Beverly Roberts, Bogart co-star, dies at age 96

Beverly Roberts, Bogart co-star, dies at age 96


Friday, July 17, 2009


The Laguna Niguel resident starred with Humphrey Bogart.

By PAUL HODGINS
The Orange County Register



Beverly Roberts, who appeared with a young Humphrey Bogart in the 1936 film Two Against the World died Monday in Laguna Niguel. She was 95. Her second cousin Christina Baker told AP that Roberts died at her home of natural causes.


Born in Brooklyn on May 14, 1914, Roberts began her career as a stage actress and singer. She was spotted by a Warner Bros. talent scout during a performance at a New York nightclub. A Warner Bros. contract player beginning in 1935, Roberts made her first film, "The Singing Kid," with Al Jolson in 1936.

She also appeared with Bogart and Pat O'Brien in "China Clipper" and with Errol Flynn and Joan Blondell in "Perfect Specimen."

In 1937 Roberts starred in her most famous film, "God's Country and the Woman," Warner Bros. first Technicolor production. It was one of 16 movies she made between 1937 and 1939.

After leaving Warner Bros. in 1940, Roberts toured the country as a singer with the Dorsey Brothers band. A committed actress, she studied under the famed Maria Ouspenskaya and returned to the stage in the 1940s.

In 1950, Roberts became administrator of Theater Authority, an umbrella organization for five theater unions, a post she held for 25 years. In her later years she worked in watercolor painting.

Roberts moved to Laguna Niguel in 1977. She was featured in the 2000 documentary "I Used to Be in Pictures." In 2002, Roberts was honored at the Del Mar Theater in Santa Cruz and the Cinecon Film Festival in Hollywood.

Roberts never married and had no children.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.