Marion Leonard

Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, Marion Leonard began working in live theatre until the age of twenty-seven when she was signed by American Mutoscope and Biograph Company. She made her screen debut in the short film At the Crossroads of Life (1908) directed by Wallace McCutcheon, Jr. (1884–1928) from a screenplay by D. W. Griffith, who also appeared as an actor in this film.

Within a year, she had leading roles, frequently directed by Griffith. At a time when screen credits were not given to actors, she and Florence Auer were the first star actresses to be billed by the studio as a "Biograph Girl". Of her films made at Biograph, thirty-two were with an up-and-coming young actress named Mary Pickford.

Marion Leonard and D. W. Griffith in ‘At the corssroads of life’ (1908)

While working for Biograph, Leonard met screenwriter/director Stanner E.V. Taylor and a personal relationship developed that led to marriage. The two would eventually leave Biograph to make films together for Universal Pictures and other studios and sometimes through their own production company.

Engagement illustration announcement from 1911 published in Motion Picture News

In 1915, after appearing in more than one hundred and fifty films, Marion Leonard retired from film but did return eleven years later at age forty-five for one final appearance in a 1926 Mack Sennett comedy.

Marion Leonard died in 1956 at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, California.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Marion Leonard.

• Marion Leonard at IMDb
• Marion Leonard at Women Film Pioneers Project