Lillian Diana Gish (October 14, 1893 – February 27, 1993) was an American pioneering actress of the screen and stage, and a director and writer. Her film acting career spanned 75 years, from 1912, in silent film shorts, to 1987. Gish was called "The First Lady of American Cinema", and is credited with pioneering fundamental film performance techniques.

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Sunday, August 02, 2020. 2:31.PM.

Lillian Gish - Actress, director, writer.

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1. Profile :

*Gish in 1921

Born Lillian Diana Gish, October 14, 1893, Springfield, Ohio, U.S.

Died February 27, 1993 (aged 99), New York City, U.S.

Occupation   Actress director writer

Years active 1902–1988

Parent(s) Mary Robinson McConnell, James Leigh Gish

Relatives Dorothy Gish (sister)

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2. Introduction : 

Lillian Diana Gish (October 14, 1893 – February 27, 1993) was an American pioneering actress of the screen and stage, and a director and writer. Her film acting career spanned 75 years, from 1912, in silent film shorts, to 1987. Gish was called "The First Lady of American Cinema", and is credited with pioneering fundamental film performance techniques.

Gish was a prominent film star from 1912 into the 1920s, being particularly associated with the films of director D. W. Griffith. This included her leading role in the highest-grossing film of the silent era, Griffith's The Birth of a Nation (1915). At the dawn of the sound era, she returned to the stage and appeared in film infrequently, including well-known roles in the controversial western Duel in the Sun (1946) and the thriller The Night of the Hunter (1955).

She also did considerable television work from the early 1950s into the 1980s, and closed her career playing opposite Bette Davis in the 1987 film The Whales of August. During her later years Gish became a dedicated advocate for the appreciation and preservation of silent film. Despite being better known for her film work, she was also an accomplished stage actress, and was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 1972.

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3. Early life :

*Dorothy and Lillian Gish with actress Helen Ray, their leading lady in Her First False Step (1903)

Gish was born in Springfield, Ohio, the first child of Mary Robinson McConnell (1876–1948), an actress, and James Leigh Gish (1873–1912). Lillian had a younger sister, Dorothy, who also became a popular movie star.

Her mother was Episcopalian and her father was of German Lutheran descent. The first several generations of Gishes were Dunkard ministers. Gish's father was an alcoholic and left the family; her mother took up acting to support them. The family moved to East St. Louis, Illinois, where they lived for several years with Lillian's aunt and uncle, Henry and Rose McConnell. Their mother opened the Majestic Candy Kitchen, and the girls helped sell popcorn and candy to patrons of the old Majestic Theater, located next door. The girls attended St. Henry's School, where they acted in school plays.

In 1910, the girls were living with their aunt Emily in Massillon, Ohio, when they were notified that their father, James, was gravely ill in Oklahoma. The seventeen-year-old Lillian traveled to Shawnee, Oklahoma, where James's brother Alfred Grant Gish and his wife, Maude, lived. Her father, who by then was institutionalized in the Oklahoma Hospital for the Insane in Norman, was able to travel the 35 miles to Shawnee and the two got reacquainted. She stayed with her aunt and uncle, and attended Shawnee High School there. Her father died in Norman, Oklahoma, in 1912, but she had returned to Ohio a few months before this.

When the theater next to the candy store burned down, the family moved to New York, where the girls became good friends with a next-door neighbor, Gladys Smith. Gladys was a child actress who did some work for director D. W. Griffith, and later took the stage name Mary Pickford.[9] When Lillian and Dorothy were old enough they joined the theatre, often traveling separately in different productions. They also took modeling jobs, with Lillian posing for artist Victor Maurel in exchange for voice lessons.

In 1912, their friend Mary Pickford introduced the sisters to Griffith and helped get them contracts with Biograph Studios. Lillian Gish soon became one of America's best-loved actresses; she was 19 years old at the time, but told casting directors she was 16.

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4. Career :

4.1 Early career :

Gish made her stage debut in 1902, at The Little Red School House in Risingsun, Ohio. From 1903 to 1904, she toured in Her First False Step, with her mother and Dorothy. In the following year she danced with a Sarah Bernhardt production in New York City.

4.2 Film stardom at Biograph Studios (1912–1925) :

*Gish with Richard Barthelmess in Broken Blossoms (1919).

*Gish as Anna Moore in Way Down East (1920)

*Photo play magazine cover by Rolf Armstrong (1921).

After 10 years of acting on the stage, she made her film debut opposite Dorothy in Griffith's short film An Unseen Enemy (1912). At the time established thespians considered "the flickers" a rather base form of entertainment, but she was assured of its merits. Gish continued to perform on the stage, and in 1913, during a run of A Good Little Devil, she collapsed from anemia. Lillian took suffering for her art to the extreme in a film career which became her obsession. One of the enduring images of Gish's silent film years is the climax of the melodramatic Way Down East, in which Gish's character floats unconscious on an ice floe towards a raging waterfall, her long hair and hand trailing in the water. Her performance in these frigid conditions gave her lasting nerve damage in several fingers. Similarly, when preparing for her death scene in La Bohème over a decade later, Gish reportedly did not eat and drink for three days beforehand, causing the director to fear he would be filming the death of his star as well as of the character.

Lillian starred in many of Griffith's most acclaimed films, including The Birth of a Nation (1915), Intolerance (1916), Broken Blossoms (1919), Way Down East (1920), and Orphans of the Storm (1921). He utilized her expressive talents to the fullest, developing her into a suffering yet strong heroine. Having appeared in over 25 short films and features in her first two years as a movie actress, Lillian became a major star, becoming known as "The First Lady of American Cinema" and appearing in lavish productions, frequently of literary works such as Way Down East. She became the most esteemed actress of budding Hollywood cinema.

She directed her sister Dorothy in one film, Remodeling Her Husband (1920), when D. W. Griffith took his unit on location. He told Gish that he thought the crew would work harder for a girl. Gish never directed again, telling reporters at the time that directing was a man's job. The film is now thought to be lost.

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4.2 Work with MGM (1925–1928) :

Gish reluctantly ended her work with Griffith in 1925 in order to take an offer from the recently formed MGM, which gave her more creative control. MGM offered her a contract in 1926 for six films, for which she was offered 1 million dollars ($13.4 million in 2015 dollars). She turned down the money, requesting a more modest wage and a percentage so that the studio could use the funds to increase the quality of her films — hiring the best actors, screenwriters, etc. By the late silent era Greta Garbo had usurped her as MGM's leading lady, and Gish's contract with MGM ended in 1928. Three films with MGM gave her near-total creative control: La Bohème, The Scarlet Letter (both 1926), and The Wind (1928). The Wind, Gish's favorite film of her MGM career, was a commercial failure with the rise of talkies, but is now recognized as one of the most distinguished works of the silent period. Though not a box-office hit as before, her work was respected artistically more than ever, and MGM pressed her with offers to appear in the new medium of sound pictures.

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5. Sound debut, return to the stage, and television and radio :

*Gish in Jed Harris's Broadway production of Uncle Vanya, 1930.

Her debut in talkies was only moderately successful, largely due to the public's changing attitudes. Many of the silent era's leading ladies, such as Gish and Pickford, had been wholesome and innocent, but by the early 1930s (after the full adoption of sound and before the Motion Picture Production Code was enforced) these roles were perceived as outdated. The ingenue's diametric opposite, the vamp, was at the height of its popularity. Gish was increasingly seen as a "silly, sexless antique" (to quote fellow actress Louise Brooks's sarcastic summary of those who criticized Gish). Louis Mayer wanted to stage a scandal ("knock her off her pedestal") to garner public sympathy for Gish, but Lillian didn't want to act both on screen and off, and returned to her first love, the theater. She acted on the stage for the most part in the 1930s and early 1940s, appearing in roles as varied as Ophelia in Guthrie McClintic's landmark 1936 production of Hamlet (with John Gielgud and Judith Anderson) and Marguerite in a limited run of La Dame aux Camélias. Of the former, she said, with pride, "I played a lewd Ophelia!"

Returning to movies, Gish was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1946 for Duel in the Sun. The scenes of her character's illness and death late in that film seemed intended to evoke the memory of some of her silent film performances. She appeared in films from time to time for the rest of her life, notably in The Night of the Hunter (1955) as a rural guardian angel protecting her charges from a murderous preacher played by Robert Mitchum. She was considered for various roles in Gone with the Wind ranging from Ellen O'Hara, Scarlett's mother (which went to Barbara O'Neil), to prostitute Belle Watling (which went to Ona Munson).

Gish made numerous television appearances from the early 1950s into the late 1980s. Her most acclaimed television work was starring in the original production of The Trip to Bountiful in 1953. She appeared as Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna in the short-lived 1965 Broadway musical Anya. In addition to her later acting appearances, Gish became one of the leading advocates of the lost art of the silent film, often giving speeches and touring to screenings of classic works. In 1975, she hosted The Silent Years, a PBS film program of silent films. She was interviewed in the television documentary series Hollywood: A Celebration of the American Silent Film (1980).

*Gish at 80 years of age, 1973.

Gish received a Special Academy Award in 1971, "For superlative artistry and for distinguished contribution to the progress of motion pictures". In 1979, she was awarded the Women in film Crystal Award in Los Angeles In 1984, she received an American Film Institute Lifetime Achievement Award, becoming only the second female recipient (preceded by Bette Davis in 1977) and the only recipient who was a major figure in the silent era. She has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1720 Vine Street.

Her last film role was appearing in The Whales of August in 1987 at the age of 93, with Vincent Price, Bette Davis, and Ann Sothern, in which Gish and Davis starred as elderly sisters in Maine. Gish's performance was received glowingly, winning her the National Board of Review Award for Best Actress. At the Cannes festival, Gish won a 10-minute standing ovation from the audience. Some in the entertainment industry were angry that Gish did not receive an Oscar nomination for her role in The Whales of August. Gish herself was more complacent, remarking that it saved her the trouble of "losing to Cher".

Her final professional appearance was a cameo on the 1988 studio recording of Jerome Kern's Show Boat, starring Frederica von Stade and Jerry Hadley, in which she affectingly spoke the few lines of The Old Lady on the Levee in the final scene. The last words of her long career were: "Good night".

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5.1 Radio :

Gish starred in an episode of the popular CBS Radio series Suspense. The episode "Marry for Murder" was broadcast on September 9, 1943.[16] In 1944, Gish starred in an episode of I Was There, broadcast on CBS. The episode dramatized the making of the film The Birth of a Nation. On May 31, 1951, she starred in an adaptation of Black Chiffon on Playhouse on Broadway.

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6. Honors :

The American Film Institute named Gish 17th among the greatest female stars of Classic American cinema. In 1955, she was awarded the George Eastman Award, for distinguished contribution to the art of film, at the George Eastman Museum's (then George Eastman House's) inaugural Festival of Film Artists. She was awarded an Academy Honorary Award in 1971, and in 1984 she received an AFI Life Achievement Award. Gish was also awarded in the Kennedy Center Honors.

In 1979, she introduced The Wind at a screening at the Wiltern Theatre in Los Angeles. She was a special guest at the Telluride Film Festival in 1983.

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7.Bowling Green State University :

The Gish Film Theatre and Gallery of Bowling Green State University's Department of Theatre and Film was named for Lillian and Dorothy Gish. Gish was in attendance at the dedication on June 11, 1976; she accepted the honor for herself and her sister, who had died several years earlier. The University awarded Gish the honorary degree of Doctor of Performing Arts the next day. In 1982, the University accepted a collection of Gish films and photographs that had previously been displayed at the Museum of Modern Art. It solicited donations from Gish friends and associates to renovate the Gish Theatre and create an endowment in the 1990s. Following Gish's 1993 death, the University raised funds to enlarge its gallery to display memorabilia received from Gish's estate.

In February 2019, the University's Black Student Union called for the renaming of the Gish Theatre due to Gish's involvement with the controversial The Birth of a Nation. In April 2019, a task force recommended removing the Gish name; the trustees unanimously voted to remove the name on May 3, 2019.

Mike Kaplan, co-producer The Whales of August (1987), Lillian Gish's final film, circulated a petition urging Bowling Green State University to restore the names of actresses Dorothy and Lillian Gish to the film theater. The protest was signed by over 50 film industry figures, including actors Helen Mirren and James Earl Jones and directors Bertrand Tavernier and Martin Scorsese.

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8. Personal life :

*Lillian and her sister Dorothy, 1921.

Gish never married nor had any children. The association between herself and D.W. Griffith was so close that some suspected a romantic connection, an issue never acknowledged by Gish, although several of their associates were certain they were at least briefly involved. For the remainder of her life, she always referred to him as "Mr. Griffith". She was also involved with producer Charles Duell, and drama critic and editor George Jean Nathan. In the 1920s, Gish's association with Duell became something of a tabloid scandal when he sued her and made the details of their relationship public.

Gish was a survivor of the 1918 flu pandemic, having contracted the illness during the filming of Broken Blossoms.

Gish learned French, German, and Italian during 15 years in Europe, which she first visited in 1917. George Jean Nathan praised Gish's acting glowingly—comparing her to Eleonora Duse.

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9. Political views :

Gish was a staunch Republican, and was a strong supporter of Ronald Reagan in the 1970s.

During the period of political turmoil in the US that lasted from the outbreak of World War II in Europe until the attack on Pearl Harbor, she maintained an outspoken non-interventionist stance. She was an active member of the America First Committee, an anti-intervention organization founded by retired General Robert E. Wood, with aviation pioneer Charles Lindbergh as its leading spokesman. She said she was blacklisted by the film and theater industries until she signed a contract in which she promised to cease her anti-interventionist activities and never disclose the fact that she had agreed to do so.

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10. Death :

Lillian Gish died of heart failure on February 27, 1993, aged 99. She was 8 months away from becoming a centenarian. Her body was interred beside that of her sister Dorothy at Saint Bartholomew's Episcopal Church in New York City. Her estate was valued at several million dollars, the bulk of which went toward the creation of the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize Trust.

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11. Legacy :

*Gish posed as Elaine of Astolat in Way Down East

A retrospective of Gish's life and achievements was showcased in an episode of the Emmy award-winning PBS series, American Masters.

11.1 The AllMovie Guide wrote on her legacy :

"Lillian Gish is considered the movie industry's first true actress. A pioneer of fundamental film performing techniques, she was the first star to recognize the many crucial differences between acting for the stage and acting for the screen, and while her contemporaries painted their performances in broad, dramatic strokes, Gish delivered finely etched, nuanced turns carrying a stunning emotional impact. While by no means the biggest or most popular actress of the silent era, she was the most gifted, her seeming waiflike frailty masking unparalleled reserves of physical and spiritual strength. More than any other early star, she fought to earn film recognition as a true art form, and her achievements remain the standard against which those of all other actors are measured."

11.2 Turner Classic Movies wrote :

"Having pioneered screen acting from vaudeville entertainment into a form of artistic expression, actress Lillian Gish forged a new creative path at a time when more serious thespians regarded motion pictures as a rather base form of employment. Gish brought to her roles a sense of craft substantially different from that practiced by her theatrical colleagues. In time, her sensitive performances elevated not only her stature as an actress, but also the reputation of movies themselves."

11.3 The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize :

A street in Massillon, Ohio is named after Gish, who had lived there during an early period of her life and fondly referred to it as her hometown throughout her career.

François Truffaut's movie Day for Night (1973) is dedicated to Dorothy and Lillian Gish.

Gish's photo is mentioned as an inspiration for a troubled soldier in the 1933 novel Company K.

The luxury boutique hotel Maison 140, in Beverly Hills, began its historic life as the home of Hollywood actresses Lillian and Dorothy Gish. The sisters originally converted the mansion into a home for young actresses coming out to find their way in Hollywood. Having hailed from Ohio, they understood the comforts that would be missed from home while exploring one's dreams.[39]

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12. In popular culture :

The debut album of The Smashing Pumpkins, released on May 28, 1991, is entitled Gish in reference to her. Singer Billy Corgan explained in an interview, "My grandmother used to tell me that one of the biggest things that ever happened was when Lillian Gish rode through town on a train, my grandmother lived in the middle of nowhere, so that was a big deal..."

'Lillian Gish' is sometimes used as rhyming slang for needing to urinate and was referenced by Winston, a character in the Scottish BBC comedy Still Game.

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13. Lillian Gish filmography :

13. 1 Silent : 1912 – 1913 – 1914 – 1915 – 1916 – 1917 – 1918 – 1919 – 1920s

13. 2 Post Silent : 1930s – 1940s – 1950s – 1960s – 1970s – 1980s – 

13.1 Silent :

1912

Year Title Role Note

1912 An Unseen Enemy The Sister 

Two Daughters of Eve In Theatre Crowd 

So Near, yet So Far A Friend 

In the Aisles of the Wild The Young Daughter 

The One She Loved 

The Painted Lady Belle at Ice Cream Festival Uncredited

The Musketeers of Pig Alley The Little Lady 

Gold and Glitter The Young Woman 

My Baby 

The Informer Undetermined Secondary Role 

Brutality At Theatre 

The New York Hat Customer in Shop / Outside Church 

The Burglar's Dilemma Birthday Wellwisher 

A Cry for Help The Maid 

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1913

Year Title Role Note

1913 Oil and Water In First Audience Uncredited

The Unwelcome Guest At Auction Uncredited

A Misunderstood Boy The Daughter 

The Left-Handed Man The Old Soldier's Daughter 

The Lady and the Mouse The First Sister WomanThe 

The House of Darkness The Nurse 

Just Gold The Sweetheart 

A Timely Interception The Farmer's Daughter 

The Mothering Heart The Young Wife 

An Indian's Loyalty The Ranchero's Daughter 

During the Round-Up The Ranchero's Daughter 

A Woman in the Ultimate Verda 

A Modest Hero The Wife 

So Runs the Way Fred's Wife 

Madonna of the Storm The Mother 

The Battle at Elderbush Gulch Melissa Harlow 

The Conscience of Hassan Bey The Rugmaker's Daughter 

The Little Tease Girl in bandanna 

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1914

Year Title Role Note

1914 The Green-Eyed Devil Mary Miller 

Judith of Bethulia The Young Mother 

The Battle of the Sexes Jane Andrews Incomplete/lost film

The Hunchback The Orphan - as an Adult 

The Quicksands 

Home, Sweet Home Payne's Sweetheart 

Lord Chumley Eleanor Butterworth 

The Rebellion of Kitty Belle Kitty Belle 

The Angel of Contention Nettie - the Angel 

Man's Enemy Grace Lisle 

The Tear That Burned Anita - the Truant 

The Folly of Anne Anne 

The Sisters May 

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1915

Year Title Role Note

1915 The Birth of a Nation Elsie 

The Lost House Dosia Dale Lost film

Enoch Arden Annie Lee 

Captain Macklin Beatrice Lost film

The Lily and the Rose Mary Randolph 

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1916

Year Title Role Note

1916 Pathways of Life 

Daphne and the Pirate Daphne La Tour 

Sold for Marriage Marfa 

An Innocent Magdalene Dorothy Raleigh Lost film

Intolerance The Woman Who Rocks the Cradle / Eternal Mother 

Diane of the Follies Diane Lost film

The Children Pay Millicent 

The House Built Upon Sand Evelyn Dare Lost film

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1917

Year Title Role Note

1917 Souls Triumphant Lillian Vale Lost film

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1918

Year Title Role Note

1918 Hearts of the World Marie Stephenson 

The Great Love Susie Broadplains Lost film

Lillian Gish in a Liberty Loan Appeal Lost film

The Greatest Thing in Life Jeannette Peret Lost film

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1919

Year Title Role Note

1919 A Romance of Happy Valley Jennie Timberlake 

Broken Blossoms Lucy Barrows 

True Heart Susie True Heart Susie 

The Greatest Question Nellie Jarvis 

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1920s

Year Title Role Note

1920 Remodeling Her Husband N/A Director only/Lost film

Way Down East Anna Moore 

1921 Orphans of the Storm Henriette Girard 

1923 The White Sister Angela Chiaromonte 

1924 Romola Romola 

1925 Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ Chariot Race Spectator Cameo (Uncredited)

1926 La Bohème Mimi 

The Scarlet Letter Hester Prynne 

1927 Annie Laurie Annie Laurie 

The Enemy Pauli Arndt Partially extant

1928 The Wind Letty Her final silent film role

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Post Silent:

1930s

Year Title Role Note

1930 One Romantic Night Princess Alexandra Her first talkie film role

1933 His Double Life Alice Chalice 

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1940s

Year Title Role Note

1942 Commandos Strike at Dawn Mrs. Bergesen 

1943 Top Man Beth Warren Alternate title: Man of the Family

1946 Miss Susie Slagle's Miss Susie Slagle 

Duel in the Sun Laura Belle Nominated - Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress

1948 Portrait of Jennie Mother Mary of Mercy 

1949 The Ford Theatre Hour Mrs. Midget Episode: "Outward Bound"

The Philco Television Playhouse Abby Episode: "The Late Christopher Bean"

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1950s

Year Title Role Note

1951 Celanese Theatre Sister Christina Episode: "The Joyous Season"

Robert Montgomery Presents Episode: "Ladies in Retirement"

1952 Schlitz Playhouse of Stars Grandma Moses Episode: "The Autobiography of Grandma Moses"

1953 The Philco Television Playhouse Carrie Watts Episode: "The Trip to Bountiful"

1954 Robert Montgomery Presents Episode: "The Quality of Mercy"

The Campbell Playhouse Miss Harrington Episode: "The Corner Druggist"

1955 The Cobweb Victoria Inch 

The Night of the Hunter Rachel Cooper 

Kraft Television Theatre Mrs. Bibb Episode: "I, Mrs. Bibb"

Playwrights '56 Mrs. Compson Episode: "The Sound and the Fury"

1956 Ford Star Jubilee Mary Todd Lincoln Episode: "The Day Lincoln Was Shot"

The Alcoa Hour Esther Crampton Episode: "Morning's At Seven"

1958 Orders to Kill Mrs. Summers 

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1960s

Year Title Role Note

1960 The Play of the Week Dolly Talbo Episode: "The Glass Harp"

The Unforgiven Mattilda Zachary 

1962 The Defenders Laura Clarendon Episode: "Grandma TNT"

1963 Mr. Novak Miss Maude Phipps Episode: "Hello, Miss Phipps"

Breaking Point Stella Manville Episode: The Gnu, Now Almost Extinct"

1964 The Defenders Mrs. Cooper Episode: "Stowaway"

The Alfred Hitchcock Hour Bessie Carnby Episode: "Body in the Barn"

1966 Follow Me, Boys! Hetty Seibert 

1967 Warning Shot Alice Willows 

The Comedians Mrs. Smith 

1969 Arsenic and Old Lace Martha Brewster TV movie

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1970s

Year Title Role Note

1976 Twin Detectives Billy Jo Haskins TV movie

1978 Sparrow Widow TV movie

A Wedding Nettie Sloan 

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1980s

Year Title Role Note

1981 The Love Boat Mrs. Williams Episode: "The Successor"

Thin Ice Grandmother TV movie

1983 Hobson's Choice Miss Molly Winkle TV movie

Hambone and Hillie Hillie Radcliffe 

1985 American Playhouse Mrs. Loftus Episode: "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn"

1986 Sweet Liberty Cecelia Burgess 

1987 The Whales of August Sarah Webber Final film role

The End.

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