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| Birth Name(s) : Constance Frances Marie Ockleman |
Date of Birth: November 14, 1919 |
| Status:
Married
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Partner:
Robert Carleton-Munro |
| Profession:
Actor |
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Full Veronica Lake Biography
Veronica Lake was born in Brooklyn, New York on November 14, 1919 with the birth name of Constance Frances Marie Ockleman. Her father worked for an oil company as a ship employee. While still a child, Veronica's parents moved to Florida when she wasn't quite a year old. By the time she was five, the family had returned to Brooklyn. She was expose to acting early when she starred in a primary school play. It was to be her only stage outing, at least for a while.
By the time Veronica had graduated from high school in Miami, she was already known as one of the local Miami beauties. She felt that she was ready for films. Her mother and step-father moved to a small home in Beverly Hills, California in 1938 where Mrs. Keane enrolled her lovely daughter in the well known Bliss Hayden School of Acting in Hollywood. She didn't have to wait long for a part to come her way. Her first movie was as one of the many coeds in the RKO film, Sorority House (1939) in 1939. It was a minor part, to be sure, but it was a start.
Veronica quickly followed up that project with two other films. All Women Have Secrets (1939) and Dancing Co-Ed (1939), both in 1939, were again bit roles for the pretty young woman from the East Coast, but she didn't complain. After all, other would-be starlets took a while before they ever received a bit part. Veronica continued her schooling, in 1940, while taking a bit roles in two more films, Young as You Feel (1940) and Forty Little Mothers (1940). Prior to this time, she was still under her natural name of Constance Keane. Now, with a better role in 1941's I Wanted Wings (1941), she was asked to change her name and Veronica Lake was born. Now, instead of playing coeds, she had a decent, speaking part. Veronica felt like an actress. The film was a success and the public loved this bright newcomer. Paramount, the studio she was under contract with, then assigned her to two more films that year, Hold Back the Dawn (1941) and Sullivan's Travels (1941).
From 1952 to 1966, Veronica made television appearances and even tried her hand at the stage. Not a lot of success for her at all. By now alcohol was the order of the day. She was down on her luck and drank heavily. In 1962, Veronica was found living in an old hotel and working as a bartender. She, finally, returned to the big screen in 1966 in Footsteps in the Snow (1966). Another drought ensued and she appeared on the silver screen for the last time in 1970's Flesh Feast (1970) - a very low budget film. On July 7, 1973, Veronica died of hepatitis in Burlington, Vermont. The beautiful actress with the long blonde hair was dead at the age of 53. |
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Additional Veronica Lake Biography
Her success was fleeting. Following a string of broken marriages and long struggles with mental illness and alcoholism, she died almost destitute.
Veronica Lake was born Constance Frances Marie Ockelman in Brooklyn, New York on November 14, 1922. Her father, Harry E. Ockelman, of German-Dutch descent, worked for an oil company onboard a ship. When she was about one year old, the family moved to Florida but returned to Brooklyn before she was five. Her father died in an industrial explosion in Philadelphia in 1932 when she was 9. Her mother (née Constance Charlotta Trimble) married family friend Anthony Keane, a newspaper staff artist, a year later, and Ockelman began using his last name.
Connie was sent to an all-girls Catholic boarding school in Montreal, Canada, which she hated. The Keane family later moved to Miami, Florida. Constance Keane attended high school in Miami, where she was known for her beauty. She had a troubled childhood and was allegedly diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic during her teenage years, although no records exist to verify this diagnosis.
In 1938, Keane moved with her mother and step-father to Beverly Hills, California, where her mother enrolled Keane in the celebrated Bliss-Hayden School of Acting at the Beverly Hills Playhouse. Her first appearance on screen was for RKO, playing a small role among several coeds in the 1939 film, Sorority House. Similar roles followed, including All Women Have Secrets and Dancing Co-Ed.
During the making of Sorority House, director John Farrow first noticed how her hair always covered her right eye, creating an air of mystery about her and enhancing her natural beauty. She was then introduced to the Paramount producer Arthur Hornblow Jr. He changed her name to Veronica Lake because, "hen I think about Veronica, I think about classic, and ... beauty is a classical beauty", and the surname suited her blue eyes.
Her contract was subsequently dropped by RKO. She married art director John S. Detlie in 1940. Another small role in the comedy, Forty Little Mothers, brought unexpected attention. In 1941, she was signed to a long term contract with Paramount Pictures. On August 21, she gave birth to a daughter, Elaine Detlie.
I Married a Witch was a hit. Co-star Fredric March, probably annoyed by her impatience with his need for multiple takes for many of their scenes together, started calling the movie "I married a bitch" and refused to talk about the experience or work with her again.Lake with frequent collaborator Alan Ladd
A stray lock of her shoulder-length blonde hair during a publicity photo shoot led to her iconic peekaboo hairstyle, which hid one eye, and was widely imitated. During World War II, she changed her trademark image to encourage women working in war industry factories to adopt more practical, safer hairstyles.
Although widely popular with the public, Lake had a complex personality and acquired a reputation for being difficult to work with. Eddie Bracken, her co-star in Star Spangled Rhythm (1942), was quoted as saying "he was known as 'The Bitch' and she deserved the title." In that movie, Lake took part in a song lampooning her hair style, "A Sweater, A Sarong and a Peekaboo Bang", performed with Dorothy Lamour and Paulette Goddard, although some of Lake's vocals were dubbed.
Nevertheless, Lake was making $4,500 per week under her contract with Paramount when she married director André de Toth in 1944. Their son, her third child, André Michael de Toth III, was born October 25, 1945. Lake is said to have begun drinking more heavily during this period and people began refusing to work with her.
Paramount cast Lake in a string of mostly forgotten films. A notable exception was The Blue Dahlia (1946) in which she again co-starred with Alan Ladd (who reportedly was also less than fond of her). During filming, author Raymond Chandler referred to her as "Moronica Lake". Paramount decided not to renew her contract in 1948.
A reporter found her working as a barmaid at the all women's Martha Washington Hotel in Manhattan. At first, Veronica claimed that she was a guest at the hotel and covering for a friend. Soon afterward, she admitted that she was employed at the bar. The reporter's widely distributed story led to some television and stage appearances. In 1966, she had a brief stint as a TV hostess in Baltimore, Maryland, along with a largely ignored film role in Footsteps in the Snow.
She published her autobiography Veronica amid much publicity and positive reviews. With the proceeds, Lake co-produced and starred in her last film, Flesh Feast (1970), a very low budget horror movie with a Nazi-myth storyline.
She then moved to the UK, where she had a short-lived marriage with "English sea captain" Robert Carleton-Munro before returning to the U.S. in 1973, having filed for divorce. Lake was immediately hospitalized and although she is said to have made a cheerful and positive impression on the nurses who cared for her, she was apparently estranged from her three surviving children. She had no guests or visitors and was destitute again.
Lake was 50 when she died of hepatitis and acute renal failure (complications of her alcoholism) near Burlington, Vermont. Her ashes were scattered off the Virgin Islands.
Lake has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6918 Hollywood Boulevard for her contributions to the motion picture industry. |
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| You could put all the talent I had into your left eye and still not suffer from impaired vision. |
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