Singer and actress Alice Faye turned 23 today, and though a singer, could not read a note of music. (The greats of that time – Irving Berlin, George Gershwin and Cole Porter held her talent in high esteem).
At fourteen, she ran off to try out as a chorus girl, but was turned away as too young. She eventually got on as a dancer, and through a fluke her singing came to the attention of Rudy Vallee, and wound up on the radio. Through her connection to him she landed at Fox and continued there through the Zanuck regime.
She married another singer and actor, Tony Martin, in 1937. They eloped to Yuma Arizona so it was a small wedding. But they made up for it in the film Sally, Irene and Mary, (which opened in March 1938), when their characters wed on screen.
Her brother Bill Faye (who took her stage name too) was her business manager, before then he was an investment banker in NY. Her triumphs in two other 1938 films – In Old Chicago and Alexander’s Ragtime Band made her Queen of the Fox lot.
Ahead in 1939, she would appear in Tail Spin, Rose of Washington Square, Hollywood Cavalcade, and Barricade.