Mala Powers
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Mary Ellen "Mala" Powers (December 20, 1931 – June 11, 2007) was an American film actress.
She was born in San Francisco, California. In 1940 her family moved to Los Angeles. Her father was an executive with United Press. In the summer of her relocation, Powers attended the Max Reinhardt Junior Workshop where she enjoyed her first role in a play before a live audience. She continued with her drama lessons, and a year later she auditioned and won a part in the 1942 Dead End Kids film Tough as They Come.
At the age of 16 she began working in radio drama, before becoming a film actress in 1950. Her first roles were in Outrage and Edge of Doom in 1950. That same year, Stanley Kramer signed Powers to star opposite Jose Ferrer in what may be her most remembered role as Roxane in Cyrano de Bergerac. She was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for her part in this movie.
While on a USO entertainment tour in Korea in 1951, she acquired a blood disease and almost died. She was treated with chloromycetin, but a severe allergic reaction resulted in the loss of much of her bone marrow. Powers barely survived the experience, and her recovery took nearly nine months.
She began working again in 1952 and 1953, including a part in City Beneath the Sea and City that Never Sleeps, although she was still taking medication. Following her recovery she appeared in a series of B-movie westerns and sci-fi films. Among these were The Colossus of New York, Flight of the Lost Balloon, and Doomsday Machine.
She appeared on over 100 TV shows, including episodes of Maverick, Wild Wild West and Perry Mason, and she co-starred opposite Anthony Quinn in the TV movie The Man and the City.
She was married to Monte Vanton in 1954, but they later divorced; they had a son, Toren Vanton, who survived his mother. Powers remarried in 1970 to M. Hughes Miller, a book publisher. Shortly before her death from complications of leukemia in 2007, aged 75, she had been on a lecture tour at universities. She was a master teacher for the past 14 years in the summer program at the University of Southern Maine for the Michael Chekhov Theatre Institute, training actors and teachers of acting. Powers was the Executrix of the Michael Chekhov Estate and instrumental in publishing On the Technique of Acting, To the Actor, and The Path of the Actor, books all written by Micheal Chekhov.
She was Patron of the Michael Chekhov Studio London and had a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
[edit] References
- Tom Weaver, Science Fiction Stars and Horror Heroes, 1991, McFarland & Company, Inc., ISBN 0-89950-594-5.
