Dorothy Leeds — And I Follow!

Just some scraps on chorus girl and actress Dorothy Leeds, whose name I came across in Marjorie Farnsworth’sZiegfeld Follies book.

Her first credit is the 1915 Vitagraph film The Awakening with Anita Stewart and Earle Williams, directed by Ralph Ince.  This suggest to me that she is from the greater NYC area, Vitagraph having been located in Brooklyn. She next appeared in the Broadway shows Step this Way (1916), Dance and Grow Thin (1917), the Ziegfeld Follies of 1917 and 1918, and Ziegfeld’s Nine O’Clock Review (1919), then a revival of Floradora (1920), and finally Raymond Hitchcock’s Hitchy-Koo (1920), in which she was singled out in ads as the “Prettiest Girl” in the show. After this she returns to films. She co-stars in two Johnny Hines shorts, Torchy in High (1920) and Torchy Turns Cupid (1920). She then plays a smaller role in the Johnny Hines feature Burn ’em Up Barnes (1921), her last credit. Those are the known facts.

Then she vanishes! I have my theories. I see from 1940 census data that a Dorothy Leeds lived in Brooklyn with her family, including a son who would be about the right age to have been born around the time of her last credits. This Dorothy Leeds is married to a Harry Leeds. And there was a Harry Leeds who had an act in vaudeville, burlesque and music hall with Trixie Le Mar, although that pair were from Australia. But they also played the States — maybe he stayed.

One wonders, as well, if she was related to Flo Leeds, i.e. Mrs. Florence Helena Lincoln Leeds, who’d also been in the Follies and in The Century Girl and played a role in the scandalous ten year divorce ordeal between National City Bank chairman James A. Stillman and his wife Fifi. (Leeds bore Stillman’s illegitimate son.)

At any rate, the Dorothy Leeds in the 1940 Census also says she is from Connecticut and that her cousin Frank Courtney is living with the family. I started to idly wonder if he was related the Courtney Sisters (one of whom was also named Florence) but then I remembered that their real name was Grismer and they were from Texas. Sometimes we can get carried away.

Anyway, it all made for a savory soup of speculation over my morning tub of espresso. If anyone knows the real facts feel free to share them and we’ll substitute reality for fantasy where appropriate.