Ann Dvorak Q&A with Biographer Christina Rice Pt.1

Ann Dvorak

Ann Dvorak: Hollywood’s Forgotten Rebel – Introduction

Inevitably, my first question is, Why Ann Dvorak?

I’ve definitely been asked that more than once! I rented Three on a Match around 1995 and was blown away by Ann Dvorak in it. She projected so much nervous raw energy, and even though the film was made during the pre-Code era I was still caught off guard by how edgy her performance was. I subsequently watched Scarface and G Men, not realizing Ann was in either one, and was impressed enough to try to find out more about her.

I soon realized that no writer had really delved deep into her life or career, and that most of her films were not readily available. I also realized that since she was relatively obscure, I could afford to collect vintage posters from her films, even though I was a starving college student at the time. Two phrases that accurately describe my personality are "obsessive researcher" and "compulsive collector," so Ann Dvorak has been a perfect outlet for both these traits. Still, I would have never thought that a dozen or so years after that initial viewing I would find myself running a tribute website, writing a biography, getting married on an estate she built, and amassing a memorabilia collection that includes over 150 vintage posters and close to 900 original photos.

I had no idea that Ann Dvorak was silent film actress Anna Lehr’s daughter — until I saw that info on your website. What was their relationship like?

I get the impression that like a lot of mother/daughter relationships, Ann and her mom tended to drive each other nuts, but were still very close. Anna Lehr strikes me as kind of melodramatic — she was a silent film actress after all — and a bit overbearing, which may at least partially explain why a 20-year-old Ann married a man she barely knew and got the heck out of her mother’s house. Later on, Dvorak supported Lehr financially until they became estranged when Ann’s third husband came into the picture. Ultimately, they were still very reliant on each other.

I was fortunate enough to acquire two separate collections of correspondence from the 1960s. One set is written by Lehr to a cousin, the other by Dvorak to a friend. They both talk about each other quite a bit and these letters paint a vivid picture of what their relationship was like, which I will be able to explore in greater detail in the biography. Anna Lehr has turned out to be such an interesting character that I also want to devote some space in the book to her vaudeville and silent film career.

Now, Ann Dvorak doesn’t sound "American" — I mean, unlike most easily pronounceable, Anglo-sounding star names of the studio era (e.g., Emmanuel Goldenberg became Edward G. Robinson, Margarita Cansino became Rita Hayworth, Melvyn Hesselberg became Melvyn Douglas, and so on). Where does that name come from (Ann Dvorak was born Anna McKim) — and how come she managed to keep it?

Ann supposedly got the name Dvorak from her mother’s side of the family. Some sources over the years have said that it was her mother’s maiden name, but Lehr was indeed Anna’s surname, though it was originally spelled Lajer. The name Dvorak is of Czech origin and the Lehr family did immigrate from that area, so it could exist somewhere on the family tree.

When Ann was hired by MGM in 1929, she actually worked under her mom’s name. As her days at Metro were winding down, she started going by "Ann Dvorak," although the snipe on the back of a publicity photo in my collection spells it "Devorak." When she signed with Howard Hughes‘ Caddo Company, she signed the agreement "D’Vorak," so she was still playing around with the spelling. I have some early clippings stating that Howard Hughes was going to change it to something less complicated, but he ultimately decided that she could keep it. The correct pronunciation is supposed to be vor-shak, but it has always been commonly pronounced da-vor-ak, in reference to Ann. She was always irritated by the mispronunciation.