This is a guest posting by fellow people-finder, Frank Reighter.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jeanie Roberts, the giggling/hiccuping nurse in 1934's Academy Award nominated Three Stooges short "Men in Black", has been searched for by Ed Shifres, Bill Cappello and myself, for many years. We have found out what happened to her!
Jeanie (Jeanne) Roberts
She was born in California as Muriel J. Roberts, June 3, 1913, to Cyrus E. Roberts and Muriel Fulcher Roberts. She made 13 films (according to IMDB), beginning with "Men in Black" in 1934, and ending with "Dangerous Holiday" in 1937.
In December, 1936, she married Henry Moeller, Jr., a mortician. According to IMDB, she "Drove from Santa Monica to San Bernardino in an undertaker's ambulance to wed Henry...". She never appeared publicly as Jeanie Roberts again. It was always as Mrs. Henry Moeller. Nothing is known about what happened to the marriage, but when Henry G. Moeller died Feb. 4, 1988, his wife at that time, was Bonnie Ray Moeller.
Through researching various public documents and finding a newspaper death notice for Jeanie's father Cyrus, who died in 1958, it was discovered that Jeanie had a daughter, Barbara Siracusa, who was the informant on both Jeanie's and Jeanie's mother, Muriel Fulcher Roberts (died in 1982), death certificates. She has not, as yet, been located, and we will try to locate her because she should be able to "fill in the blanks" on Jeanie's life.
Muriel J. (Jeanie) Roberts was last married to W. Gordon Garnett, a successful surgeon, sometime around 1960. As Gini Roberts Garnett, she died April 12, 1971 at St. Vincent's Hospital in Los Angeles. She had lived at 2210 Marino Place, in San Marino, CA. She died at age 57, of bronchopneumonia, with conditions of fatty cirrhosis of the liver and subacute and chronic pancreatitis. She was buried April 16, 1971 at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, CA. According to a family member, only 6 people attended the burial.
Eventually an article with more details of her life may be published.
Below is a video clip of two scenes of Jeanie with The Three Stooges in "Men in Black".
Muriel J. Roberts was born several days before my grandmother was born.
ReplyDeleteWhere can we see more of her movies besides men in black?
ReplyDeleteI just saw her in Girl O' My Dreams (1934) at classiccinemaonline.com (in the comedy listing). There were several other well-known stars including Mary Carlisle, Sterling Holloway, Arthur Lake, and Creighton Chaney (a.k.a. Lon jr.).
ReplyDeleteWhen I saw Jeanie Roberts in "Men In Black" some weeks ago, I was amazed on how her smile just lit up the screen; I just had to know more about her!
ReplyDeleteTwo of her movies can be streamed or downloaded at www.archive.org:
Girl O My Dreams (1934)
http://www.archive.org/details/girl_o_my_dreams
Rich Relations (1937)
http://www.archive.org/details/RichRelations
I hope you're successful in finding out more about Jeanie's life, for I suspect she was a quite remarkable gal!
I always wondered if "Jeanie ever did any voice acting for some of the old Leon Shlesinger/WB cartoons. There were several voices in tose cartoons that sounded a lot like her in MiB!
ReplyDeleteJust saw her in the 1935 film, 'The Murder Man,' with Spencer Tracy. She plays the character, Mabel. What a wonderful voice--bubbly and helium-filled.
ReplyDeleteI just saw that movie TODAY and knew it had to be the "Men in Black" nurse! However, when I went to IMB AND Wikipedia they had listed dome other actress as Spencer Tracy's secretary! How odd I thought.
ReplyDelete