G. Marion Burton

Gertrude Marion Burton, born Gertrude Marion Hopkins on June 8, 1875, in Stillwater, Minnesota, was an American playwright, screenwriter, reporter, and Broadway performer. She died on January 3, 1952. Also known by her married name Gertrude Bergen, she was active across multiple areas of the entertainment and publishing industries, with work spanning the stage, silent-era Hollywood, and print journalism.

Burton was the only child of Jesse Pease Hopkins and Ella Clewell, and grew up primarily in San Francisco after an early childhood in Minnesota. Her education took her first to the Irving Institute in San Francisco and later to Emerson College in Boston, from which she graduated. In 1899, she married Henry Hannah Bergen in Brooklyn, New York, and the couple made their home at the Grand Hotel in Manhattan.

Her writing career encompassed both journalism and fiction, with contributions appearing in publications including Parisienne, Collier's, Smart Set, Town and Country, and Vanity Fair. She also produced a syndicated weekly column titled "Broadway Silhouettes," which ran in multiple newspapers. In addition to her print work, Burton wrote screenplays for director E. H. Griffith during Hollywood's silent era. Her film credits include The Woman Game (1920), The Custard Cup (1923), The Face on the Bar-Room Floor (1923), Another Scandal (1924), Untamed Youth (1924), Burnt Fingers (1927), Golden Shackles (1928), and Out with the Tide (1928).

On Broadway, Burton appeared as a performer and worked as a book writer. Her stage credits include the 1929 play Houses of Sand and the musical Fancy Free.