Pearl White

Pearl married stage actor Victor Sutherland on October 10, 1907. In 1910, Powers Films signed her, and she made her film debut in His Yankee Girl. Over the next three years, she appeared in over one hundred shorts, including A Pair of Fools, Helping Him Out, and Naughty Marietta. Her divorce from Victor came in 1914, with allegations of his infidelity. That same year, she starred in the serial The Perils of Pauline. It was a massive hit, and she became a star overnight. During filming, she severely injured her spine performing a dangerous stunt. Her success continued with other popular serials like The Exploits of Elaine, The Iron Claw, and Pearl of the Army. Audiences adored her as a beautiful daredevil who performed her own stunts. She was dubbed "The Queen of the Serials" and commanded $3,000 a week.

In 1919, she married actor Walter McCutcheon Jr. and published her autobiography, Just Me. Tired of the serial format, she signed a new contract with Fox and starred in dramas such as The White Moll and The Mountain Woman, though her popularity began to fade. By 1921, she divorced Walter and struggled with a serious drinking problem. Her final film was the 1924 French drama Terror. She returned to the stage in 1925 with the London Review, but a nervous breakdown prompted her retirement from show business. She moved to France, bought a nightclub in Paris, and traveled with her Greek boyfriend Theodore Cossika. She was devastated when ex-husband Walter McCutcheon Jr. committed suicide. A sound screen test in 1929 proved unsuccessful; her voice was deemed unsuitable for talkies. She continued to suffer from her 1914 spine injury and turned to drugs for pain relief. As she aged, she developed liver failure. Pearl planned her own funeral and selected her burial plot. On August 4, 1938, she died from cirrhosis of the liver at age forty-nine and was buried in Passy Cemetery in Paris, France. Betty Hutton later portrayed her in the 1947 film The Perils of Pauline.