Tributes - 1998

Maureen O'Sullivan

Film actor. Born Boyle, Ireland, 17 May 1911. Died Phoenix, Arizona, 22 June 1998, aged 87.

Maureen O'Sullivan's place in history was assured when Johnny Weissmuller whisked her away to his tree-house in Tarzan the Ape Man (1932). It was one of the most popular alliances in movie history: Tarzan, Lord of the jungle, and his mate, the refined Jane Parker. They were not the first to play these roles, nor the last, but they were easily the most popular, the longest-running and to many film buffs, the archetypes. Even Tarzan's creator, Edgar Rice Burroughs, considered them the perfect Tarzan and Jane.

O'Sullivan, who would play Jane in six films, soon became tired of people greeting her with "Me Tarzan, you Jane" jokes (based on a line which, despite common belief, was not heard in the films). Her prolificacy as Jane simply reflected her Irish work ethic, which made her one of the hardest-working actors in Hollywood. The same year she made Tarzan the Ape Man, she made no less than eight films, dividing her time between three studios.

Away from the familiar jungle settings, her films differed in quality. She was the pitiable Dora in Great Expectations (1935), provided sweet relief from the madness of the Marx Brothers in A Day at the Races (1937), and appeared with Laurence Olivier in Pride and Prejudice (1940). More frequently, however, she fulfilled her role as MGM's queen of the B-movies, playing shy, gentle characters in a succession of forgettable movies.

As Irish as her name, she was nonetheless educated at a convent school in Roehampton, England. Unlike one of her classmates, Vivien Leigh, she had no acting ambitions.

Fanciful as it may seem, she was discovered at a Dublin restaurant by director Frank Borzage, who was in Ireland filming a star vehicle for the great tenor John McCormack. Borzage arranged the waiter to send her a note, inviting her to co-star in the film, Song o' My Heart (1930).

Though her acting experience had been limited to a stage production at school (in which, she claimed, she was "very, very bad"), her delicate, pretty features won her the role. She also moved to America, sponsored by McCormack, under a short-term contract with Fox Studios.

She was appropriately geared for stardom; as well as losing her rich brogue, she was promoted as Fox's latest ingenue. A 1931 interview gave her hobbies as "poultry raising" and piano-playing, with her favourite song as Body and Soul, "though she thinks it isn't right to like jazz so much."

After five films, however, she left Fox for a long-term contract with MGM, leading to the first Tarzan film when she was suggested as a perfect physical match for Weissmuller, an ex-Olympic swimmer. O'Sullivan played Jane as sensual but sophisticated. Due to her close, almost telepathic connection with Tarzan, she also translated his thoughts to the public - particularly in the first films, where his vocabulary consisted mainly of grunts.

Though they did not pretend to be anything but escapist fun, the Tarzan films were more polished than most adventure movies. "We all gave our best," O'Sullivan recalled. "They weren't quickies - it often took a year to make one - but sometimes we were doing three at a time."

At the same, O'Sullivan was chastised for her clothing, or lack thereof, with thousands of letters complaining about her provocative garb. A seven-minute scene in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) showing Jane (portrayed by a body double), swimming nude underwater, was quickly excised by the studio. It would not be restored until the 1990s, but O'Sullivan was controversial enough without it. "I was offered all kinds of places where I could go in my shame to hide from a cruel public ready to throw stones at me," O'Sullivan said in a 1997 interview.

Her troubles were not restricted to clothing. In 1933, she was questioned by the Immigration Bureau, in their attempt to drive illegal foreign talent out of Hollywood. She was under suspicion, particularly as the fiancee of Australian screenwriter John Farrow, who had been arrested for overstaying his leave.

By that time, O'Sullivan was a marketable property and the two were allowed to stay, eventually marrying in 1936.

After a few years, she was so often pregnant that she often required filming above the waist. In 1942, she was released from her MGM contract to focus on raising her family.

For much of the decade, Farrow was the breadwinner, as a respected writer-director, as well as the author of scholarly books ranging from a history of the papacy to an English-Tahitian dictionary. O'Sullivan made only occasional film appearances until Farrow's death in 1963.

O'Sullivan made a comeback, starring in the popular Broadway comedy Never Too Late (1962) and the movie version three years later. In 1963, she co-hosted Today on NBC television. Her greatest fame in that decade, however, came from being the mother of actor Mia Farrow.

This unusual celebrity status reached its peak in 1966, when Miss Farrow married Frank Sinatra. "At his age," O'Sullivan quipped, "he should marry me!" Some years later, she would play the mother of Miss Farrow's character in the modern classic, Hannah and Her Sisters (1986).

She was one of Hollywood's few remaining stars of the thirties, discovered in the old-fashioned way: a fluke, by her own admission. Soon, however, she spread her acting wings. As she would remark: "Boy, did I fly!"

O'Sullivan had seven children. The eldest, Michael, died in 1958. She is survived by her sons Patrick and John, and her daughters Mia, Prudence, Tisa and Stephanie.