Marilyn Miller by Ferenc of Vienna

After an early start in vaudeville, working in a family act, Marilyn Miller (Mary Ellen Reynolds, 1898-1936) became a star in the 1918 ZIEGFELD FOLLIES portraying the producer’s wife, Billie Burke, and singing “Mine Was a Marriage of Convenience.” In the 1919 FOLLIES, she sang Irving Berlin’s “Mandy”; and with SALLY (1920), where she performed Jerome Kern’s “Look for the Silver Lining,” she was further memorialized in Dorothy Parker’s verse:

From the alley's gloom and chill

Up to fame danced Sally.

Which was nice for her, but still

Rough upon the alley.

How it must regret her wiles.

All her ways and glances. 

Now the theatre owns her smiles, 

Sallies, songs, and dances.