June Duprez

June Ada Rose Duprez was an English film actress and Broadway performer born on 14 May 1918 in Teddington, Middlesex, England, during an air raid in the closing months of World War I. Her father was American comedian Fred Duprez, and her mother, Florence Isabelle Matthews, was Australian. Duprez died on 30 October 1984 in London at age 66 and was buried at Streatham Park Cemetery.

Duprez began her acting career in adolescence, training at the Froebel Institute before joining the Coventry Repertory Company. Her screen debut came with The Crimson Circle in 1936, followed that same year by The Cardinal. She had a minor role in The Spy in Black in 1939, but her performance in the adaptation of A.E.W. Mason's The Four Feathers that year established her as a film star. Her greatest commercial success came with Alexander Korda's fantasy production The Thief of Bagdad in 1940, filmed across locations in the United Kingdom, northern Africa, and the Grand Canyon in Arizona. Korda subsequently took control of her career and brought her to Hollywood, setting her asking price at $50,000 per film. Because her American profile had not yet matched her British reputation, this pricing strategy effectively excluded her from most available roles.

Following her release from Korda's contract, Duprez appeared in a series of lower-budget productions, including They Raid by Night, Little Tokyo, U.S.A., and Tiger Fangs, all released between 1942 and 1943. Her fortunes improved with Clifford Odets' None But the Lonely Heart in 1944, in which she co-starred alongside Cary Grant and Ethel Barrymore. That same year she starred in "Forever Walking Free," an episode of the CBS radio program Silver Theater, broadcast on 10 September 1944, and appeared in two episodes of CBS radio's Suspense: "The Brighton Strangler" on 21 December 1944 and a replacement performance for an ill Ida Lupino in "A Thing of Beauty" on 28 December 1944. In 1945 she appeared in René Clair's film adaptation of Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None and opposite John Loder in The Brighton Strangler. She returned to CBS radio's Suspense on 20 June 1946 for the episode "Your Devoted Wife." In 1947 she starred alongside Alan Ladd, Gail Russell, and William Bendix in Calcutta.

Duprez subsequently relocated to New York City, where she pursued a stage career. Between 1946 and 1948 she appeared on Broadway in four productions: Town House, Androcles and the Lion, What Every Woman Knows, and King Henry V. In 1951 she appeared in "The Last Tycoon," an episode of the television program Robert Montgomery Presents. Her final credited film role came in 1961 with One Plus One, also released under the title Exploring the Kinsey Reports.

Beyond her acting work, Duprez composed the song "I Woke Up and Started Dreaming," which was purchased and published by Bing Crosby's music company.

Her personal life included two marriages. She first wed Frederick Beauchamp, a Harley Street physician, in 1935; they divorced in 1942. She married George Moffett, Jr., a sportsman, in October 1948, and the couple had two daughters before divorcing in 1965. During World War II, following her father's death, Duprez and her mother were unable to access their funds held in England and resorted to selling and pawning jewelry; Duprez eventually arranged for her mother to travel to Australia, where the British funds were accessible. In her later years Duprez lived in Rome for a period before returning to London, where she resided in the Knightsbridge area until her death.