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Her dislike of Le Lierre was so intense that she escaped one night
over the school wall, checking into a hotel and telephoning Fox for help. Her mother found out and Joan was switched
to the L'Hermitage school in Versailles. She left it in June 1926 to accept Fox's marriage proposal. Adrienne
objected but relented and Joan and Fox were married in London on Sept. 15, 1926. After a honeymoon in Paris and Venice,
the newlyweds settled in at Fox's residence in London.
Things went smoothly for awhile, but Fox's boozing habits and ineffectual
theatrical ventures strained the marital bliss. Upon learning Joan was pregnant, they moved to Hollywood so the baby
could be born in the United States. Adrienne Ralston Fox (nicknamed "Ditty") was born Feb. 20, 1928, one week before
Joan's 18th birthday.
In the spring of 1928, while in San Francisco on the last lap of
touring in a play, Richard Bennett telephoned his daughter in Los Angeles. Joan was not in, but he talked with the baby's
nurse. Under pressure from the bombastic Bennett, the nurse confessed the truth about the Fox marriage, which sent Bennett
scurrying to Los Angeles, propelled on his journey almost single-handedly by his rage. He threatened to shoot Fox if
he could find him, and insisted that Joan apply for divorce (which was finalized in August 1928). He offered her the
part of the ingenue in a new play he was preparing for Broadway, entitled Jarnegan. She thought over her
situation and then accepted. She sold her furniture, unwillingly deposited her five-month-old daughter in the care of
a good friend in Loas Angeles, and in late July 1928, took a train for New York.
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| Onstage in Jarnegan with Richard Bennett |
The play, which opened Sept. 24, 1928, was greeted with
respectful acceptance by the critics. With the success of the play assured and her salary raised to $150 weekly, Joan
immediately sent for her baby and the nurse. She bolstered her income with occasional jobs as a photographic model.
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| Richard Bennett and Joan Bennett in Jarnegan, 1928 |
One night during the run of Jarnegan, Joan was visited
by Joseph Schenck and John Considine, Jr., emissaries of Samuel Goldwyn in search of a stage ingenue to play the role of Phillis
Benton opposite Ronald Colman in the film version of Bulldog Drummond. She refused a screen test due to the
nonsuccess of two previous ventures, so was offered the part without one, plus a five-year contract with United Artists
at $500 a week. It was a salary too attractive for a divorced mother to turn down, so she and Ditty headed west
in January 1929.
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| Bulldog Drummond with Ronald Colman |
Joan remembers Ronald Colman her co-star in Bulldog
Drummond, as a "divine, sweet man who knew I had absolutely no experience." Reviews of the film said she photographed
well and was charming.
Following a forgettable second feature, Three Live Ghosts,
Joan was released from her United Artists contract. Freelancing, she performed for several weeks in a play before being
cast by George Arliss as Lady Clarissa in Disraeli (1929) at Warner Brothers. Thankless ingenue roles followed
until John Barrymore, longtime friend of the Bennetts, asked that Joan be cast as Faith in Moby Dick (1930).
"I was scared to death working with Barrymore," says Joan, "because I had known him for years and knew about the drinking
and thought that might be a problem, but Dolores Costello was expecting their first child and he didn't touch a drink."
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| As Faith in Moby Dick, 1930 |
Joan Bennett, Diana Anderson, Diana Markey, Melinda Markey, Melinda
Beno, Stephanie Wanger, Stephanie Guest, Shelley Wanger, Shelley Mortimer, John Marion Fox, Gene Markey, Walter Wanger, Richard
Bennett, Constance Bennett, Barbara Bennett, Barbara Downey, Adrienne Morrison, Adrienne Bennett, Mabel Bennett, Mabel Morrison,
Adrienne Ralston Fox, www.joanbennett.net
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