Mary Murphy was a talented actress who spent nearly two decades in the film industry, but her most notable role remains her iconic performance as the "good girl" who redeems Marlon Brando's tough biker in the cult classic The Wild One (1953). Born on January 26, 1931, in Washington D.C., Murphy moved to Cleveland, Ohio, with her family six months later, where her father, James, a businessman, died in 1940. Her mother eventually relocated the family to Southern California, where Murphy attended University High School in the Los Angeles area, graduating in 1949.
After a stint as a sales associate at Saks Fifth Avenue in Beverly Hills, Murphy was "discovered" at a café and signed by Paramount Studios. She began her film career with insignificant bit and extra work in movies such as The Lemon Drop Kid (1951),My Favorite Spy (1951),When Worlds Collide (1951),and The Greatest Show on Earth (1952).
Murphy's breakthrough role came when she won the female lead opposite Tommy Morton in the show business drama Main Street to Broadway (1953). Although the film was ill-received, Murphy's performance opposite Marlon Brando in The Wild One (1953) earned her recognition as a talented actress. She continued to work in films throughout the 1950s, including The Mad Magician (1954),Sitting Bull (1954),Beachhead (1954),A Man Alone (1955),Hell's Island (1955),and The Desperate Hours (1955).
Murphy's personal life was marked by a tumultuous marriage to Dale Robertson, which was annulled by Christmas time in 1956. She remarried in 1962 and retired from acting by the late 1970s. Murphy turned her attention to environmental causes and worked in a Los Angeles art gallery. She died on May 4, 2011, of heart disease, in Beverly Hills.
