Here is the biography of Helen Amelia Gilbert:
Helen Amelia Gilbert was born into a musical family, with her father, Vaughn Gilbert, owning a music store where she played various instruments as a child. She was inspired by Pablo Casals and went on to study the cello, winning a scholarship to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. After graduating, she became a concert artist, performing at various locations, but it was while performing at the Hollywood Bowl that she was discovered by Herbert Stothart and given a seat in his MGM orchestra.
In 1936, she married the assistant musical director at Columbia, Mischa Bakaleinikoff, in Tijuana, Mexico. Two years later, while her orchestra was recording for the upcoming musical Sweethearts (1938),director Fred M. Wilcox spotted her and her acting career began.
Her first role was as Miss Rose Meredith, Andy Hardy's high school "crush" and drama teacher in Andy Hardy Gets Spring Fever (1939). She soon separated from her husband and began an affair with Lew Ayres. She responded to gossip columnists that they were just "good pals who happen to be working on the same picture," The Secret of Dr. Kildare (1939).
In November, she won an uncontested divorce from Bakeleinkoff on charges that he was rude to her and her friends. She was next spotted with Howard Hughes at the annual Motion Picture Guild Christmas charity party. Over the next two years, she was seen everywhere by columnists, accompanied by a host of gentlemen friends.
As her acting career waned, her notoriety grew due to her affairs, marriages, separations, and divorces. She was touted as "the new personality" in the trailer for the upcoming Dr. Kildare film, but as film historian David J. Hogan writes, "In the eyes of MGM Chief Louis B. Mayer, a contract actress who associated with Hughes was foolish and probably not deserving of star treatment."
Helen's subsequent marriages were to Seymour J. Chotiner, whom she married in March 1942, and Victor Makzoume, whom she married in 1944. Her marriage to Makzoume was marked by scandal and tragedy, as he died of a heart attack in Rome in 1948. Helen was granted an allowance of $650 pending the distribution of Makzoume's estate, and she eventually inherited half of it.
After her marriage to Makzoume, Helen married Johnny Stompanato, a bodyguard and money man for Mickey Cohen, in 1949. The marriage was marked by domestic violence, and Stompanato was eventually killed by Lana Turner's daughter in 1958.
Helen married James E. Durant, the Flamingo Hotel casino manager, in 1950, but the marriage was marked by violence and eventually ended in divorce. She married her seventh and final husband, H. O. Bryant, in 1952, and the two remained married until his death in 1987.
Helen's film career was marked by a series of flops, including Thief of Damascus (1952) and Girls in Prison (1956). She made her final film appearance in The She-Creature (1956) and then retired from acting. She died in 1995, at the age of 76, due to cardiac arrest.
