Transcending Categories, Staging Autonomy: Marion Davies’s Transitions from Showgirl to Screen Star and Producer-Manager

Abstract

Marion Davies (1897–1961) transitioned from showgirl and musical theatre performer in the 1910s to silent screen star and actress-producer in the 1920s. In addition to her comedic talents, she multitasked as producer-manager of her production unit, ‘Marion Davies Productions’ at Cosmopolitan Productions. She used her professional collaborations with screenwriter-friend Frances Marion and strong directors such as King Vidor to make appealing pictures that also transformed her star image. This paper argues that her years of discipline and professionalism on the stage and in show business contributed to her subsequent screen successes and as actress-producer of the films in which she starred. Her career complicates the notions of stardom and creative agency in the ‘lively arts’ of the late 1910s–1930s.