Gertrude Astor

Known for ActingBorn 1887-11-09Died 1977-11-09Lakewood, Ohio, USA

Gertrude Astor (Born Gertrude Eyster November 9, 1887 – November 9, 1977) was an American motion picture character actress, who began her career playing trombone on a riverboat. Born in Lakewood, Ohio, Astor at the age of 12 ran off and joined a woman's band as a trombone player and toured the states. In New York she left the band to obtain film work and got a job as an extra before her career took off. Astor was a prolific performer, between 1915 and 1962 she appeared in over 250 movies. Her first known credit is in a Biograph short in 1915. She then became a contract player at Universal. A tall, angular and beautiful woman, Astor frequently towered over the leading men of the era; thus, she was most frequently utilized in comedy roles as aristocrats, golddiggers and "heroine's best pal". Her best-known silent appearances were as the visiting stage star in Stage Struck (1925) with Gloria Swanson, as the vamp who plants stolen money on Harry Langdon in The Strong Man (1926), and as Laura LaPlante's wisecracking travelling companion in The Cat and the Canary (1927). Astor worked prolifically at Hal Roach studios with such headliners as Laurel and Hardy, Our Gang, and especially Charley Chase. She was also kept busy at Columbia Pictures' short subjects unit. She continued to play bits in feature films throughout the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s. She was briefly glimpsed as the first murder victim in the Sherlock Holmes adventure The Scarlet Claw and was among the ranks of dress extras in 1956's Around the World in Eighty Days. Her last appearance was in John Ford's The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. In her later years, Astor was a welcome guest at several Sons of the Desert gatherings, and became an honorary member of the Way Out West tent. She died in Woodland Hills, California from a stroke. She is interred in the Abbey of Psalms in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Hollywood, CA.Read more

Movies & web series

An Angel Comes To Brooklyn

The Avenging Rider

Empty Saddles

Manhattan Monkey Business

I'll Take Vanilla

Crook's Tour

Synthetic Sin

Twin Beds

Five and Ten Cent Annie

Hit of the Show

Ginsberg the Great

The Country Beyond

Sin Cargo

Satan in Sables

The Ridin' Kid from Powder River

The Silent Watcher

The Ne'er-Do-Well

Skin Deep

You Never Know

The Impossible Mrs. Bellew

Her Mad Bargain

The Concert

Under Two Flags

Wives Never Know

Running Hollywood

Western Limited

Dames Ahoy

Two Weeks Off

The Fall of Eve

The Butter and Egg Man

Folly of Youth

The Torrent

Fight and Win

Hollywood

Rupert of Hentzau

Alice Adams

What Am I Bid?

The Lion Man

Sunset Boulevard

Frisco Lil

Paula

All About Eve

I Love Lucy

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

Northern Frontier

The Sound of Music

The Chases of Pimple Street

I Have Lived