Fay Wray

Canadian-born (September 15, 1907) Vina Fay Wray was brought up in Los Angeles and began her career in 1923 as a heroine in westerns at Universal. In 1926 she was selected as a WAMPAS Baby Star, the same year as Joan Crawford. In 1928 she would land her first important lead role in Erich von Stroheim's The Wedding March (1928); it remained her favorite performance. She also appeared that year in Street of Sin (a lost film) opposite Emil Jannings.

Fay continued playing leads in a number of films and 1933 appeared in eleven films for Paramount, including King Kong. Director Merian C. Cooper told her that he had a part for her in a picture in which she would be working with a tall, dark leading man - she thought he meant Gary Cooper because she had appeared with him in several previous efforts. You can read everything you would ever want to know about Fay and Kong from any number of sources, but she was very effective in a number of other films of the period. In 1932 she starred along with Joel McCrea in The Most Dangerous Game, and opposite Lionell Atwill and Lee Tracy in Doctor X. Those films are favorites of mine. She continued her aggressive pace, making eleven films again in 1934, including The Clairvoyant with Claude Raines, and Viva Villa! with Wallace Berry.

Unfortunately, by the mid/late thirties, Fay's roles became less frequent as she had somewhat pigeon-holed herself as suited only for horror and thrillers - she is known as the first "Scream Queen". Given the right role, Fay could have had her star up alongside the most renowned actresses of the day. And she has outlived all of them through the person of Ann Darrow - the beauty who killed the beast. Fay Wray, who appeared in over 100 films during her career, died of natural causes at the age of 96 in 2004.

If you want to see images of Fay in King Kong, look elsewhere, they are everywhere.

Motion Picture Magazine September, 1929 - Artist: Marland Stone

Undated postcard

Street of Sin publicity still - 1928

Modern Screen Magazine October, 1932

The Clairvoyant publicity still - 1934

Fay Wray - What do you think - Allure?