Carmel Myers

Carmel Myers (April 9, 1899 – November 9, 1980) was an American actress born in San Francisco whose career spanned silent film, sound film, Broadway, radio, and television. Her father, Isidore Myers, was a Russian-Jewish rabbi of Russian birth and Australian upbringing who was also a noted scholar and activist in causes including women's suffrage, the abolition of capital punishment, and Zionism. Her mother, Anna Jacobson Myers, was of Austrian-Jewish heritage. Myers had an older brother, Zion, and was a cousin of director Mark Sandrich and photographer Ruth Harriet Louise. The family relocated to Los Angeles in 1905.

Myers left Los Angeles High School after D. W. Griffith cast her in a bit part in Intolerance (1916), a production for which her father served as an unpaid consultant. She continued her education at a school for young actors and later helped her brother establish himself as a writer and director in Hollywood.

Following her early film work, Myers moved to New York City, where she spent approximately two years working primarily in theater. That period included her sole Broadway appearance, in the 1919 musical The Magic Melody. She subsequently signed with Universal Studios, where she built a following in vamp roles. Among her Universal pictures was the romantic comedy All Night, opposite a then-obscure Rudolph Valentino; the two also appeared together in A Society Sensation.

By 1924, Myers had moved to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, where she appeared in Broadway After Dark alongside Adolphe Menjou, Norma Shearer, and Anna Q. Nilsson. The following year brought what many consider her most prominent role: the Egyptian vamp Iras in the 1925 epic Ben-Hur, in which her character attempts to seduce both Messala, played by Francis X. Bushman, and the title character, played by Ramón Novarro. The film strengthened her standing in the industry, and she continued in significant parts throughout the decade, including Tell It to the Marines (1926) with Lon Chaney, Sr., William Haines, and Eleanor Boardman, and Four Walls and Dream of Love (both 1928), each featuring Joan Crawford. She also appeared in The Show of Shows (1929), a showcase of prominent film performers of the era.

Myers transitioned into sound pictures, working largely in supporting roles. Her sound-era credits include Svengali (1931) and The Mad Genius (1931), both opposite John Barrymore and Marian Marsh, as well as a smaller part in The Conspirators (1944), which starred Paul Henreid, Peter Lorre, and Sydney Greenstreet. In 1939, she performed for thirteen weeks on the Resinol radio program, broadcast twice weekly from station KHJ and carried on the Don Lee Network. Following the birth of her son in May 1932, she devoted increasing attention to her personal life.

Myers extended her work into early television with The Carmel Myers Show, a celebrity interview program that aired on ABC in 1951. The following year she founded Carmel Myers Productions, a company dedicated to producing radio and television content. Its output included Mark Hellinger Tales, a transcribed radio drama series narrated by Edward Arnold, and Cradle of Stars, a filmed television series directed by and starring Gregory Ratoff. Also in 1952, Doubleday and Company published her 64-page book Don't Think About It, in which Myers drew on her experiences after the death of her husband to articulate a philosophy for emotional recovery following personal tragedy. In 1976, she was among the silent-era performers cast in Won Ton Ton, the Dog Who Saved Hollywood, a comedy built around cameos by numerous stars from Hollywood's past. Later in life she pursued careers in real estate and perfume distribution.

Myers married attorney and songwriter Isidore Kornblum on July 16, 1919; the marriage ended in divorce in 1923. On June 9, 1929, she married attorney Ralph H. Blum, with whom she had three children: son Ralph H. Blum, born in 1932 and later known for his writings on divination through Norse runes; and two adopted daughters, actress and radio personality Susan Adams Kennedy, born in 1940, and television producer Mary Cossette, born in 1941. Her grandson, literary agent and manager John Ufland, was born in 1962. Myers and Blum purchased the Sunset Boulevard home previously owned by Gloria Swanson. On October 30, 1951, Myers married Paramount Pictures executive Alfred W. Schwalberg in Brooklyn; they remained married until his death in 1974.

Myers died of a heart attack on November 9, 1980, at Los Angeles Medical Center at the age of 81. She was buried near her parents at Home of Peace Cemetery in East Los Angeles. Her epitaph, reading the Hebrew word L'Chaim, translates as "to life."