Estelle Taylor

Taylor in 1920.

Taylor made her Broadway stage début in George V. Hobart's Come-On, Charlie,[23] which opened on April 8, 1919 at 48th Street Theatre in New York City.[24] The story was about a shoe clerk who has a dream in which he inherits one million dollars and must make another million within six months.[25] It was not a great success and closed after sixteen weeks.[19] Taylor, the only person in the play who wore red beads, was praised by a New York City critic who wrote, "The only point of interest in the show was the girl with the red beads."[19] During the play's run, producer Adolph Klauber saw Taylor's performance and said to the play's leading actress Aimee Lee Dennis: "You know, I think Miss Taylor should go into motion pictures. That's where her greatest future lies. Her dark eyes would screen excellently."[19] Dennis told Taylor what Klauber said, and Taylor began looking for work in films.[19] With the help of J. Gordon Edwards, she got a small role in the film A Broadway Saint (1919).[19] She was hired by the Vitagraph Company for a role with Corinne Griffith in The Tower of Jewels (1920), and also played William Farnum's leading lady in The Adventurer (1920) for the Fox Film Corporation.[19]

One of Taylor's early successes was in 1920 in Fox's While New York Sleeps with Marc McDermott. Charles Brabin directed the film, and Taylor and McDermott play three sets of characters in different time periods. This film was lost for decades, but has been recently discovered and screened at a film festival in Los Angeles. Her next film for Fox, Blind Wives (1920),[26] was based on Edward Knoblock's play My Lady's Dress and reteamed her with director Brabin and co-star McDermott. William Fox then sent her to Fox Film's Hollywood studios to play a supporting role in a Tom Mix film.[26] Just before she boarded the train for Hollywood, Brabin gave her some advice: "Don't think of supporting Mix in that play. Don't play in program pictures. Never play anything but specials. Mr. Fox is about to put on Monte Cristo. You should play the part of Mercedes. Concentrate on that role and when you get to Los Angeles, see that you play it."[26]

Taylor traveled with her mother, her canary bird, and her bull terrier, Winkle.[26] She was excited about playing Mercedes and reread Alexandre Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo on the train.[26] When she arrived in Hollywood, she reported to Fox Studios and introduced herself to director Emmett J. Flynn, who gave her a copy of the script, but warned her that he already had another actress in mind for the role.[26] Flynn offered her another part in the film, but she insisted on playing Mercedes and after much conversation was cast in the role.[26] John Gilbert played Edmond Dantès in the film, which was eventually titled Monte Cristo (1922). Taylor later said that she, "saw then that he [Gilbert] had every requisite of a splendid actor."[26] The New York Herald critic wrote, "Miss Taylor was as effective in the revenge section of the film as she was in the first or love part of the screened play. Here is a class of face that can stand a close-up without becoming a mere speechless automaton."[27]

Fox also cast her as Gilda Fontaine, a "vamp", in the 1922 remake of the 1915 Fox production A Fool There Was,[26] the film that made Theda Bara a star. Robert E. Sherwood of Life magazine gave it a mixed review and observed: "Times and movies have changed materially since then [1915]. The vamp gave way to the baby vamp some years back, and the latter has now been superseded by the flapper. It was therefore a questionable move on Mr. Fox's part to produce a revised version of A Fool There Was in this advanced age."[28] She played a Russian princess in the film Bavu (1923),[26] a Universal Pictures production with Wallace Beery as the villain and Forrest Stanley as her leading man.

Taylor as Moses' sister Miriam in The Ten Commandments (1923)

One of her most memorable roles is that of Miriam, the sister of Moses (portrayed by Theodore Roberts), in the biblical prologue of Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments (1923), one of the most successful films of the silent era. Her performance in the DeMille film was considered a great acting achievement.[26] Taylor's younger sister, Helen, was hired by Sid Grauman to play Miriam in the Egyptian Theatre's onstage prologue to the film.[29][30]

Taylor as Mary, Queen of Scots, from Stars of the Photoplay (1924)

Despite being ill with arthritis, she won the supporting role of Mary, Queen of Scots in Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall (1924), starring Mary Pickford. "I've since wondered if my long illness did not, in some measure at least, make for realism in registering the suffering of the unhappy and tormented Scotch queen," she told a reporter in 1926.[26]

In 1925, she and her husband Jack Dempsey starred in an American silent drama film, a cowboy movie titled "Manhattan Madness" directed by John McDermott. It was produced by Fine Arts Pictures and distributed through Associated Exhibitors.

She played Lucrezia Borgia in Don Juan (1926), Warner Bros.' first feature-length film with synchronized Vitaphone sound effects and musical soundtrack. The film also starred John Barrymore, Mary Astor and Warner Oland. Variety praised her characterization of Lucrezia: "The complete surprise is the performance of Estelle Taylor as Lucretia [sic] Borgia. Her Lucretia is a fine piece of work. She makes it sardonic in treatment, conveying precisely the woman Lucretia is presumed to have been."[31]

She was to have co-starred in a film with Rudolph Valentino, but he died just before production was to begin.[32] One of her last silent films was New York (1927), featuring Ricardo Cortez and Lois Wilson.[33]

In 1928, she and husband Dempsey starred in a Broadway play titled The Big Fight, loosely based around Dempsey's boxing popularity, which ran for 31 performances at the Majestic Theatre.[34]

She made a successful transition to sound films or "talkies." Her first sound film was the comical sketch Pusher in the Face (1929).[6]

Notable sound films in which she appeared include Street Scene (1931), with Sylvia Sidney; the Academy Award for Best Picture-winning Cimarron (1931), with Richard Dix and Irene Dunne; and Call Her Savage (1932), with Clara Bow.

Taylor returned to films in 1944 with a small part in the Jean Renoir drama The Southerner (released in 1945), playing what journalist Erskine Johnson described as "a bar fly with a roving eye. There's a big brawl and she starts throwing beer bottles."[35] Johnson was delighted with Taylor's reappearance in the film industry: "[Interviewing] Estelle was a pleasant surprise. The lady is as beautiful and as vivacious as ever, with the curves still in the right places."[35] The Southerner was her last film.

Taylor married three times, but never had children. In 1911 at aged 17,[22] she married a bank cashier named Kenneth Malcolm Peacock, the son of a prominent Wilmington businessman.[21] They lived together for five years[22] and then separated so she could pursue her acting career in New York.[21] Taylor later claimed the marriage was annulled.[35] In August 1924, the press mentioned Taylor's engagement to boxer and world heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey.[36] In September, Peacock announced he would sue Taylor for divorce on the ground of desertion.[22] He denied he would name Dempsey as co-respondent, saying "If she wants to marry Dempsey, it is all right with me."[22] Taylor was granted a divorce from Peacock on January 9, 1925.[37][38]

Taylor and Dempsey were married on February 7, 1925 at First Presbyterian Church in San Diego, California.[39] They lived in Los Feliz, Los Angeles. Her marriage to Dempsey ended in divorce in 1931.

Her third husband was theatrical producer Paul Small. Of her last husband and their marriage, she said: "We have been friends and Paul has managed my stage career for five years, so it seemed logical that marriage should work out for us, but I'm afraid I'll have to say that the reason it has not worked out is incompatibility."[40]

In her later years, Taylor devoted her free time to her pets and was known for her work as an animal rights activist. "Whenever the subject of compulsory rabies inoculation or vivisection came up," wrote the United Press, "Miss Taylor was always in the fore to lead the battle against the measure."[41] She was the president and founder of the California Pet Owners' Protective League,[5][6] an organization that focused on finding homes for pets to prevent them from going to local animal shelters.[42] In 1953, Taylor was appointed to the Los Angeles City Animal Regulation Commission,[6] which she served as vice president.[5]