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Dorothy Davenport

Dorothy Davenport

Dorothy Davenport (March 13, 1895 – October 12, 1977) was an American actress, screenwriter, film director, and producer who appeared in silent film for Biograph Studios under the direction of D.W. Griffith.

While filming on location in Oregon for The Valley of the Giants (1919), Wallace Reid was injured in a train wreck. As a remedy for the pain from this injury, studio doctors administered large doses of morphine to Reid to which he became addicted. Reid's health slowly grew worse over the next few years, and he died of the addiction in 1923. After Reid's death, Davenport and Thomas Ince co-produced the film Human Wreckage (1923) with James Kirkwood, Sr., Bessie Love and Lucille Ricksen, a film that dealt with the dangers of narcotics addiction. Davenport took Human Wreckage on a roadshow engagement, followed up with another "social conscience" picture about excessive mother-love called Broken Laws in 1924, again billed as "Mrs. Wallace Reid" to capitalize on her husband's notorious death. She then produced The Red Kimona (1925) about white slavery. On screen she opens the film in silent narration or prologue. The details of the latter film were so realistic that Davenport was successfully sued.

She would later direct Linda (1929), Sucker Money (1933), Road to Ruin (1934), and The Woman Condemned (1934) and worked as a producer, writer, and dialogue director. Among her last credits are co-author of the screenplay for Footsteps in the Fog (1955), and as dialogue director for The First Traveling Saleslady (1956) with Ginger Rogers.

She and husband Wallace Reid had two children. She was married to him until his death on January 18, 1923. She never remarried. Dorothy Davenport died at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in 1977 in Woodland Hills, California. She is interred with her husband in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale.

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Man Hunt

1933

as Mrs. Scott

Hellship Bronson

1928

as Mrs. Bronson

The Satin Woman

1927

as Mrs. Jean Taylor (as Mrs. Wallace Reid)

The Red Kimona

1925

as Woman Telling the Story (uncredited)

Broken Laws

1924

as Joan Allen

Human Wreckage

1923

as Ethel MacFarland

The Fighting Chance

1920

as Leila Mortimer

His Extra Bit

1918

as The Wife

The Squaw Man's Son

1917

as Edith, Lady Effington

Treason

1917

as Luella Brysk

The Girl and the Crisis

1917

as Ellen Wilmot

The Scarlet Crystal

1917

as Marie Delys

Mothers of Men

1917

as Clara Madison

The Wrong Heart

1916

The Devil's Bondwoman

1916

as Beverly Hope

Barriers of Society

1916

as Martha Gorham

Black Friday

1916

as Elionor Rossitor

The Unattainable

1916

as Bessie Gale

A Yoke of Gold

1916

as Carner

The Way of the World

1916

as Beatrice Farley

Doctor Neighbor

1916

as Hazel Rogers

The Unknown

1915

as Nancy Preston

Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo

1915

as Grand Duchess Feodora

In Humble Guise

1915

as Grace Hunt

The Test of Manhood

1914

as Ethel Crandall

The Den of Thieves

1914

as Dorothy

'Cross the Mexican Line

1914

as Dorothy West

A Wife on a Wager

1914

Love's Western Flight

1914

as Dorothy

Passing of the Beast

1914

as The Mountie's Wife

The Man Within

1914

The Siren

1914

as Renee

The Quack

1914

as Mary Rohan

Women and Roses

1914

as Wallace's Mistress

The Fruit of Evil

1914

The Skeleton

1914

as Jack's Wife

The Test

1914

as The Poor Man's Wife

A Gypsy Romance

1914

as Queen of the Gypsies

Cupid Incognito

1914

as Angela Graham

The Spider and Her Web

1914

The Way of a Woman

1914

as Dorothy

The Mountaineer

1914

as Dorothy - Jim's Sweetheart

The Heart of the Hills

1914

as The Government Detective

The Voice of the Viola

1914

as Dorothy

Breed o' the Mountains

1914

as Sue Jarvis

A Flash in the Dark

1914

as Mrs. Randall

The Greater Devotion

1914

Fires of Conscience

1914

as Ethel

The Wheel of Life

1914

as The Prospector's Wife

The Countess Betty's Mine

1914

as Countess Betty Ardmore

The Intruder

1914

as The Woodsman's Sweetheart

A Hopi Legend

1913

The Lightning Bolt

1913

as Dot

A Cracksman Santa Claus

1913

as Dot

Retribution

1913

as Dorothy

The Fires of Fate

1913

as Dot - Wally's Sweetheart

The Cracksman's Reformation

1913

as Dorothy

The Revelation

1913

as Mrs. Burns

The Spark of Manhood

1913

Pierre of the North

1913

as Mary McKenzie - the Factor's Daughter

His Only Son

1912

as Jessie Carter

Her Indian Hero

1912

as Veda Mead

A Brave Little Woman

1912

as Clara Lyttell

The Golden Supper

1910

as Flower Girl

A Gold Necklace

1910

as A Friend