Nonna Dooley, the future silent screen star, began her career as a showgirl in a Shubert revue in the Winter Garden, later went on to the famed Ziegfeld Follies. After a successful career on the stage with the Follies, Nita decided to try her hand with films in Hollywood. Her rise to fame was very quick. In 1920, at the age of 25, she starred with ...
We were all as blind as bats. Theda Bara couldn't see a foot ahead of her and poor Rudy (Valentino) groped his way through many a love scene and I really mean groped. They all used big reflectors to get extra light from the sun - that's how we acquired that interesting Oriental look. We didn't have any censors in those days, but we did have our own bosoms and our own eyelashes... And we never took ourselves seriously.
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Fact
1
For the last 2 decades of her life, Nita Naldi lived in a room at the Wentworth Hotel on West 46th St. in New York City.
2
In 2009, the first in-depth biography of Nita was written by Hala Pickford in, "Rudolph Valentino: A Wife's Memories of an Icon by Natacha Rambova".
3
The press thought Naldi had gained too much weight before she started filming "A Sainted Devil". Naldi claimed to lose 23lbs and the critics backed off. However as her weight fluctuated over the years the press was extremely harsh, claiming she weighed 210lbs in 1941.
4
Was considered the female Valentino.
5
Had a fake Italian ancestry story cooked up by press agents, much like Theda Bara's Egyptian childhood story.
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