Miracle Girl
(American Magazine, circa 1943) A year ago, Jennifer Jones was a stage-struck girl living in a two-room walk-up in New York with her husband, two babies, a puppy, and a parrot. Then one day she read Franz Werfel's moving novel, The Song of Bernadette, true story of the simple French girl who became a saint. When she put the book aside, Jennifer knew that Bernadette was the dramatic role she had been born to play. About the same time, a producer at Twentieth Century-Fox, in Hollywood, also read the story of Bernadette. He saw in it as one of the great film dramas of all time. But where was the actress worthy of the part? She must be young, talented, unsophisticated, no movie glamour queen. So the studio began a search for an unknown, and it was a Hollywood miracle when Jennifer Jones, one among 2,000 applicants, was chosen. Jennifer was the only person who had known all along how it would come out. "One of my premonitions," she calls it. Now, instead of a two-room apartment, she and her husband live in a house in Bel Air, where there's plenty of space for her two boys, age 3 and 2. Winner of the most coveted role of the year, Jennifer still squeezes her own orange juice and mends her own dresses, as the pictures on these pages show. |
Jennifer had her first premonition at the age of six, when she told her father she was going to be an actress. He let her study elocution and dramatics in school, and hoped the acting ambition would wear off. But when Jennifer left Monte Cassino Junior College, run by the Bendictine Sisters, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, she joined a traveling stock company and got her first taste of real trouping.
The company roamed over Oklahoma and Texas, carrying their worldly goods - a tent, scenery, and some benches - in a truck. They stopped in each town as long as there were enough people sitting on the benches.
The company roamed over Oklahoma and Texas, carrying their worldly goods - a tent, scenery, and some benches - in a truck. They stopped in each town as long as there were enough people sitting on the benches.
Jennifer's salary was $10 a week plus expenses. Before the curtain went up she sold tickets, or stood behind the candy counter at the door. In many of the towns they played in, the audience had never seen a stage show before. They cheered the hero and hissed the villain, and kids sneaked backstage and poked the actors to see if they were real. Jennifer's favorite drama was Smilin' Through, in which she died dramatically amid a storm of tears from the crowd.
After a year with the tent show, Jennifer knew she was always going to be an actress. She persuaded Papa, who was also convinced by this time, to send her to Northwestern Univeristy, in Evanston, Ill., to study dramatics. Then she struck out for New York. But instead of seeing her name in lights on Broadway, she found herself acting in a tiny theater in downtown Greenwich Village. It was there that she met Bob Walker, a young radio actor now also working in pictures. They were married, and while each of her two babies was born, Jennifer's stage career took an intermission. In between babies, she modeled for photographers.
She's very proud of Bob, Jr., 3 and Michael, 2 but the studio, for reasons of its own, wants her to appear single. That's why no picture has ever been taken of the Walker family together.
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After a year with the tent show, Jennifer knew she was always going to be an actress. She persuaded Papa, who was also convinced by this time, to send her to Northwestern Univeristy, in Evanston, Ill., to study dramatics. Then she struck out for New York. But instead of seeing her name in lights on Broadway, she found herself acting in a tiny theater in downtown Greenwich Village. It was there that she met Bob Walker, a young radio actor now also working in pictures. They were married, and while each of her two babies was born, Jennifer's stage career took an intermission. In between babies, she modeled for photographers.
She's very proud of Bob, Jr., 3 and Michael, 2 but the studio, for reasons of its own, wants her to appear single. That's why no picture has ever been taken of the Walker family together.
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