Mae Clarke: The Tragic Life of the Frankenstein Star Hollywood Left Behind

Today, we’re talking about Mae Clarke, another victim of the Hollywood machine. Earlier this year I made a promise that I was going to do a better job honoring the women of the Universal Monster movies and so far, I think I’ve done a pretty good job! I made a post ranking the women of Universal Monster movies. I made a post about Helen Chandler from Dracula, Zita Johann from The Mummy, and today we are continuing the journey with Mae Clarke.‌ You might remember Mae Clarke as Elizabeth in 1931’s Frankenstein, or perhaps for that shocking scene in The Public Enemy - you know the one. But her life, her story, goes so far beyond those moments on the screen. From her humble beginnings to her meteoric rise in Hollywood, Mae Clarke’s life was as dramatic, as heartbreaking, and as riveting as the movies on screen.

Mae Clarke played Elizabeth, the worried fiancé of Dr. Henry Frankenstein in Universal's 1931 monster movie Frankenstein.

Mae Clarke was born Violet Mary Klotz on April 16, 1910, in Philadelphia. Her early years were spent in Atlantic City where her father was a theater organist. Mae was drawn to the stage from an early age. By her mid-teens she was already dancing in musicals, and it was in fact in one of these shows that she was first discovered by dance producer Earl Lindsay. Before long, Mae made her way to New York City where she started working as a dancer in nightclubs. It was here that she met another future star: Barbara Stanwyck, who was still going as Ruby Stevens at the time. Barbara Stanwyck would take Mae under her wing, showing her the ropes of the industry. The two would become lifelong friends.‌ Barbara Stanwyck would later recall how they lived above a laundry, the train would shake the walls all the time, they were making $40 a week and working non-stop. Mae had great work ethic, and she impressed everyone that she worked with.

Mae’s first break in theater came thanks to Barbara Stanwyck. Barbara booked a role in a show called The Noose and she said that she really wanted two roles for her friends, one of them being Mae. That’s really all it took, and The Noose ended up being a really successful show.‌ Around this time Mae Clarke meets Lew Brice, the brother of comedian Fanny Brice. The two of them get married. I will remind you at this point that Mae Clarke is just 18 years old. Lew Brice is about twice her age. They make a show that they take it on the road, which leads to Mae Clarke’s first screen test. Mae Clarke’s career was moving quickly, but Lew Brice’s was at a standstill, and it caused him to lash out. His insecurities absolutely got the best of him, he started drinking and gambling and treated Mae really poorly, and by January of 1930, she filed for divorce. This was just after the stock market crash, and though divorce is never ideal, the timing worked out for her. She was getting all of this work as her family on the east coast lost their jobs. She moved them out to California with her. She was able to support them, and in return she got a lot of emotional stability and security. She really credits them for saving her, during what could have been a dark time.

It was during this time that Mae Clarke was cast in the two roles that would define her career - whether she liked it or not. I will always know her as Elizabeth in Frankenstein, but there’s another role, a much smaller role, that she was relentlessly associated with despite her protests: Kitty in The Public Enemy.‌ The Public Enemy was a pre-code gangster film starring James Cagney and Jean Harlow. In Mae Clarke’s most famous scene, she has a grapefruit pushed in her face, and this scene never left the public consciousness no matter how hard Mae Clarke tried to separate herself from it. One newspaper, decades after The Public Enemy came out, said “No woman since Eve had been so associated with one fruit as Hollywood actress Mae Clarke.” Mae Clarke herself said that she would love to shove some grapefruits in the faces of people who couldn’t think of her for anything else.

In her later interviews, Mae Clarke spoke candidly about her rise and fall as an actress. She was remarkably self-aware and had a fairly good outlook on life.

Mae had her second heartbreak around this time too. Though her divorce was not yet finalized, she was publicly engaged to John McCormick. (I think that this is the same John McCormick that would later go on to marry Zita Johann.) But while John McCormick was on vacation in Hawaii, he married someone else! Mae Clarke found out by reading it in the newspaper, and she was humiliated. She kept a brave face and moved forward.

Now Waterloo Bridge was one of the first films being produced under Junior Laemmle at Universal, and they decided to hold open casting calls for actresses at any studio. Mae Clarke was under contract with Columbia, and they decided they wanted to submit her. She auditioned using her scene from The Noose. Mae Clarke remembered Junior as charming, and well-suited to be an executive. Junior Laemmle liked Mae right away, but he had a business deal to negotiate. He knew that Waterloo Bridge was going to make her a big star, and he didn’t want to just give her back to Columbia after that. He worked out a deal where both he and Columbia would share Mae Clarke and each studio would pay her for whatever weeks she was working at their studio, and this was all well and good. It did result in Mae Clarke making 9 movies within a single year.

‌While The Public Enemy was Mae Clarke’s most famous role during her lifetime, it’s her portrayal as Elizabeth in Frankenstein that remains her most enduring. Elizabeth is the fiancé of Dr. Frankenstein, and while it’s not a particularly meaty role, she made the most of every scene.

She was genuinely scared of the Monster while filming her role, and she and Boris had to plan together how she could make it through her scenes without falling into hysterics. Boris Karloff suggested that she look at only his little finger which he would wiggle to communicate to her that he was just Boris in makeup. It worked.

Mae Clarke was genuinely terrified of the monster as Elizabeth in Frankenstein. She and Boris Karloff had to work together so she could make it through her scenes.

Mae Clarke’s career trajectory seemed unstoppable, but we all know how unforgiving Hollywood can be. In 1932, the stress of her failed relationships, of supporting her family, and the relentless pace of work all caught up with her and led to a nervous breakdown. She spent some a sanitarium, as they were called then, and though she returned to work, she was never quite the same. In 1933, she was a passenger in a car crash that broke her jaw and scarred her face. It impacted her speech for a time too. In 1934 she had another nervous breakdown, and the treatments she endured in the institution were traumatic. I think they did more harm than good.

Her breakdowns were well known in Hollywood - it’s really easy to find references to them in old newspapers and magazines. She even spoke openly of them, but it caused Hollywood to lose faith in her. Universal cancelled her contract due to illness and even James Whale, who she once had a really great working relationship with, he didn’t ask her to return for Bride of Frankenstein. She was heartbroken. Mae Clarke rightfully took a few years away from the industry. She married a pilot in 1937 and briefly moved with him to South America, but they would divorce just two years later. When she came back in the 1940s, opportunities were scarce. She suddenly found herself living this double life. She was working as a receptionist and a secretary in her day to day, but still looking for acting opportunities wherever she could.

It took a toll. She already felt inferior for not finishing school past 8th grade, and now she was having a hard time finding work. She was having a really hard time supporting her family anymore. In 1946, she married again, again to an entertainer who was having a hard time finding work. Again they would be divorced within just a few years.

The 1950s were slightly kinder to Mae Clarke as she found a new medium in television. She secured guest roles on show such as Dragnet, The Loretta Young Show, Perry Mason, and more. Of course, these roles were a far cry from her heyday in Hollywood, but they did allow her to keep doing what she loved.

“Everything important in my life just happened to me. I didn’t go after any of it.”

In her later interviews, Mae Clarke spoke candidly about her rise and fall as an actress. She was remarkably self-aware and had a fairly good outlook on life. In the 1950s, not long after going to court on fraud charges for getting $39 in State unemployment payments, Mae Clarke said she didn’t regret her life as an actress. She admitted that things weren’t going so well but believed that as a housewife or anything else she may have faced just as much heartbreak. In her later years, she came to enjoy painting, and upon retirement, she moved to the Motion Picture Home in Woodland Hills. In the last few decades, whole new generations of fans discovered her work, and they wrote her fan mail all the time, which she treasured.

For better or worse, Mae Clarke was special. She once said, “Everything important in my life just happened to me. I didn’t go after any of it.” When asked how she wanted to be remembered, she simply quoted James Cagney, who said of her, “Mae Clarke was a professional actress who knew what was required of her and did her job excellently.” But of course she was so much more than that. It breaks my heart to think of how Mae Clarke suffered and how hard she had to fight in life. She’s another example of the Hollywood machine and an actress who, while remembered, does not get nearly the recognition she deserves. She was a talented actress with a warm heart, and a devoted daughter. She was one of the world’s first scream queens. She is another example of how behind the glitz and glamour of Hollywood, there’s almost always a story of passion and perseverance.

So, the next time you’re watching Frankenstein, Waterloo Bridge, or The Public Enemy I want you to think of Mae Clarke. Not just the actress or the role, but the woman she was. What is your favorite Mae Clarke film?