Anita Loos

Birthday: 26 April 1888, Mount Shasta, Sissons, California, USA

Height: 150 cm

While she is now best known for her book "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes," Anita Loos was one of Hollywood's foremost early screenwriters. She began writing screen scenarios for the 'Bio ...Show More

While she is now best known for her book "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes," Anita Loos was one of Hollywood's foremost early screenwriters. She began writing screen scenarios for the 'Biograph Company' at an early age (though not 12, as she later claimed), and the first to be produced, The New York Hat (1912), was not only directed by the legendary D.W. Griffith but starred another of Hollywood's future heavyweights: Mary Pickford. After working for some years with Griffith (including writing the surtitles for his epic Intolerance: Love's Struggle Throughout the Ages (1916), she began to work for Douglas Fairbanks, whom she had championed in his early days in Hollywood.Her husband and collaborator John Emerson convinced her to quit screenwriting for the sake of his own pride -- nevertheless, fate intervened in the form of "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes," an unassuming book she had compiled from a series of magazine stories she had based on the predilection of then-famous intellectual H.L. Mencken to be dazzled by gold-digging ditzes. The book was a surprise smash all over the world, later spawning a sequel ("But Gentlemen Marry Brunettes"), which became a not particularly successful silent movie but later a hugely successful film starring Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell, and a hit Broadway musical.This success, and the on-again, off-again nature of her marriage to Emerson allowed her to re-enter the film industry, where she worked on such classics as San Francisco (1936), The Women (1939), and Jean Harlow's Red-Headed Woman (1932). In her later years, she also wrote several pieces for the theater, eventually regaining fame via a number of movie memoirs, including "A Girl Like I" and "Kiss Hollywood Goodbye." These are today as well known for their colorful treatment of the truth as for their witty observations on the early days of Hollywood. Hide

I'm furious about the women's liberationists. They keep getting up on soapboxes and proclaiming that Show more I'm furious about the women's liberationists. They keep getting up on soapboxes and proclaiming that women are brighter than men. That's true, but it should be kept very quiet or it ruins the whole racket. Hide

[commenting on the young deaths of many of the Mack Sennett bathing beauties, in "A Girl Like I"] .. Show more [commenting on the young deaths of many of the Mack Sennett bathing beauties, in "A Girl Like I"] ...beauty combined with lack of brains is extremely deleterious to the health. Hide

[My brother] Clifford would painstakingly correct anyone who mispronounced our name. I never cared w Show more [My brother] Clifford would painstakingly correct anyone who mispronounced our name. I never cared what people called me. So I became Miss "Loose," while my brother was always Dr. "Lohse." Hide

Memory is more indelible than ink. Memory is more indelible than ink.

[From her 1977 book "Cast of Thousands"[ I can never take for granted the euphoria produced by a cup Show more [From her 1977 book "Cast of Thousands"[ I can never take for granted the euphoria produced by a cup of coffee. I'm grateful every day that it isn't banned as a drug, that I don't have to buy it from a pusher, that its cost is minimal and there's no need to increase the intake. I can count on its stimulation 365 mornings every year. And thanks to the magic in a cup of coffee, I'm able to plunge into a whole day's cheerful thinking. Hide

[on Hollywood in the 1920s] To place in the limelight a great number of people who ordinarily would Show more [on Hollywood in the 1920s] To place in the limelight a great number of people who ordinarily would be chambermaids and chauffeurs, and give them unlimited power and wealth, is bound to produce lively results. Hide

It's true that the French have a certain obsession with sex, but it's a particularly adult obsession Show more It's true that the French have a certain obsession with sex, but it's a particularly adult obsession. France is the thriftiest of all nations; to a Frenchman, sex provides the most economical way to have fun. The French are a logical race. Hide

Anita Loos's FILMOGRAPHY

as Director (3) as Creator (5)

The Women

Blossoms in the Dust

Intolerance: Love's Struggle Throughout the Ages

San Francisco

Red-Headed Woman