Jean Brooks

Jean Brooks
Brooks in a publicity headshot, 1942
Born	Ruby Matilda Kelly (1915-12-23)December 23, 1915 Houston, Texas, U.S.
Died	November 25, 1963(1963-11-25) (aged 47) Richmond, California, U.S.
Cause of death	Hepatic encephalopathy
Occupation	Actress singer
Years active	1935–1948
Spouse(s)	Richard Brooks (m. 1941–44) William Douglas Lansford (m. 1946–56) Thomas Leddy (m. 1956–63)

Ruby Matilda Kelly (December 23, 1915 – November 25, 1963), known professionally as Jean Brooks, was an American film actress and singer who appeared in over thirty films. Though she never achieved major stardom in Hollywood, she had a number of prominent roles in the early 1940s as a contract player for RKO Radio Pictures.

Raised in Texas and Costa Rica, she began her career as a singer in New York City before being cast in several minor walk-on parts in films. She would later appear in supporting roles in the Universal Pictures serial productions Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe (1940) and The Green Hornet Strikes Again! (1941). In 1942, Brooks signed a contract with RKO and appeared in multiple films by the studio, including Jacques Tourneur's The Leopard Man (1943), Mark Robson's horror noir The Seventh Victim (1943), and drama Youth Runs Wild (1944), as well as several films in the Falcon series.

Her later career was marred by struggles with alcoholism, and a series of drunken public appearances resulted in Brooks ending her contract with RKO. In 1948, she made her final film appearance in Women in the Night (1948) before abandoning her career as an actress and relocating to San Francisco, California. She died in 1963 of complications resulting from her alcoholism.

Brooks was born Ruby M. Kelly on December 23, 1915 in Houston, Texas, the fourth child of Horace and Robina Kelly. Through her mother, Brooks was of English and Canadian descent. Her two older brothers, Horace Jr. and Ernest, were both teenagers at the time she was born; a third son had died in 1912 at age seven of tetanus.