June Clayworth (Who’s Who at MGM, 1937) 🇺🇸

June Clayworth took the hard road to success. No producer saw her one day and boomed her to stardom the next. No studio casting director took one look at the lovely young woman and decided she was just the character he needed for a starring role in a picture. June began her theatrical career at the bottom.

Miss Clayworth was born in Wilkesbarre, Pennsylvania, on June 9, of English-French descent. She has two brothers and one sister, all older than she. She attended Wyoming Seminary and was graduated from Emerson College of Boston with high honors, including a degree of Bachelor of Literary Interpretation.

Expected Leads at Once

June tells how, after graduation, she felt that all she had to do was show herself to any stock company director, exhibit her diploma, and step into the lead in one of his productions. She believed that her amateur experience, gained through singing and acting for charitable organizations in and about Boston, would convince him that she was a veteran actress.

She finally got nerve enough to ask a small stock company director for a job. He told her that he’d pay her a salary commensurate with her ability. June worked for five months, playing leads in various Shakespeare dramas, and modern plays as well, and at the end of that time she received the munificent sum of ten dollars.

Got Experience Anyway

Miss Clayworth left the stock company immediately. She wasn’t angry at the trick they had played on her. “In fact,” she says, “I felt grateful for the invaluable experience they had given me.”

She next joined another small stock company, this time in Scranton, Pennsylvania. And she got the matter of salary arranged at the start. Five dollars a week was to be her stipend. The salary didn’t cover her transportation costs, but June was determined to win success on the stage if it took the best years of her life.

She got her big chance when the leading woman of the company fell ill. She stepped into the part and was so successful that she received offers from New York. She played in such Broadway productions as Torch Song, Page Pygmalion, Laughing Lady, Once in a Lifetime and Are You Decent? In between these plays she appeared in vaudeville with William Gaxton and Charles Ruggles, playing featured parts.

Screen Debut in 1934

Hollywood recognized her talents then and beckoned for June to come West. She made her screen debut in 1934 in “Strange Wives,” with Roger Pryor. Since then she has appeared in Good Fairy, “Lady Tubbs” and “The Fighter.”

Placed under contract to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer as a featured player, Miss Clayworth has appeared in Married Before Breakfast, “Between Two Women” and Live, Love and Learn.

June is five feet four inches tall and weighs 106 pounds. She has golden-brown hair and brown eyes. Her favorite vacation is a trip to New York City, where she has many friends in the theatres. She does most of her traveling by air. She is considered one of the best-dressed women of the film capital.

Jean’s career received an impetus in 1934 when McClelland Barclay, noted illustrator, designated her “the outstanding young American beauty.” Soon she was in demand for many roles.

Collection: Who’s Who at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (1937)