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Yvonne De Carlo - Publicity Photo (1944)

Biography:
The daughter of an aspiring actress, Marie De Carlo, and a salesman, William Middleton, De Carlo was born Margaret Yvonne Middleton in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. "I was named Margaret Yvonne - Margaret because my mother was very fond of one of the derivatives of the name. She was fascinated at the time by the movie star Baby Peggy, and I suppose she wanted a Baby Peggy of her own." Her maternal grandfather, Michael de Carlo, was Sicilian-born, and her maternal grandmother, Margaret Purvis, was Scottish-born. Margaret's mother ran away from home, when she was 16 to become a ballerina, after a couple of years working as a shop girl, she was finally married in 1924. Little Margaret was just a toddler when her father beat a hasty departure only one step ahead of the law. Her father abandoned her family when she was 3. While her mother was away with her boyfriends, Margaret lived with her grandparents. She found a secure spot with them; however, she wanted some attention, very desperately. The little girl inherited her mother's personality. By the time she entered grade school, she found that her strong singing voice brought her the attention she longed for. Although her mother recognized Margaret's talent for singing, she had decided long ago that any daughter of hers would be a dancer. As a teenager, “Peggy” was taken by her mother to Hollywood where she enrolled her in dancing school, also attending Le Conte Middle School in Hollywood. Margaret also lived in a downtown apartment, with her mother, where Marie took on odd jobs such as a waitress. Margaret was uprooted again when her Visa expired, she would have to make three trips, the first of which is from Los Angeles, California to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, within a few years, where she and her mother both returned, because she was unable to find work. Despite of all the traveling she went to, her ballet had already continued. It was also noted that her body was also not subtle enough to withstand the rigors of ballet.
She attended and dropped out of Vancouver's defunct King Edward High School, to focus more on her dance studies. She then attended the B.C. School of Dancing. It was there that Canadian dance instructor, June Roper, started her in a new direction, for which she was grateful and relieved. The following year at the Orphann Theater, Margaret appeared as a hula dancer in the famous Waikiki. When she was 17, Margaret had become a graceful young woman. A new nightclub, the Palamar had opened in Vancouver, and she finessed a weeklong booking. Hoping to present more sophisticated image, she combined her middle name with her mother's maiden name, which turned out to be Yvonne De Carlo.
The pair made several such trips until 1940, when De Carlo was first runnerup to "Miss Venice Beach" and was hired by showman Nils Granlund as a dancer at the Florentine Gardens. She had been dancing for Granlund only a short time when she was arrested by immigration officials and deported to Canada,but in January of 1941, Granlund sent a telegram to Canadian immigration officials pledging his sponsorship of De Carlo in the United States, and affirmed his offer of steady employment, both requirements to reenter the country.
Before she worked at Florentine, she also got her first job at 16, working at Vancouver's Palomar, where it expanded from a ballroom to a nightclub in 1938, and been employed ever since. When she refused to allowing Mr. Carroll to show her bare breasts, just like he did with many other future actresses and/or stars, she and her mother explicitly left the nightclub.
Seeking contract work in the movies, she abruptly quit the Florentine Gardens after less than a year, landing a role as a bathing beauty in the 1941 B-movie Harvard, Here I Come. Other roles were slow to follow, and De Carlo took a job in the chorus line of Earl Carroll, another Hollywood showman. Her sixth film appearance was at the request of Nils Granlund, and the film Rhythm Parade was set at the Florentine Gardens nightclub in Hollywood.
In December 1941, the Japanese Attack on Pearl Harbor signaled America's entrance into World War II. From there, she joined Hollywood's biggest stars performing in morale boosting U.S. oceans. She clearfully sang in front of thousands of servicemen. De Carlo was a favorite leading lady of the 1940s, and a recipient of many letters from GI's.
She was a Paramount starlet, but the studio apparently signed her mainly for her slight resemblance to Dorothy Lamour, as it was common then for studios to sign lookalikes in order to remind the stars in question that they easily could be replaced should their behavior become difficult or their box-office appeal begin to wane. When she moved to Universal Studios, she was utilized as a B-movie version of Maria Montez, one of the studio's reigning divas.
She realized that her sensitivity brought her more money she had craved for as a child. As she entered more sophisticated circles, the lesson she'd learned from her maternal grandparents weren't forgotten. She was given a musical short as a Zombie in The Pearl of Bagdad. The young dancer appreciated what she saw on the screen, thinking she had a shot at the major leagues. With a glamorous lifestyle along and big bucks, De Carlo changed her mind to become a movie star.

Filmography:

Harvard, Here I Come! (1941)
This Gun for Hire (1942)
Road to Morocco (1942)
Youth on Parade (1942)
Lucky Jordan (1942)
Rhythm Parade (1942)
The Crystal Ball (1943)
Salute for Three (1943)
So Proudly We Hail! (1943)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)
Let's Face It (1943)
Deerslayer (1943)
True to Life (1943)
Standing Room Only (1944)
The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
Kismet (1944) - Handmaiden (uncredited)
Rainbow Island (1944)
Here Come the Waves (1944)
Practically Yours (1944)
Bring on the Girls (1945)
Salome, Where She Danced (1945)
Frontier Gal (1945)
Song of Scheherazade (1947)
Brute Force (1947)
Slave Girl (1947)
Black Bart (1948)
Casbah (1948)
River Lady (1948)
Criss Cross (1949)
Calamity Jane and Sam Bass (1949)
The Gal Who Took the West (1949)
Buccaneer's Gal (1950)
The Desert Hawk (1950)
Tomahawk (1951)
Hotel Sahara (1951)
Silver City (1951)
The San Francisco Story (1952)
Scarlet Angel (1952)
Hurricane Smith (1952)
Sombrero (1953)
Sea Devils (1953)
The Captain's Paradise (1953)
Fort Algiers (1953)
Border River (1954)
Happy Ever After (1954)
Passion (1954)
Shotgun (1955)
La Contessa di Castiglione (1955)
Flame of the Islands (1956)
Raw Edge (1956)
Magic Fire (1956)
The Ten Commandments (1956)
Death of a Scoundrel (1956)
Band of Angels (1957)
The Sword and the Cross (1958)
Timbuktu (1959)
McLintock! (1963)
A Global Affair (1964)
Law of the Lawless (1964)
Forbidden Temptations (1965) (documentary)
Munster, Go Home! (1966)
Hostile Guns (1967)
The Power (1968)
Arizona Bushwhackers (1968)
The Delta Factor (1970)
The Seven Minutes (1971)
Black Fire (1975)
Blazing Stewardesses (1975)
It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time (1975)
House of Shadows (1976)
Won Ton Ton, the Dog Who Saved Hollywood (1976) (cameo)
Satan's Cheerleaders (1977)
Nocturna (1979)
Guyana: Cult of the Damned (1979)
Black Fire (1979) (Spanish version)
The Man with Bogart's Face (1980)
Silent Scream (1980)
Liar's Moon (1981)
Play Dead (1981)
Vultures (1983)
Flesh and Bullets (1985)
American Gothic (1988)
Cellar Dweller (1988)
Mirror, Mirror (1990)
Oscar (1991)
The Naked Truth (1992 direct-to-video)
Desert Kickboxer a.k.a. Desert Hawk (1992 direct-to-video; unconfirmed)
Seasons of the Heart (1993) (voice only)

TV Work:

Bonanza: A Rose For Lotta (1959)
The Greatest Show on Earth: The Night the Monkey Died (1964)
The Munsters (1964 - 1966)
Custer (1 episode, 1967)
The Girl on the Late, Late Show (1974)
The Mark of Zorro (1974)
Roots (1977) (miniseries)
The Munsters' Revenge (1981)
Murder, She Wrote: Jessica Behind Bars (1985) (guest star)
A Masterpiece of Murder (1986)
Tales From the Crypt (1995)
Here Come the Munsters (1995) (cameo)
The Barefoot Executive (1995)

Death:
Later, she moved to a home in the Black Lake Retirement Community, near Solvang, California, but in declining health, she then became a resident of the Motion Picture & Television Hospital, in Woodland Hills, California, where she spent her last years. There, on January 8, 2007, she died of natural causes. A memorial service was held a few days later at The Woodland Hills MGM Theater, among them attending the service were surviving The Munsters co-stars, Butch Patrick and Pat Priest. She is survived by her son, Bruce R. Morgan. She was cremated.

Labels: Yvonne De Carlo