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Constance Campbell Bennett (October 22, 1904 in
film|1904 - July 24, 1965 in film|1965) was a
United States|US actor|actress known for more for
her elegant persona than her acting talents.
Largely underrated today, Bennett was one of
Hollywood's most luminous stars, delivering
amusing, madcap, and occasionally arch
performances that belie her ornamental reputation.



==Biography==
Born in New York City, she was the daughter of
actor Richard Bennett and actress Adrienne
Morrison, and the eldest sister of actresses
Barbara Bennett|Barbara and Joan Bennett.
Independent, cultured, ironic and outspoken,
Constance, first Bennett sister to enter films,
appeared in New York-produced silents before a
chance meeting with Samuel Goldwyn led to her
Hollywood debut in Cytherea (1924). She abandoned
a burgeoning career in silents for marriage to
Philip Plant in 1925; divorced, she resumed her
film career with the advent of talking pictures
(1929), and with her delicate blonde features and
glamorous fashion style, quickly became a popular
film star. 

She also captured numerous headlines in 1932, when
she married one of Gloria Swanson's former
husbands, Henry de la Falaise|Henri le Bailly, the
Marquis de La Coudraye de La Falaise (1898-1972),
a French nobleman and film director. They were
divorced in 1940.

A 1931 contract with Warner Brothers Studios
earned her $300 000 for two movies and made her
one of the highest paid stars in Hollywood. The
next year she moved to RKO, where she acted in
What Price Hollywood? (1932), directed by George
Cukor, an ironic and at the same time tragic
behind-the-scenes looks at the old Hollywood
studio system, in which she gave her finest
performance. In this movie she is a star-struck
waitress, named Mary Evans, who manages to make a
good impression on a prominent film director
(played by Lowell Sherman); with his patronage she
became a movie star. While the director have some
serious alcoholic problems, she marries a wealthy
playboy (played by Neil Hamilton), who genuinely
loves his wife but is jealous of the demands made
on her by her career. So he leave her, but not
before Mary has been impregnated. She began to
turning her attentions to her mentor, but it is
too late: he kills himself in her bedroom. Hoping
to heal her emotional wounds, Mary flees to Paris
with her child, where she is reunited with his
contrite husband. 

Then Bennett showed her versatility in the likes
of Our Betters (1933), The Affairs of Cellini
(1934), After Office Hours (1935), Topper (1937,
in a career standout as ghostess-with-the-mostest
Marian Kirby, a role she repeated in the 1939
sequel, Topper Takes a Trip), with Cary Grant,
Merrily We Live (1938) and Two-Faced Woman (1941,
in a hilarious performance supporting Greta
Garbo).

She was a close friend of Gloria Laura Mercedes
Morgan-Vanderbilt|Gloria Morgan-Vanderbilt, and
despite the potential harm to her career, stood by
Vanderbilt all through her notorious 1934 child
custody trial. She married her third husband, the
actor Gilbert Roland in 1941 and had three
children with him, before they divorced in 1946. 
By this time she was working less frequently in
film but was in demand in both radio and theatre. 
Her shrewd investments had made her a very wealthy
woman, and she founded a cosmetics and clothing
company that added to her wealth, but Bennett
enjoyed being a celebrity and so continued to
work. 

In June 1946 the 41-year-old actress married US
Air Force Colonel John Theron Coulter, who was
then 34. After her marriage, she concentrated her
efforts on providing relief entertainment to US
troops still stationed in Europe, winning military
honors for her services. In recognition of her
military contributions, and as the wife of
Coulter, who had by then achieved the rank of
Brigadier General, she was buried in Arlington
National Cemetery. Coulter died in 1995 and was
buried with her.

She made no films from the early 1950s until 1965
when she made a comeback in the film Madame X
(film)|Madame X (released posthumously in 1966 in
film|1966), still looking chic while playing Lana
Turner's mother.  Shortly after filming was
completed, Bennett collapsed and died from a
cerebral hemorrhage.

Constance Bennett has a star on the Hollywood Walk
of Fame for her contribution to Motion Pictures,
at 6250 Hollywood Boulevard, a short distance from
the star of her sister, Joan.

==External Links==

*http://silent-movies.com/Ladies/PBennett.html
Constance Bennett Photo Gallery
*imdb name|id=0000909|name=Constance Bennett