Elsa Alsen (1880-1975) was a German opera star who relocated permanently to the United States in 1928. She was a soprano, and best-known for her performances in Wagner.
During a trip to Hollywood, where she sang at the Hollywood Bowl, Alsen played Lawrence Tibbett’s mother in The Rogue Song. Ironically, she does not appear to have sung a note in the film.
Ullrich Haupt (1887-1931) was a German actor who relocated to America and made his fil debut in 1916. He worked steadily in supporting roles, and made a successful transition to sound. Haupt was fourth-billed in Josef Von Sternberg’s Morocco (1930), but his career was cut tragically short when he was killed in an accidental shooting on a hunting trip.
Haupt appeared in one MGM musical, as the wicked Prince Serge in The Rogue Song.
Judith Voselli (1895-1966) was born in Barcelona, but was playing supporting roles on Broadway throughout the early 1920s, including several musical comedies.
Vosselli made her first film in 1926, and worked regularly until 1935. Three of her films were MGM musicals. One of these, The Rogue Song, gave her one of her best roles, as the scene-stealing Tatiana. She also made appearances in A Lady’s Morals and Naughty Marietta.
Gertrude Lamson (1874-1965) was a stage actress with an international reputation who specialized in tragic roles, including Hedda Gabler and Camille.
O’Neil began her film career in 1913, playing Mercedes in a version of The Count of Monte Cristo co-directed by Edwin S Porter. With her stage background, she made an easy transition to sound films, and was fourth-billed in Academy Award-winning Cimarron (1931).
She also featured in three Metro musicals, playing Princess Alexandra in the lost The Rogue Song, wealthy Mrs Vibart (the hero’s mother) in The Florodora Girl and the Mother Superior in Call of the Flesh.
Nance O’Neil attracted press attention in the 1900s when she formed an intimate friendship with Lizzie Borden. That salacious interest is maintained on the internet today.
Catherine Dale Owen (1900-1965) was an American blue blood who trained at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. She acted on Broadway from the mid-twenties and made her film debut in His Glorious Night (1929), the film blamed by some commentators for initiating the decline in the career of John Gilbert.
His Glorious Night was directed by actor Lionel Barrymore, who was also at the helm of Owen’s only MGM musical, The Rogue Song. Most of her performance is now lost, though it can be heard on the surviving full audio track.
Owen retired from acting in 1935.
Lawrence Mervil Tibbet [sic] (1896-1960) was one of the great American opera stars, and also one of the most glamorous. He combined a deep baritone voice, of the quality required by a leading singer at New York’s Metropolitan Opera, with good looks and acting ability. These attributes made it inevitable that, with the advent of sound, Hollywood would come calling. Tibbett had already performed many of the great operatic roles, and developed a successful radio and recording career, when he signed a contract with MGM in 1930.
Tibbett’s career in films did not last long. He starred in four Metro musicals, made a couple of pictures for Fox, and then returned full-time to the stage. But his Hollywood career was by no means a failure. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for his debut performance in The Rogue Song, something achieved by few actors. Unfortunately, The Rogue Song, MGM’s first all-Technicolor musical, is now a lost film.
Following this success, Tibbett did not embarrass himself in his other assignments, New Moon, The Prodigal and The Cuban Love Song (in which he duetted with himself).
By the end of his career, Tibbett had been a leading man at the Met for 27 seasons and established himself in the operatic pantheon.
May Blossom Boley (1881-1963) was a successful actor and dancer on Broadway whose film career started late. She was 45 when she featured as ‘the Strong Woman’ in The Wagon Show.
Despite her background in musical comedy, Boley only made one musical for MGM, when she played Broadway star and husband hunter Fanny Kelly in Children of Pleasure.
Helen Johnson (1906-2002) had a very brief career in leading roles, followed by a slow decline under the name Judith Wood, culminating in an uncredited appearance in The Asphalt Jungle (1950).
In the early 30s, Johnson appeared in a number of ‘A’ features, most notably as the feckless Pat Thayer in Children of Pleasure.
Winifred Elaine Gibson (1898-1987) was an actor who starred in films without ever really becoming a film star. She had performed in vaudeville, burlesque and musical comedies before featuring in Nothing But the Truth (1929). The following year she was given the female lead in Children of Pleasure.
Thereafter, Gibson mostly appeared in ‘B’ pictures; Richard Barrios calls her “one of the best tough blondes in Depression cinema”. In the 1950s, as she moved into television work, she and her partner, Beverley Roberts, were heavily involved in the development of theatrical trade unionism in New York.
Lottice Howell (1897-1982) was a versatile soprano who was happy in both opera and the vaudeville stage.
Howell signed a contract with MGM in 1929, but only appeared in a handful of films before returning to the stage. Two of these were the musicals Free and Easy and In Gay Madrid.
