Lola Albright

About Lola Albright

She won the Best Actress award at the 1966 Berlin Film Festival for her performance in "Lord Love a Duck" as Tuesday Weld's mother who turns suicidal when she thinks she has ruined her daughter's life. Albright was also known to TV viewers as Edie Hart, the girlfriend of Craig Stevens' "Peter Gunn" (NBC, 1958-60; ABC 1960-61).

Albright was a switchboard operator, stenographer and photographer's model while doing bit dramatic roles to learn her craft. She made her film debut with a small part in "The Pirate" (1948), with Judy Garland and Gene Kelly. She was seen with Garland and Fred Astaire in "Easter Parade" (also 1948) but won her first real notices as the wife of a boxing match manipulator who becomes involved with a fighter (Kirk Douglas) in "Champion" (1948). Some of her roles were unchallenging, such as in "The Tender Trap" (1955), where Albright was merely one of the women in Frank Sinatra's life. Yet, for all the programmers, there were shots such as "A Cold Wind in August", in which Albright again won critical acclaim, this time for playing an aging stripper. Albright's film career petered out around 1968, the year she played David Niven's wife and the mother of a nubile teen-age daughter in "The Impossible Years".

Unlike other film actors who were slow to take the plunge into TV, Albright was actively working in the medium from 1951, when she guest-starred in two episodes of "Lux Video Theatre". Throughout the 50s, she appeared made numerous guest appearances, including several during the 1955-56 TV season as a love interest on "The Bob Cummings Show". Albright was on "Peter Gunn" for its entire three-season run and, in 1965, replaced an ailing Dorothy Malone for part of the season on "Peyton Place" (ABC). She continued appearing on episodics, particularly those of Universal TV, into the early 80s. She never really clicked in TV-movies, appearing in only three: the thrillers "How I Spent My Summer Vacation" (NBC, 1967) and "Terraces" (NBC, 1977) and the melodramatic "Delta County, U.S.A." (ABC, 1977).

Partners

Husband

Bill Chadney. married on May 19, 1961; separated c. 1967; reconciled; separated again in the early 1970; divorced in 1974

Husband

Jack Carson. met when they appeared together in "The Good Humor Man"; began relationship in 1950; married on August 1, 1952; divorced in October 1958

Education

West High School, Akron , Ohio

King Grammar School, Akron , Ohio

Career Milestones

In the 1970s and 1980s, made guest appearances on many TV shows like "Medical Center", "Kojak", "Switch" and "Quincy, M.E."

In the early 1940s worked as receptionist at Akron radio station, occasionally performing in bit parts

Raised in Akron, Ohio

TV series debut as regular, Edie Hart, girlfriend to "Peter Gunn"

1943

Began working regularly as radio performer; then worked as model

1947

Signed to a contract by MGM

1948

Film debut in a bit part in "The Pirate"

1948

Had first real screen role in the musical "Easter Parade"

1949

Had breakthrough role in "Champion"

1950

Cast opposite future husband Jack Carson in "The Good Humor Man"

1951

Began working in television, making appearances on "Pantomime Quiz" and "Lux Studio Theatre"

1954

Appeared in "Invitation to Marriage" on TV's "Fireside Theatre"

1955

Played recurring role on TV's "The Bob Cummings Show"

1962

Starred with Elvis Presley in "Kid Galahad"

1966

Briefly replaced an ill Dorothy Malone as Constance Mackenzie in the ABC primetime serial "Peyton Place"

1966

Won the Silver Bear Best Actress Award at the Berlin Film Festival for "Lord Love a Duck"

1967

Made TV-movie debut, "How I Spent My Summer Vacation"

1968

Last feature films to date, "The Impossible Years", "The Money Jungle" and "Where Were You When the Lights Went Out?"