FAMOUS FACES IN GLASGOW! OUR MARY’S ROAD TO HOLLYWOOD... FROM BRIDGETON
East End actress went on to star in 300 movies
TAKE a look at t h i s photograph from our archives. It’s a fair bet you recognise bona fide Scottish Sir Harry Lauder, bekilted pipe in hand, on the left.
On the right is the great American composer and lyricist Irving Berlin, pictured with Lauder in Glasgow in September 1946, for a trade screening of the film Blue Skies, for which he had written the music.
But do you recognise the woman in the middle?
This is Mary Gordon, a Bridgetonborn actor who went on to star in a whopping 300 movies, and yet remains little- known in her native city. will star and
She is pictured here with the two gents at a reception in the Central Hotel, held after the screening.
It was the first time Mary had been back in Glasgow since she left Scotland in 1919.
Her most celebrated role was as Sherlock Holmes’s long- suffering for
Hollywood housekeeper, Mrs Hudson, in the Basil Rathbone series of thrillers based on the famous detective’s adventures.
But she also starred alongside some of Hollywood’s greatest stars, including Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, Mae West, James Stewart and Laurel and Hardy.
Her films included Bonnie Scotland and Mr Smith Goes To Washington. The IMDb film site notes that she was “often typecast as an Irish mother despite being a native of Scotland. This used to drive Irish film- goers crazy, who could easily detect the Scottish accent.”
She was born Mary Gilmour, the daughter of a Bridgeton wire weaver, and she worked as a dressmaker before discovering a talent for performing.
According to IMDb, she joined a theatre company bound for an American tour, and arrived in the US in her twenties. She had a few small roles on Broadway and became friends with the director John Ford while making Hangman’s House. She went on to make seven more films with him.
With her mother, also Mary, and daughter, Molly, she lived in Los Angeles. In 1939, she took on her most famous role as Mrs Hudson, playing the role in ten films and numerous radio plays.
She was a charter member of the Hollywood Canteen, entertaining servicemen throughout the Second World War.
According to the now defunct
Glasgow Bulletin, on her 1946 visit – during which she was regularly mobbed by fans – Mary made a point of getting re- acquainted with friends and returning to her old haunts in the east end. She recalled singing in the choir at one parish church.
“Ah’m no’ really a star,” she told The Bulletin.
“Ah’m just one o’ the small fry, just a character actress in Hollywood. America has been very kind to me, but I’ve had my heartbreaks since I was last here.”
Mary married a commercial traveller, William Gordon, in 1908. They were estranged in 1914 and separated in 1917 but it is unclear if they ever legally divorced. She kept his surname and never remarried.
Mary spent the final years of her life in Pasadena, California with her daughter and grandson. She died after a long illness on August 23, 1963.