Louise Huntington

Louise Huntington (November 1, 1904 – June 2, 1997) was an American actress whose career spanned stage, film, and television. Born in Dallas, Texas, she relocated with her family to Houston at the age of four. She pursued higher education at Wellesley College and the University of Texas, where she was a member of the Curtain Club. She supplemented her training through work with the Houston Little Theater before moving into professional performance.

Huntington built her early stage experience through a stock theater company in Denver and through vaudeville appearances alongside Kenneth Harlan. Her Broadway career extended from 1926 to 1939, beginning with The Constant Nymph, in which she originated the role of Paulina Sanger during its run from December 1926 through April 1927. In 1929 she appeared in The Nut Farm, playing Agatha Sliscomb. The following year she joined the original production of Elizabeth the Queen as a Lady-in-Waiting, a run that lasted from November 1930 through March 1931. In January 1938 she appeared in two simultaneous revivals: Pygmalion, in which she played Mrs. Higgins, and Captain Jinks of the Horse Marines, in which she played Mrs. Jinks. Her final Broadway credit was The World We Make, where she played Head Nurse and Neighbor during its run from November 1939 through January 1940. Her stage work also took her abroad, including a tour with a troupe that traveled through Africa in 1928.

In 1930, Fox executive Winfield Sheehan signed Huntington to a studio contract after seeing her perform in New York. Her film work encompassed both silent productions and early sound pictures. She appeared in The Viking in 1931, directed by Varick Frissell and George Melford, in which she played Mary Joe. The film holds the distinction of being the first Canadian-produced film to incorporate sound. During additional location shooting for the production, director Frissell, cinematographer Alexander G. Penrod, and nearly the entire film crew were killed on March 15, 1931, when the sealing ship SS Viking exploded in ice off the Horse Islands on the northern Newfoundland coast; Huntington was not present on that day. Also in 1931, she appeared in Three Rogues, directed by Benjamin Stoloff and co-starring Fay Wray, playing Bronco's girl; Fair Warning, directed by Alfred L. Werker and co-starring George O'Brien, in which she played Kate Cumberland; and The Man Who Came Back, directed by Raoul Walsh, in which she played Clarice.

Later in her life, Huntington continued to perform on stage and television and worked as a theater director. She acted in commercials into her eighties. She was first married to Robert Roberts, from whom she later divorced. Her second husband, Sydney Houston, died in the mid-1970s. She had two daughters, Lynn Roberts Roalsen and Diana Huntington Lejuez. Huntington died in Summit, New Jersey, in 1997.