Day 17 0f 365 days - Marie Provost (or Prevost)

Marie Provost

(BROADS) 

The Nick Lowe Song

Mary Provost did not look her best

The day the cops bust into her loneiy nest

In the cheap hotel up

on Hollywood West July 29

She'd been lyin' there

for two or three weeks

The neighbors said

they never heard a squeak

For hungry eyes that couid not speak

Said even little doggie's have got to eat

She was winner
The became the doggie's dinner
She never meant that much to me
(But now I see) Oh poor Mary

Mary Provost was a movie queen
Mysterious angel of the silent screen
And run like the wind
the nation's young men steam
When Mary crossed the silent screen
Oh she came out west from New York
But when the talkies came
Mary just couldn't cope
Her public said Mary take a walk
All the way back to New York

Those twin balms didn't help her sleep
As her nights grew long
and her days grew bleak
It's all downhill
once you've passed your peak
Mary got ready for that last big sleep
The cops came in
and they looked around
Throwing up everywhere over
what they found
The handywork of Mary's little dachshund
That hungry little dachshund
Poor Mary, poor Mary, poor poor Mary

Poor Mary

(November 8, 1898 – January 21, 1937) was a Canadian-born film actress. During her twenty-year career, she made 121 silent and talking pictures

Prevost began her career during the silent film era. She was discovered by Mack Sennett who signed her to contract and made her one of his "Bathing Beauties" in the late 1910s. Prevost appeared in dozens of Sennett's short comedy films before moving on to feature length films for Universal. In 1922, she signed with Warner Bros. where her career flourished as a leading lady. She was a favorite of director Ernst Lubitsch who cast her in three of his comedy films;The Marriage Circle (1924), Three Women (1924) and Kiss Me Again (1925).

After being let go by Warner Bros. in early 1926, Prevost's career began to decline and she was relegated to secondary roles. She was also beset with personal problems, including the death of her mother in 1926 and the breakdown of her marriage to actor Kenneth Harlan in 1927, which fueled her depression. She began to abuse alcohol and binge eat causing her to gain weight thus making it difficult for her to secure acting jobs. By 1935, Prevost was only able to secure bit parts in films. She made her last onscreen appearance in 1936.

After years of drinking, Prevost died of acute alcoholism at the age of 38 in January 1937. Prevost's estate was valued at $300 since she had squandered most of her earnings. Her death prompted the Hollywood community to create the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital.

Marie Provost - a doggie's dinner