and D. W. Griffith, giving leading artists control over their own films and distribution. It was a landmark in film history, and it made Pickford not only a star but a studio founder.
Her later silent work, including Sparrows (1926), showed a more dramatic range, and her first talking picture, Coquette (1929), won her the Academy Award for Best Actress. She received an Honorary Academy Award in 1976 for her contributions to film. Pickford died in 1979, remembered as a performer who helped invent movie stardom and, just as importantly, helped artists own a share of it.