Virginia Valli

Acting

Virginia Valli

Born 1898-06-10 · Chicago, Illinois, USA

From Wikipedia Virginia Valli (June 10, 1898 – September 24, 1968) was an American stage and film actress whose motion picture career started in the silent film era and lasted until the beginning of the sound film era of the 1930s. Born Virginia McSweeney in Chicago, Illinois, she got her acting start in Milwaukee with a stock company. She also did some film work with Essanay Studios in her hometown of Chicago, starting in 1916. Valli continued to appear in films throughout the 1920s. She was an established star at the Universal studio by the mid-1920s. In 1924 she was the female lead in King Vidor's Southern Gothic Wild Oranges, a film now being seen after several decades of film vault obscurity. She also appeared in the romantic comedy, Every Woman's Life, about "the man she could have married, the man she should have married and the man she DID marry." She made the bulk of her films between 1924 and 1927 including Alfred Hitchcock's debut feature, The Pleasure Garden, Paid To Love (1927), with William Powell, and Evening Clothes (1927), which featured Adolphe Menjou. In 1925 Valli performed in The Man Who Found Himself with Thomas Meighan. The production was made at a Long Island, New York studio. Her first sound picture was The Isle of Lost Ships in 1929, but her film career would not last much longer due to declining fame. Unable to find a suitable studio, she quit films after making the quickie Night Life in Reno, in 1931. Valli was first married to George Lamson and the two shared a small bungalow in Hollywood, in close proximity to the Hollywood Hotel. In 1931, she married her second husband, actor Charles Farrell, to whom she remained married until her death. They moved to Palm Springs, where she was a social fixture for many years. She suffered a stroke in 1966, and died two years later, aged 70, in Palm Springs, California. She was buried in the Welwood Murray Cemetery of that city.

Acting credits

Uneasy Money poster
NR

Lord Dawlish is made the heir of an eccentric English millionaire, who cuts off a nephew and niece, living in America. Dawlish is engaged to Claire Edmont, an actress. Dawlish offers half his inheritance to the niece, and when she refuses to accept he goes to America to persuade her.

Uneasy Money

1918

Sentimental Tommy poster
7.0

Grizel is the daughter of the Painted Lady, who believes that her lover will one day return. Grizel is ostracized by the other children of the town. Tommy and his sister come to the town. Tommy is friendly, but Elspeth keeps her distance. When the Painted Lady dies, Dr. Gemmell makes Grizel his housekeeper. Time passes and after the doctor dies, Grizel, who is now twenty-one years old, loves Tommy, who is an author in London. Tommy visits the town but cannot decide whether he loves Grizel. Grizel knows that Tommy does not love her, and after he returns to London her unhappiness leads to insanity. Tommy returns and marries Grizel, although he believes that she will hate him when she gets better. After two years under Tommy's care, she regains her sanity. After Tommy lets her know that he cared for her out of his love for her; not for pity, Grizel is happy.

Sentimental Tommy

1921

Wild Oranges poster
6.5

Millie Stope lives with her grandfather on a remote island. Man-child Nicholas, a fugitive from justice, also lives there and is terrorizing them - and he's interested in Millie. One day widower John Woolfolk, sailing on his yacht, happens upon the island. Soon he and Millie fall in love. Will jealous Nicholas stand for this?

Wild Oranges

1924

Marriage poster
8.0

Marjorie Pope, who is engaged to Magnet, a wealthy suitor whom she does not love, elopes with Trafford, an inventor, after his airplane crashes on the grounds of her parents' rural home. Soon, however, Marjorie, irked by his dedication and idealism, persuades Trafford to market his wonderful invention, but her extravagance leads her into an affair with Sir Roderick. Trafford turns her out of their African home, but she returns to nurse him back to health when he is injured by a lion.

Marriage

1927

Watch Your Wife poster
7.0

Writer James Langham and his wealthy wife, Claudia, quarrel and are divorced. Claudia moves into a posh hotel and renews her acquaintance with Alphonse Marsac, an old European friend with an eye on her fortune. Alone in the family mansion, James goes to an agency and rents a "wife" to be his daytime companion and housekeeper.

Watch Your Wife

1926

The Street of Illusion poster
10.0

Directed by Erle C. Kenton. With Virginia Valli, Ian Keith, Harry Myers, Kenneth Thomson.

The Street of Illusion

1928

The Pleasure Garden poster
5.3

Two chorus girls at the Pleasure Garden Theatre follow different paths in love and fortune.

The Pleasure Garden

1925

Night Life in Reno poster
4.5

A story of love, humor and drama against the background of America's "Biggest Little City." An (interrupted) indiscretion by John Wyatt with a floozy prompts his wife, June, to make a trip to Reno, Nevada in order to get a quickie six-week-waiting-period divorce. John, penitent over his past actions (since he got caught), follows his wife to Reno and manages a reconciliation after a murder gives him a chance to prove his true devotion.

Night Life in Reno

1931

His Father's Wife poster
8.0

When Patricia "Patty" Hudson, a struggling New York writer becomes ill, her doctor, advising a restful occupation, arranges for her to be the private secretary to the aged James Winthrop, Sr. The closeness of their resulting relationship disturbs Winthrop's relatives, Mrs. Harrison Tyler and her daughter Sally, who hope to inherit his fortune.

His Father's Wife

The Family Upstairs poster
8.0

No synopsis available yet.

The Family Upstairs

1926

No artwork available
NR

Finding himself broke and out of a job in Paris, American William Ruggles joins the Turkish army and is sent to fight in its war in the Balkans. During a particularly hard-fought battle, he rescues a wounded Turkish soldier. Before he dies the Turk, out of gratitude, leaves William his fortune - but with the proviso that he take care of the Turk's three beautiful young wards.

Filling His Own Shoes

1917

Ladies Must Dress poster
7.0

Joe and Eve are engaged, but Joe cannot help contrasting the drabness of her attire with the dressy clothes of their friends. Eve overhears him talking of this and breaks with him. Then, with the help of her friend, Mazie, she metamorphoses into a ravishing beauty. Joe is remorseful, but the situation is made more complex when he suspects Eve of questionable relations with her boss.

Ladies Must Dress

1927

Up the Ladder poster
5.2

A woman secretly sells her ancestral home in order to fund her sweetheart's new invention, a videophone, and then marries him when his fortune is made, only to be betrayed by his affair with her best friend.

Up the Ladder

1925

Behind Closed Doors poster
7.0

Behind the doors of a foreign government's embassy in Washington D. C., a group of royal loyalists is attempting to raise funds to aid a counter-revolution and restore the deposed emperor in a new republic. They are led by an unknown leader called 'The Eagle."

Behind Closed Doors

1929

A Lady of Quality poster
7.0

Clorinda Wildairs breaks off an affair with the unscrupulous Sir John Ozen to become engaged to a rich nobleman, Mertoun, the Duke of Osmonde. Clorinda accidentally kills Sir John when he, infuriated by her forthcoming marriage, threatens to blackmail her. She buries the body in the cellar and admits her act to the forgiving Osmonde before marrying him.

A Lady of Quality

1924

The Lady Who Lied poster
9.0

During a carnival in Venice, Horace Pierpont, a wealthy American (Lewis Stone), falls in love with Fay Kennion (Virginia Valli). Their romance is derailed when she goes over to his apartment and finds the vampy Fifi (Nita Naldi) there. Fay goes down to Algiers, where she marries a former sweetheart, Dr. Alan Mortimer (Edward Earle).

The Lady Who Lied

1925

The Silver Lining poster
8.0

At a reception for Mr. and Mrs. Vance Leighton, three men are discussing the effects of heredity in shaping the careers of children. To prove his contention that the theory of heredity is often demonstrated to be false, John Strong, a secret service agent, tells a true story: Two orphan sisters are adopted, one by society leaders, the other by a couple of crooks. The latter, known as "The Angel," becomes an expert pickpocket, while the other, Evelyn, becomes a reigning belle.

The Silver Lining

1921

Satan's Private Door poster
NR

The house of Thomas Chatterton is divided against itself. His son Joseph is an inebriate; his daughter Anne is a social butterfly who neglects her baby and husband; the old man lives in solitude. Edith Conway comes to visit the Chattertons and finds herself distinctly out-of-place, of a different type. Thomas Chatterton finds in Edith a long-wished-for companion.

Satan's Private Door

1917

East Side, West Side poster
7.2

Director Allan Dwan’s excellent use of New York locations enlivens a rags-to-riches tale that fully exploits star George O’Brien’s championship boxing prowess.

East Side, West Side

1927

In Every Woman's Life poster
9.0

Sara Langford, an American girl in Paris, is courted by Count Desanges, who loves her but is considerably older; Thomas Carlton, who is married but is out for conquest; and Julian Greer, her true love. In rescuing Greer from the sea, the count is permanently paralyzed but manages to shoot Carlton when he attacks Sara. Ultimately, the true lovers are reunited.

In Every Woman's Life

1924

The Man Who poster
8.0

Bedford Mills, wounded in France, meets aristocratic Helen Jessop at a party given by her father for returning war heroes in his Fifth Avenue home. Bedford falls violently in love with Helen, but discovering that he is only a poor bank clerk she insists that he must first become a man of importance. He decides that, in view of the soaring prices of shoes, he will refuse to wear shoes on the street. Causing a sensation, he is arrested and then released, but all New York reads of his exploits.

The Man Who

1921

Guilty? poster
9.0

A Senator, accused of bribery on circumstantial evidence and sent to prison, decides to commit suicide so that his daughter will feel free to marry the son of a judge. A story told through the eyes of ten people, all familiar with the victim and all with varying versions.

Guilty?

1930

The Signal Tower poster
5.8

A railroad worker accepts a colleague's offer to stay in his home, but when his friend is called out one night to stop a runaway train, he makes a play for the man's wife.

The Signal Tower

1924

The Very Idea poster
9.0

Gilbert and Edith Goodhue lack nothing in life except a child, which they desperately desire. Edith's brother Alan, who is interested in eugenics, suggests that they pay their chauffeur Joe and maid Nora to have a baby for them. While awaiting the proper time to elapse, Edith and Gilbert travel to Palm Beach for an extended vacation, where Gilbert, attempting to obtain a child for his wife, vamps a dancer with a baby.

The Very Idea

1920