Vintage original 5 x 7 in. US double-weight matte "fan photo" of silent film star MARY PHILBIN c.1927.
She is depicted in a close studio shot with a facsimile of her signature. This "fan photo" was Issued during her association with Universal Pictures and includes the original mailing envelope, on which studio head Carl Laemmle proudly notes: Carl Laemmle Presents Mary Philbin in: Merry-Go-Round; Fool's Highway; The Gaiety Girl; The Rose of Paris; Fifth Avenue Models; The Phantom of the Opera; Stella Maris; Love Me and the World is Mine; and The Crimson Hour.
The "fan photo" is in very fine- condition and the mailing envelope is in good- condition.
*"Mary Loretta Philbin (July 16, 1902 – May 7, 1993) was an American film actress of the silent film era, who played the "beauty" Christine Daaé in the 1925 film The Phantom of the Opera opposite Lon Chaney, and Dea in The Man Who Laughs alongside Conrad Veidt.
Philbin began her acting career after winning a beauty contest sponsored by Universal Pictures in Chicago. After she moved to California, Erich von Stroheim signed her to a contract with Universal, deeming her a "Universal Super Jewel." She made her screen debut in 1921, and the following year was honored at the first WAMPAS Baby Stars awards, a promotional campaign sponsored by the Western Association of Motion Picture Advertisers in the United States, which annually honored young women whom they believed to be on the threshold of movie stardom.
During the 1920s, Philbin starred in a number of high-profile films, most notably in D. W. Griffith's 1928 film Drums of Love. In 1927, she appeared in Edward Sloman's Surrender with Ivan Mosjoukine, though her most celebrated role was in the Universal horror film The Phantom of the Opera in 1925. Philbin's ethereal screen presence was noted in a 1924 edition of Motion Picture Classic, in which she was referred to as "one of the astonishing anomalies of motion pictures. Pat O'Malley once said of her: 'If I were superstitious I would think that the spirit of some great tragedienne of a forgotten past slipped into Mary's soul when she heard the camera begin to click.'
Philbin played a few parts during the early talkie era and most notably dubbed her own voice when The Phantom of the Opera was given sound and re-released. She retired from the screen in 1930 and devoted her life to caring for her aging parents.
Philbin spent the remainder of her life after leaving the film industry as a recluse, living in the same home in Huntington Beach, California. She never married and rarely made public appearances. One rare public appearance by Philbin occurred in her later years at the Los Angeles opening of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical The Phantom of the Opera.
She died of pneumonia at age 90 in 1993 and was buried at the Calvary Cemetery in east Los Angeles, California."
*(source: Wikipedia)
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