Hazel Forbes

Hazel Forbes, born Hazel Froidevaux on November 26, 1910, was an American dancer and actress whose Broadway career spanned the late 1920s and 1930. She died on November 19, 1980, in Los Angeles, California, one week before her seventieth birthday, and is interred in the Great Mausoleum at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California.

Forbes first gained public attention through beauty competitions. At sixteen, she was named Miss Long Island at an Atlantic City, New Jersey pageant, and in 1926 she was selected Miss United States at the Paris International Beauty Pageant. By 1927, at the age of seventeen, she had established herself as a showgirl in New York City.

Her early stage work brought her into the orbit of producer Florenz Ziegfeld and his Ziegfeld Follies. Broadway producer Earl Carroll attempted to recruit Forbes away from Ziegfeld for a January 1929 dance revue at his Earl Carroll Theatre, offering her a substantial financial incentive. Ziegfeld ultimately prevailed in the dispute. Forbes went on to appear in Rosalie, which opened January 10, 1928, and Whoopee!, which opened December 4, 1928, the latter in support of Eddie Cantor. In 1930 she appeared in Simple Simon, a musical comedy by Guy Bolton that opened February 18 of that year. She also took part in a short run of Steel, a play by John Wexley performed at Webster Hall in 1932.

Forbes pursued a parallel career in film, traveling to Hollywood and appearing in a number of shorts and features. In 1929 she appeared in Harry Rosenthal and His Bath and Tennis Club Orchestra, followed by The Fight and Seeing-Off Service in 1930. Her film work continued into 1934 with Bachelor Bait, If This Isn't Love, and Down to Their Last Yacht. A series of threatening letters she received contributed to her decision to step back from motion pictures. Having inherited a fortune from her second husband, she donated her earnings as a film extra to charity.

Forbes married three times. Her first marriage, to automobile salesman Harry Judson in 1928, ended in divorce in 1930. In 1931 she married Paul Owen Richmond in Kennedyville, Maryland. Richmond died suddenly in 1932, leaving Forbes an estate estimated at two million dollars derived from his dentifrice and hair shampoo business interests. On April 16, 1938, she married entertainer Harry Richman in Palm Springs, California. Actress Glenda Farrell served as maid of honor and Joseph M. Schenck as best man. Richman reportedly spent thirty thousand dollars on the wedding, including five thousand dollars on flowers. The couple shared a home in Beechhurst, Long Island. Shortly after the wedding, Forbes contracted pneumonia and recovered in part through treatment with sulfanilamide. The marriage ended in divorce in 1941 on grounds of cruelty. By 1942, Forbes was reported to be receiving the attentions of millionaire Max Bamberger.