Date of Birth
14 November 1919,
Brooklyn, New York, USA
Date of Death
7 July 1973, Burlington, Vermont, USA (hepatitis)
Birth Name
Constance Frances Marie Ockelman
Nickname
The Peek-a-boo Girl
Height
4' 11½" (1.51 m)
Mini Biography
Veronica Lake was born in Brooklyn, New York on November 14, 1919 with the birth name of Constance Frances Marie Ockelman. Her father worked for an oil company as a ship employee. While still a child, Veronica's parents moved to Florida when she wasn't quite a year old. By the time she was five, the family had returned to Brooklyn. She was exposed to acting early when she starred in a primary school play. It was to be her only stage outing, at least for a while. When Veronica was 12, her father died in an explosion on an oil ship. One year later her mother wed Anthony Keane and Veronica took his last name as her own. From that point on the family moved around a lot, living in Canada, New York State and Miami, Florida. By the time Veronica had graduated from high school she was already known as one of the local Miami beauties. She felt that she was ready for films. Her mother and step-father moved to a small home in Beverly Hills, California in 1938 where Mrs. Keane enrolled her lovely daughter in the well known Bliss Hayden School of Acting in Hollywood. She didn't have to wait long for a part to come her way. Her first movie was as one of the many coeds in the RKO film, Sorority House (1939) in 1939. It was a minor part, to be sure, but it was a start. Veronica quickly followed up that project with two other films. All Women Have Secrets (1939) and Dancing Co-Ed (1939), both in 1939, were again bit roles for the pretty young woman from the East Coast, but she didn't complain. After all, other would-be starlets took a while before they ever received a bit part. Veronica continued her schooling, in 1940, while taking a bit roles in two more films, Young as You Feel (1940) and 40 Little Mothers (1940). Prior to this time, she was still under her natural name of Constance Keane. Now, with a better role in 1941's I Wanted Wings (1941), she was asked to change her name and Veronica Lake was born. Now, instead of playing coeds, she had a decent, speaking part. Veronica felt like an actress. The film was a success and the public loved this bright newcomer. Paramount, the studio she was under contract with, then assigned her to two more films that year, Hold Back the Dawn (1941) and Sullivan's Travels (1941). The latter received good reviews from the always tough film critics. As Ellen Graham, in This Gun for Hire (1942) the following year, Veronica now had top billing. She had paid her dues and was on a roll. The public was enamored with her. In 1943, Veronica starred in only one film. She portrayed Lieutenant Olivia D'Arcy in So Proudly We Hail! (1943) with Claudette Colbert. The film was a box-office smash. It seemed that any film Veronica starred in would be an unquestionable hit. However, her only outing for 1944, The Hour Before the Dawn (1944) would not be well-received by either the public or the critics. As Nazi sympathizer Dora Bruckmann, Veronica's role was dismal at best. Critics disliked her accent immensely because it wasn't true to life. Her acting itself suffered because of the accent. Mediocre films trailed her for all of 1945. It seemed that Veronica was dumped in just about any film to see if it could be salvaged. Hold That Blonde (1945), Out of This World (1945), and Miss Susie Slagle's (1946) were just a waste of talent for the beautiful blonde. The latter film was a shade better than the previous two. In 1946, Veronica bounced back in The Blue Dahlia (1946) with Howard Da Silva. The film was a hit, but it was the last decent film for Veronica. Paramount continued to put her in pathetic movies. After 1948, Paramount discharged the once prized star and she was out on her own. In 1949, she starred in the Twentieth Century film Slattery's Hurricane (1949). Unfortunately, another weak film. She was not on the big screen again until 1952 when she appeared in Stronghold (1951). By Veronica's own admission, the film "was a dog." From 1952 to 1966, Veronica made television appearances and even tried her hand on the stage. Not a lot of success for her at all. By now alcohol was the order of the day. She was down on her luck and drank heavily. In 1962, Veronica was found living in an old hotel and working as a bartender. She finally returned to the big screen in 1966 in Footsteps in the Snow (1966). Another drought ensued and she appeared on the silver screen for the last time in 1970's Flesh Feast (1970) - a very low budget film. On July 7, 1973, Veronica died of hepatitis in Burlington, Vermont. The beautiful actress with the long blonde hair was dead at the age of 53.
IMDb Mini Biography By:
Denny Jackson
Mini Biography
Constance Keane (her stepfather's surname), beauty pageant winner, came to Hollywood with her star-struck mother in 1938. Enrolled in the Bliss Hayden School of Acting, she began playing extra and bit parts, eventually in about 6 films. An abortive screen test at MGM led to a better one at Paramount, a contract, and a breakout role in I Wanted Wings (1941), as a torch-singing vamp. Producer Arthur Hornblow Jr. renamed her Veronica Lake for this film; she was 17. Her best films include two comedies, Sullivan's Travels (1941) and I Married a Witch (1942), and her three film-noirs with Alan Ladd (1942-46). Her screen image was cool yet sultry, tough yet vulnerable. Her comedy talent was recognized by Rene Clair and Preston Sturges but not by Paramount, which then cast her in cameos and routine supporting roles until 1948 when her contract was dropped. Mismanagement by director-husband André De Toth and intermittent heavy drinking ended her film career by 1952. She had steady TV and stage work until 1959 when a severe ankle break sidelined her; she resumed work as a Baltimore TV hostess in 1962, returned to the stage 1963 and appeared in plays (and two low-budget films) through 1970. She was 53 when she died of hepatitis in 1973. The great films and performances for which she is and will be remembered date from 1941-1946 when she was 21-26 years old.
IMDb Mini Biography By:
Rod Crawford
Spouse
Trade Mark
'Peekaboo' hairstyle, covering right side of forehead and sometimes partly over right eye.
Trivia
Lake's parents: Harry Ockelman, seaman, died in ship explosion, February 1932; Constance Charlotta Trimble. Lake's paternal grandparents were Danish and Irish; Lake's maternal grandparents were the children of Irish immigrants.
Birth year usually given as 1919 but her autobiography and Lenburg's highly negative biography both indicate 1922. The 1920 United States Census shows that her father Harry Ockelman is unmarried and childless, while in 1930 Constance is listed as seven years old.
Her height variously given as "barely five feet" to 5' 2" Photos indicate the shorter height.
Children: Elaine Detlie, b. 21 August 1941; William Detlie, lived 8-15 July 1943; Andre Michael De Toth III, b. 25 October 1945; Diana De Toth, b. 16 October 1948.
An accomplished aviatrix, she took up flying in 1946 and in 1948 flew her small plane from Los Angeles to New York.
A 1943 Paramount newsreel shows her adopting an upswept hairdo at the behest of War Womanpower Commission, to discourage "peekaboo bangs" on Rosie the Riveter.
Got her big break when teamed with the only actor in Hollywood relatively near to her in height, Alan Ladd. Ladd was 5' 6" and she was just 4' 11".
Daughter-in-law of Joseph McCarthy.
During World War Two, the rage for her peek-a-boo bangs became a hazard when women in the defense industry would get their bangs caught in machinery. Lake had to take a publicity picture in which she reacted painfully to her hair getting "caught" in a drill press in order to heighten public awareness about the hazard of her hairstyle.
She has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame located at 6918 Hollywood Blvd.
Kim Basinger won an Oscar as "Best Actress in a Supporting Role" for portraying a prostitute who is supposed to look like Lake.
She and Alan Ladd made 7 movies together: The Blue Dahlia (1946), Duffy's Tavern (1945), The Glass Key (1942), Saigon (1948), Star Spangled Rhythm (1942), This Gun for Hire (1942) and Variety Girl (1947). In Variety Girl (1947), Star Spangled Rhythm (1942) and Duffy's Tavern (1945) they appear as themselves.
Cousin of actress Helene Marshall.
Her ashes sat on a funeral home's shelf until 1976 when her cremation was paid for and supposedly spread on the Florida coastline. Some 30 years after her death, her ashes resurfaced in a New York antique store in October 2004.
In Italy, all her films were dubbed by Rosetta Calavetta. She was only dubbed once by another actress: Clelia Bernacchi (in Hold Back the Dawn (1941)).
Her third husband, Joseph Allen McCarthy, wrote lyrics for many Cy Coleman songs, among them "I'm Gonna Laugh You Right Out Of My Life" and "Why Try To Change Me Now?" sung by Frank Sinatra. McCarthy's father, Joseph McCarthy, was also a lyricist; his most famous songs are "You Made Me Love You" and "I'm Always Chasing Rainbows.".
Actor Stewart Stafford lived the first three years of his life in her old apartment in New York (her name was still visible inside the mailbox).
When former lover Marlon Brando read in a newspaper that a reporter had found Veronica Lake working as a cocktail waitress in a Manhattan bar, he instructed his accountant to send her a check for a thousand dollars. Out of pride, she never cashed it, but kept it framed in her Miami living room to show her friends.
Personal Quotes
You could put all the talent I had into your left eye and still not suffer from impaired vision.
I will have one of the cleanest obits of any actress. I never did cheesecake like Ann Sheridan or Betty Grable. I just used my hair."
I wasn't a sex symbol, I was a sex zombie.
[1970, reflecting on her career] I've reached a point in my life where it's the little things that matter. I'm no longer interested in doing what's expected of me. I was always a rebel and probably could have got much farther had I changed my attitude. But when you think about it, I got pretty far without changing attitudes. I'm happier with that.
Hollywood gives a young girl the aura of one giant, self-contained orgy farm, its inhabitants dedicated to crawling into every pair of pants they can find.
[on Alan Ladd] Alan Ladd was a marvelous person in his simplicity. In so many ways we were kindred spirits. We both were professionally conceived through Hollywood's search for box office and the types to insure the box office. And we were both little people. Alan wasn't as short as most people believe. It was true that in certain films Alan would climb a small platform or the girl worked in a slit trench. We had no such problems together.
[on Paulette Goddard] It was her honesty I liked.
[on Marlon Brando] Our romance was short but sweet. He was on the dawn of a brilliant film career, and I was in the twilight of one. Of course, my career could never compare with his.
Salary
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