Winston Churchill, Anne Frank were fans of 1930s movie star
LOS ANGELES — Deanna Durbin, a star whose songs and smile made her one of the biggest box office draws of Hollywood’s Golden Age with fans that included Winston Churchill, has died. She was 91.
Family friend Bob Koster of Los Angeles said that Ms. Durbin died around April 20 in a village outside Paris, where she had lived out of public view since 1949. The exact date of her death was not known, and Koster also did not know the cause. Koster’s father, Henry Koster, directed six of Ms. Durbin’s films.
At the height of her career, the Canadian-born Ms. Durbin, who made her first feature, “Three Smart Girls,” at age 13, was among the highest-paid actresses.
Her admirers included Churchill, who said she was his favorite star according to biographer William Manchester, and Anne Frank, who had Durbin’s photo pasted on the wall in the secret quarters where she and her family hid in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam.
In 1938 she received an honorary Academy Award for her “significant contribution in bringing to the screen the spirit and personification of youth.” Her hair, makeup and on-screen outfits set fashion trends worldwide and were emulated by millions. In the 1941 hit “Nice Girl?” Ms. Durbin, then 20, wore a spangled white organdy dress, ruffled and modestly cut, that became the rage at proms and country club dances across the United States.
“She was one of the last really legitimate movie stars from the 1930s who was still with us,” film historian Alan K. Rode said.
But Durbin retired from the mov- ies at age 28 and never looked back despite appeals from directors, studios and fans.