Virginia Grey

Virginia Grey
Virginia Grey in Dramatic School (1938)
Born	(1917-03-22)March 22, 1917 Edendale, California, U.S.
Died	July 31, 2004(2004-07-31) (aged 87) Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Occupation	Actress, Singer
Years active	1927–1977

Virginia Grey (March 22, 1917 – July 31, 2004) was an American actress who appeared in over 100 films and a number of television shows from the 1930s through to the early-1980s.

Born in Edendale, California, Grey was the youngest of three daughters of the director Ray Grey. One of her early babysitters was movie star Gloria Swanson. Grey debuted at the age of 10 in the silent film Uncle Tom's Cabin (1927) as Little Eva. She continued acting for a few more years, but then left movies for three years in order to finish her education.

Grey gave up on training to be a nurse and returned to films in the 1930s with bit parts and work as an extra, and eventually signed a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), appearing in several films, including The Hardys Ride High (1939), Another Thin Man (1939), Hullabaloo (1940), and The Big Store (1941).

She left MGM in 1942, and signed with several different studios over the years, working steadily. During the 1950s and 1960s, producer Ross Hunter frequently included Grey in his popular soap melodramas, such as All That Heaven Allows, Back Street and Madame X.

She had an on again/off again relationship with Clark Gable in the 1940s. After Gable's wife Carole Lombard died and he returned from military service, Gable and Grey were often seen at restaurants and nightclubs together. Many, including Virginia herself, expected him to marry her with the tabloids expecting a wedding announcement. It was a great surprise when he hastily married Lady Sylvia Ashley in 1949, leaving Grey heartbroken. Gable divorced Ashley in 1952. However, Gable never rekindled their romance and Grey's friends say that her hoping and waiting for Gable was the reason she never married. She was also a staunch conservative Republican.