65 Facts About Claudette Colbert

Claudette Colbert won the Academy Award for Best Actress for It Happened One Night, and received two other Academy Award nominations during her career.

Claudette Colbert's career began to wane in the early 1960s.

Emilie "Lily" Claudette Colbert Chauchoin was born in 1903 in Saint-Mande, France, to Jeanne and Georges Chauchoin.

Claudette Colbert's mother had intended to name her daughter Lily, but the pastor mistakenly chose Emilie, so she was always called Lily in the family.

Claudette Colbert's brother, Charles Chauchoin, was born in the Bailiwick of Jersey.

Claudette Colbert stated that she was always climbing those stairs until the age of 18.

Claudette Colbert had hoped to become a painter ever since she first gripped a pencil.

Claudette Colbert's brother was drafted 1917 as private first class.

Claudette Colbert's mother was an opera music fan, and her aunt was a dressmaker.

Claudette Colbert studied at Washington Irving High School, which was known for its strong arts program.

In 1921, Claudette Colbert made her stage debut at the Provincetown Playhouse in revivals of Rostetter's The Widow's Veil and Aria da Capo by Edna St Vincent Millay, at the age of 17.

Claudette Colbert had used the name Claudette, instead of Lily, since high school; for her stage name, she added her paternal grandmother's maiden name, Colbert.

Claudette Colbert's father died in 1925; her grandmother died in New York in the mid-1930s at the age of 88.

Claudette Colbert worked in a string of mostly short-lived shows in Chicago, Washington, DC, Boston and Connecticut, which enabled her to gain experience in different genres.

Claudette Colbert was again acclaimed as a carnival snake charmer in the Broadway production of The Barker, and she reprised the role in London's West End.

Claudette Colbert was noticed by theatrical producer Leland Hayward, who suggested her for the heroine role in the silent film For the Love of Mike.

Claudette Colbert starred in Mysterious Mr Parkes, a French-language version of Slightly Scarlet for the European market, although her French was tinged with an English accent after American life.

In 1933, Claudette Colbert renegotiated her contract with Paramount to allow her to appear in films for other studios.

Claudette Colbert's leading roles were down-to-earth and diverse, highlighting her versatility.

Claudette Colbert was initially reluctant to appear in the screwball comedy It Happened One Night.

Claudette Colbert won the Academy Award for Best Actress for the film.

In Cleopatra, Claudette Colbert played the title role opposite Warren William and Henry Wilcoxon.

Claudette Colbert was loaned to Universal Pictures for Imitation of Life, which was another box-office success.

Those three films were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture in the next year; Claudette Colbert is the only actress to date to star in three films nominated for Best Motion Picture in the same year.

Claudette Colbert's rising profile internationally allowed her to renegotiate her contract, which raised her salary.

In 1936, Claudette Colbert signed a new contract with Paramount, making her Hollywood's highest-paid actress.

Claudette Colbert spent the rest of the 1930s deftly alternating between romantic comedies and dramas: She Married Her Boss with Melvyn Douglas; The Bride Comes Home, with Fred MacMurray; Under Two Flags with Ronald Colman; Zaza with Herbert Marshall; and It's a Wonderful World with James Stewart.

One columnist wrote that Claudette Colbert placed her career "ahead of everything, save possibly her marriage", and that she had a strong sense of what was best for her, and a "deep-rooted desire to be in shape, efficient, and under control".

Claudette Colbert was very particular about how she appeared on-screen, and believed her face was difficult to light and photograph.

Claudette Colbert insisted on having the right side of her face away from the camera when shooting close-up, because of a small bump from a broken nose as a child.

Claudette Colbert learnt about lighting and cinematography, and refused to begin filming until she was satisfied that she would be shown to her best advantage.

Claudette Colbert participated in 13 episodes of radio's The Screen Guild Theater, between 1939 and 1952.

In 1940, Claudette Colbert was offered a seven-year contract with Paramount Pictures that would have paid her $200,000 a year; she declined the offer after learning she could command $150,000 per film as a freelance artist.

Claudette Colbert secured roles in several prestigious films and this period marked the height of her earning power.

Claudette Colbert again became the industry's highest-paid star in 1942.

Goddard said that Claudette Colbert "was at [my] eyes at every moment".

Claudette Colbert was initially reluctant to appear as a mother of teenaged children, but Selznick eventually convinced her to take the role.

In 1945, Claudette Colbert ended her association with Paramount and continued to freelance in such films as Guest Wife with Don Ameche.

Claudette Colbert achieved great success opposite Fred MacMurray in the comedy The Egg and I, which was the year's second-highest grossing picture, and later acknowledged as the 12th-most profitable American film of the 1940s.

The romantic comedy Bride for Sale, wherein Claudette Colbert played part of a love triangle that included George Brent and Robert Young, was well-reviewed.

In 1949, Claudette Colbert was asked to play the lead role in All About Eve, because the producer felt that she best represented the style he envisioned for the part.

However, Claudette Colbert severely injured her back, forcing her to abandon the picture shortly before filming began.

Claudette Colbert played a small role in Royal Affairs in Versailles, her only film with a French director.

Claudette Colbert had found the directorial method disappointing, which was on the heavy-handed and ponderous.

In 1954, Claudette Colbert turned down a million-dollar broadcast deal with NBC-TV, but made a pact with CBS-TV to star in several teleplays.

Claudette Colbert starred in television adaptations of Blithe Spirit in 1956 and The Bells of St Mary's in 1959, and guest-starred on Robert Montgomery Presents and Playhouse 90.

Claudette Colbert made a brief return to the screen, played the supporting role as the mother of Troy Donahue in Parrish.

The film was a commercial success, but Claudette Colbert received little attention, and she directed her agent to end any further attempts to generate interest in her as a TV actress.

Claudette Colbert appeared in a supporting role in the television miniseries The Two Mrs Grenvilles, which was a ratings success, and for which she won a Golden Globe and was nominated for an Emmy Award.

Claudette Colbert's characters were more likely to be observers and commentators.

In 1928, Claudette Colbert married actor and director Norman Foster, with whom she co-starred in the Broadway show The Barker.

In Los Angeles, Claudette Colbert shared a home with her mother, Jeanne Chauchoin, who disliked Foster and reputedly did not allow him into the home.

On Christmas Eve, 1935, in Yuma, Arizona, Claudette Colbert married Dr Joel Pressman, who eventually became a professor and chief of the head and neck surgery department of UCLA Medical School.

Claudette Colbert gave Pressman a Beechcraft airplane as a present.

Claudette Colbert served as Colbert's business manager for a time, and was credited with negotiating some of her more lucrative contracts in the late 1930s and early 1940s.

Claudette Colbert had a country house in Palm Springs for weekends.

When Claudette Colbert bought a house in Barbados in the early 1960s, Hull bought a house next door, amid rumors that their friendship was a romantic one, which Claudette Colbert denied.

The friendship ended after an argument that took place as Claudette Colbert's husband lay dying, during which Hull insisted that Pressman would not only take his own life, but Claudette Colbert's as well, rather than die alone.

For years, Claudette Colbert divided her time between her Manhattan apartment and her vacation home in Speightstown, Barbados.

When her mother Jeanne died in 1970, and her brother Charles in 1971, Claudette Colbert's only surviving relative was her brother's daughter, Coco Lewis.

Claudette Colbert suffered a series of small strokes during the last three years of her life.

Claudette Colbert died in 1996 in Barbados, where she had employed a housekeeper and two cooks.

Claudette Colbert's remains were transported to New York City for cremation and funeral services.

Claudette Colbert's ashes are laid to rest in the Godings Bay Church Cemetery, Speightstown, Saint Peter, Barbados, alongside her mother and second husband.

Claudette Colbert had met O'Hagan in 1961 on the set of Parrish, her last film, and they became best friends around 1970.