Doris Kenyon

Doris Margaret Kenyon (September 5, 1897 – September 1, 1979) was an American actress of motion pictures and television.

Spouses

Milton Sills
(m. 1926; his death 1930)
Arthur Hopkins
(m. 1933; annulled 1934)
Albert D. Lasker
(m. 1938; div. 1939)
Bronislaw Mylnarski
(m. 1947; his death 1971)

Youth

She grew up in Syracuse, New York, where her family had a home at 1805 Harrison Street. Her father, Dr. James B. Kenyon, was a Methodist Episcopal Church minister at University Church. Kenyon studied at Packer College Institute and later at Columbia University. She sang in the choirs of Grace Presbyterian and Bushwick Methodist Churches in Brooklyn, New York.

Her voice attracted the attention of Broadway theatrical scouts who enticed her to become a performer on the stage. She first appeared in the Victor Herbert operetta The Princess Pat.

Film career

In 1915 she made her first film, The Rack, with World Film Company of Fort Lee, New Jersey. One of the most remembered films of her early career is Monsieur Beaucaire (1924). In this production she starred opposite Rudolph Valentino.

She was with Paramount Pictures for the studio's first dramatic, all-talking film, Interference, in 1928.

Kenyon was cast opposite actor George Arliss in two films. These are Alexander Hamilton (1931) and Voltaire (1933). She participated in Counsellor at Law (1933) with John Barrymore. In the autumn of 1935, Doris appeared with Ramon Novarro in the play, A Royal Miscarriage, in London, England.

Kenyon's film career ended with a cameo in The Man in the Iron Mask (1939).

Radio

Kenyon played Ann Cooper in the soap opera Crossroads on NBC in the 1940s.

Television

Kenyon continued her acting career in television in the 1950s. She was cast in episodes of The Secret Storm (1954), Schlitz Playhouse of Stars and 77 Sunset Strip.

Marriages

Kenyon was married a number of times.

• Her first husband was the actor Milton Sills. She wed Sills in 1926. She was widowed in 1930. She had one son with Sills named Kenyon.
• She married prosperous New York real estate broker, Arthur Hopkins, in 1933. The two divorced the following year, citing incompatibility.
• In 1938 Doris married Albert D. Lasker, owner of Lord & Thomas, a prosperous advertising agency. They divorced in 1939.
• Her final marriage was to Bronislaw Mlynarski. He was the son of composer Emil Młynarski and the brother-in-law of Arthur Rubenstein.

Death

Doris Kenyon died in 1979 at her Beverly Hills, California home, of cardiac arrest, four days before her 82nd birthday.[citation needed]

In popular culture

In 1924 a newborn girl, Doris Kappelhoff, was named after Kenyon. Kappelhoff grew up to be singer and actress Doris Day. Many years later, Day would purchase a home in Beverly Hills that was "a few houses away from, on the very same street" from Kenyon's.

Filmography

Silent

• The Rack (1915)
• The Pawn of Fate (1916)
• The Feast of Life (1916)
• The Man Who Stood Still (1916)
• The Ocean Waif (1916 short) (Extant)
• The Traveling Salesman (1916)
• The Man Who Forgot (1917)
• A Girl's Folly (1917) (Extant)
• The Empress (1917)
• Jimmy Dale Alias the Grey Seal (1917 serial) (Lost) uncredited
• On Trial (1917)
• The Great White Trail (1917)
• Strictly Business (1917 short)
• The Hidden Hand (1917 serial) (Lost)
• The Street of Seven Stars (1918)
• The Inn of the Blue Moon (1918)
• Wild Honey (1918, William L. Sherry/Film Clearing House)
• Twilight (1919, William L. Sherry/Film Clearing House)
• The Bandbox (1919, W.W. Hodkinson/Pathe Exchange)
• The Harvest Moon (1920, W.W. Hodkinson/Pathe Exchange)
• The Conquest of Canaan (1921) (Extant)
• Get-Rich-Quick Wallingford (1921)
• Shadows of the Sea (1922, Selznick Pictures)
• The Ruling Passion (1922, United Artists)
• Sure Fire Flint (1922, Mastodon Films)
• The Last Moment (1923, Goldwyn Pictures)
• You Are Guilty (1923, Mastodon Films)
• Bright Lights of Broadway (1923, Principal Distributing)
• Restless Wives (1924, CC Burr)
• The Love Bandit (1924, Vitagraph)
• Lend Me Your Husband (1924, CC Burr)
• Monsieur Beaucaire (1924) (Extant)
• Born Rich (1924, First National)
• Idle Tongues (1924, Ince/First National)
• If I Marry Again (1925, First National)
• A Thief in Paradise (1925, First National) (Lost)
• I Want My Man (1925, First National) (Trailer only; Library of Congress)
• The Half-Way Girl (1925, First National) (Lost)
• The Unguarded Hour (1925, First National) (Lost)
• Men of Steel (1926, First National) (Lost)
• Mismates (1926, First National) (Lost)
• Ladies at Play (1926, First National) (Lost)
• The Blonde Saint (1926) (Lost)
• The Valley of the Giants (1927) (Extant; UCLA Film & TV)
• Burning Daylight (1928, First National) (Extant; Library of Congress)
• The Hawk's Nest (1928) (Lost)

Sound

• The Home Towners (1928, Warner Brothers) (Lost)
• Interference (1928)
• Beau Bandit (1930, RKO)
• The Bargain (1931, First National/Warner Bros.)
• Alexander Hamilton (1931)
• The Road to Singapore (1931)
• The Ruling Voice (1931, First National/Warner Bros.)
• Young America (1932)
• The Man Called Back (1932)
• Voltaire (1933)
• No Marriage Ties (1933, RKO)
• Counsellor at Law (1933)
• Whom the Gods Destroy (1934, Columbia)
• The Human Side (1934, Universal)
• Along Came Love (1936, Paramount)
• Girls' School (1938)
• The Man in the Iron Mask (1939, United Artists)